Nancy Drew: The Captive Curse - Review

Nancy Drew: The Captive Curse
Rating: E - Everyone

Nancy's latest adventure has her hunting monsters at Castle Funster in Germany. Fun, cute - somewhat predictable (not hard to guess end reveal). Junior version puzzles are easy to moderately difficult but are still necessary to move story along. Zero violence with discussion of three disappearances. Mostly linear with the following exceptions that I ran across:

If I picked up the hidden key behind the sparrow painting before working the tile puzzle box in the alcove near Karl's office or getting trapped between the gates, chasing the monster, it would no longer be in my possession by the time I needed it. It would also no longer be behind the painting so finding it again could not be done.

If you get a monster alert while performing a task, the game may not seem to recognize you have earned that clue to continue. You have to revisit the sequence when you are not interrupted by the monster alert to trigger the game correctly.  I discovered that problem when using the cutout on the book in the alcove and again when trying to open the secret compartment of the clock in the gift shop. The monster alert rendered the alcove clue useless and then again disabled my ability to open the clock.

After those two incidents, I made the connection that a monster alert would affect the game tasks. If I had not been able to finish the task before a monster alert came on I would return to my previous saved point to complete or discover some task in order to make sure it counted.  If there are more burps with that connection, I no longer encountered them because of my backtracking.

Basically, that's it. I enjoyed the game. Most puzzles were fun. One in particular would completely reset to a new starting combination each time I had to begin over, which was challenging. I like the setting, the graphics and the music. It was well done.

$19.99 from www.herinteractive.com


Fun Factor: As always - Drew comes through
Female Factor: Oops – Nancy' boyfriend is feeling neglected
Player Friendly: Strong linearity can cause problems

Reviewed by: Adison Garzon - Jul/11

  • Nancy Drew: The Captive Curse
  • © Her Interactive
  • Platform(s): W7 Vista XP OSX