Nancy Drew® Dossier: Lights, Camera, Curses!

It's not like the other Nancy Drew Games, but it is a really fun one. The different format and how it is played is a nice way to kick back and have fun with it.

The 'Dossier' entries focus heavily on Hidden Object Game mechanics compared to the mainline entries in the franchise. Many view them as weaker games due to this. This one's story is quite derivative too.

love the minigames, particularly the smoothie one

Pretty easy and fun game

fun, interasting, the timed mini games are a little nerve wracking but managable

Lights Camera Curses is my #1 favorite Nancy Drew game of all time. I know that sounds WILD when you put it up against 33 Nancy Drew adventure games. My TLDR if you don't want to read my rant below is: BUY THIS GAME. It's a great introduction into the Nancy Drew video games, it's fantastic for beginners, the arcade games give it more replay value, and the "hidden object" aspect of the game is clever. As for the more in-depth review, let's continue! Nancy Drew: Lights Camera Curses (LCC) came out in 2008. This was around the same time that HeR Interactive was working on Haunting of Castle Malloy and Phantom of Venice. It's mind boggling to me that HeR was able to develop this game while also working on TWO Nancy Drew games at the same time. Especially for how small the company and the development team was at the time. LCC is based on an older HeR title named "Cody Capers" which is no longer available on the HeR site. In LCC players assume the role of Nancy Drew as she gets called in to find out why accidents are threatening the production of Pharaoh, an Egyptian movie being filmed on top of an older production of Pharaoh that came out in the 1930's. Nancy must interrogate both the modern set and the eerie, underground sets as well as explore the outskirts of the studio including a Casbah in order to figure out more clues of the case. Unlike the adventure games, this is a "hidden object" Nancy Drew game. HOWEVER, it's not really hidden object. What separates this from the HO genre is that this game is more about finding and "combining" objects together logically to create new objects or solve puzzles. For example, if Nancy finds a wrench, she can combine it with a sink pipe to tighten it and get water flowing out of it. Nancy also has her own "actions" that she can use like "Look, Touch, Lock Pick, and flashlight". This reminds me a lot of old school adventure games and it feels like an homage in this game. A good example would be like Thimbleweed Park. The characters in LCC are what really shine through here. Every character in this game is quirky, fun and very interesting to get to know. There's so much fun to be had getting to know them. My favorite character in the game was Molly. She had some really fun dialogue. One thing I love about this game compared to the Nancy Drew adventure games is the dialogue system. I LOVE how the game quizzes your attention skills and makes you select what to say next. This is such an innovative way to create a mystery, by making the player pay attention to details and then have them get quizzed on what they saw. While getting wrong answers don't do anything to Nancy, getting RIGHT answers help improve Nancy's score which unlocks special rewards/achievements/and a secret ending. I also really loved the LCC arcade games. The arcade games must be unlocked in the main story in order to play them. Once you have access to all of them, you can play them anytime. LCC has a lot of replay value for these mini-games. They are really relaxing to play. My favorite arcade games are the bartending and the flashboom. Flashboom reminds me of Doctor Mario. As for critiques on this game, I do have a few: 1. Take a page from Artifex Mundi's book and allow Nancy to go wherever she wants. Connect all the areas with a map, and allow players to freely roam and explore the 2D locations. If a "puzzle" location comes up, allow Nancy to "enter" these puzzles to solve them. 2. Looking and Taking get confusing sometimes. I think this gets resolved in the sequel, but it was confusing trying to decide between looking at an object vs taking it. 3. The notebook was difficult to navigate. I wish the UI of the notebook could've been improved. Especially when you need the notebook to solve some puzzles. Overall, I LOVE this Nancy Drew mystery. It's fun, dark, deep and it's equally for adults, even if the HO genre makes the game look like it's for kids. I would argue that this game actually has a lot of charm and fun to it and in some cases is more inspiring of a game to play than some of the Nancy Drew adventures. If HeR Interactive ever decides to bring this game back, I think they should PORT these to mobile instead. Highly, HIGHLY recommended Nancy Drew game. If you are new to Nancy Drew games, these are a great start. If you are already a fan, then look no further and beat this game!

Quick, mindless puzzles that keep you busy for a couple of hours. Story is pretty fun, but the point and click gets repetitive and droning after a while. A different feel from the full length ND games, but it's nice to have the same voice actress.