[millenia]

Originally Posted by rtrooney

I think there are two Nancy Drew game series. One casual/one adventure.

Oh yeah, now that I think of it there are some HoG type games for DS at least. Haven't played them yet as I think they didn't get much praise in reviews.

[Interplay]

Originally Posted by millenia

Oh yeah, now that I think of it there are some HoG type games for DS at least. Haven't played them yet as I think they didn't get much praise in reviews.

The Nancy Drew casual games are in the "Nancy Drew Dossier" series. They are available on the PC (eg Big Fish). I played the first one and thought it was a solid casual adventure (and very different from the regular Nancy Drew games). They have totally different styles.

[rtrooney]

Finished Emerald City Confidential. A very good, but relatively easy game.

[inm8#2]

There are so many casual games, I don't know where to begin.

Big Fish games probably has thousands of them.

[rtrooney]

Originally Posted by inm8#2

There are so many casual games, I don't know where to begin.

Big Fish games probably has thousands of them.

Maybe not thousands, but many hundreds. First you have to narrow your search. BFG has many types of games, e.g., card games, memory games, match-three games. I assume, though, that you are interested in casual adventure games. Two places to start are games mentioned in this thread, and the casual game review articles which appeared through November of last year.

BFG allows for a liberal demo of every game. You get 60 minutes of free game play, after which you can decide whether or not it is worth purchasing. I just started a demo of Special Enquiry Detail. It was produced by Floodlight Games and is virtually identical to Women's Murder Club games both in style and difficulty. I liked WMC games, but I don't wan't to play another game of the same style, so I deleted it after about 15 minutes of play. It's that simple.

If there is a game you are interested in, post a question. There's a good chance someone here has played it.

[Interplay]

Originally Posted by rtrooney

Maybe not thousands, but many hundreds. First you have to narrow your search. BFG has many types of games, e.g., card games, memory games, match-three games. I assume, though, that you are interested in casual adventure games. Two places to start are games mentioned in this thread, and the casual game review articles which appeared through November of last year.

I agree Big Fish can be overwhelming in the choices. I really like how they give the average user rating for games now. I don't think there's a way to sort or search the games by user rating (that would be great). What I usually do is check out the deal of the week. If it gets good user reviews, I'll download the trial and try it out. So far, I have found that if a game gets over 4 stars, it's usually a very solid game. I just finished Twisted Lands: Shadow Town and I thought it was very good.

[rtrooney]

I tend not to rely on the BFG reviews. There are a few "reviewers" that have never rated any aspect of any game fewer than five stars out of five. They tend to skew ratings upwards, and, in my opinion, undeservedly so.

I tend to look for developers I like. I used to buy every ERS game that came out. Not any more because they became predictable...to me! But any of their games would be a good place to start for someone who wanted to give a casual adventure a try. In the first post a Puppetshow game was mentioned. It's an ERS game, and is a good challenge.

[CoyoteAG]

Originally Posted by Siddhi

Oh, I didn't know two of them were available at Big Fish. Maybe I'll try one.



Hmm, I tried one Nancy Drew and it was a full blown adventure, and not a casual. Or is there another casual series apart from the main one?

Originally Posted by millenia

I've played a few Nancy Drews and I also think they are a bit too complex to be casuals. The slide show style might make you think it's not a "real" adventure, but they are quite real.

There are Nancy Drew games that are adventure games...there are about 20 of those or something like that. Those aren't what I'm talking about. Her Interactive released two Nancy Drew casual games that they call "Nancy Drew Dossier" games. One is called "Lights, Cameras, Curses" and the other is called "Resorting to Danger". They are fun!

[palilulac]

1. F.A.C.E.S
2. Otherworld: Spring of Shadows
3. Shiver: Vanishing Hitchhiker
4. Strange Cases 2 The Lighthouse Mystery
5. Surface Mystery of Another World
6. Temple of Life The Legend Of Four Elements
7. The Secret Legacy A Kate Brooks Adventure
8. The Stroke of Midnight
9. Brink of Consciousness Dorian Gray Syndrome
10. Dark Parables: Curse of Briar Rose
* These are the best ones i played in no particular order. The one i most enjoyed was The Secret Legacy A Kate Brooks Adventure.

[Siddhi]

I loved Emerald City Confidential. Also the Blackwell series. Although not "casuals", they are easy enough for experienced players so its a much more casual and relaxing experience.

[aimless]

The thing that gets me about most casuals is the ridiculous storylines. There was one where you have to Sa-a-ave Emily! that stands out in my mind as incredibly stupid.

I'm not playing any more of BFG's games now, though not for that reason. BFG's game manager gave me so many problems I uninstalled it...or tried to. In the end, I had to force an uninstall. Yeah, like I'm going to use that again. A shame, too, since my el cheapo copy of The Awakened can't be played without it.

[rtrooney]

Just finished Depths of Betrayal. A fair amount of inventory and logic puzzles. While there is certainly a hidden object element to the game, it's more along the style of Vault Cracker, if anybody has played that game. It was a solid four hours worth of play. I would say the demo is certainly worth a try. I think most would but the game when the demo runs out of time. Available on BFG.

[rtrooney]

Someone, I think it was Colpet, mentioned a Grim Tales game. I've played the demo of Legacy, but wonder if that's the game she was speaking of. I kind of like it. It's probably worth a BFG game credit for the standard edition.

[Jubilee]

Originally Posted by rtrooney

Finished Emerald City Confidential. A very good, but relatively easy game.

I was surprised by how good this was when I played it. I was expecting a more casual suited game but this one was quite good. Reviewed it here if anyone's interested.

[rtrooney]

I like the review. It fairly well summarizes my experience.

[erodola]

I loved Emerald City Confidential, and can't recommend it enough. My favorite HOG/adventure hybrids are without any doubt:
- Mystery Case Files: Dire Grove
- Mystery Case Files: 13th Skull
The first introduced FMV sequences and the latter real talking actors (FMV merged within the drawings). Also loved the atmospheres.
Then I also quite enjoyed Dracula: Love Kills, a lightweight spin-off to the more "proper" point'n'click Dracula: Origin. Currently I'm looking forward to playing Mystery Case Files: Escape from Ravenhearst, and I'm playing all the previous MCF games to catch up with the series, but I'm being rather disappointed; probably was expecting the same quality of Dire Grove and 13th Skull, but only got senseless HOGs with Ravenhearst (the first) and Madame Fate (this is a little nicer).

[rtrooney]

There are more HOG elements in the first two Ravenhurst games than in the last. There must be several "teams" designing/executing games at BFG. The graphic styles of Dire Grove, Ravenhurst and Drawn are miles apart.