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Trail of the Twister: released in June 2010
Based on the Book: The Mystery in Tornado Alley (Nancy Drew Mystery Stories #155, published in 2000)
How Closely Does the Game Follow the Book?: Not very closely. They both take place in Oklahoma and they both involve storm chasing, but the characters and the mystery/plot are different.
Location: Oklahoma
The Mystery/Crime: Sabotage
Mode Of Transportation: Car
Is there an alarm clock in this game?: No, but the days do change
What is learned about in this game?: Weather/meteorology (tornadoes, clouds, etc.)
Brief Plot Synopsis: P.G. Krolmeister hires Nancy to go undercover as an intern on a storm chasing team to investigate who is sabotaging the team's equipment.
Brief Character Synopsis:
Chase Relerford - the team's polite, Southern boy mechanic
Actor I would cast to play him if it were a live-action show or movie: Lucas Black
Debbie Kircum - the team's diligent project manager
Actress I would cast to play her if it were a live-action show or movie: Emmy Rossum
Pa Ochs - the old man who runs the town's general store
Actor I would cast to play him if it were a live-action show or movie: Barry Corbin
Scott Varnell - the team's grumpy leader
Actor I would cast to play him if it were a live-action show or movie: Sam Rockwell
Tobias "Frosty" Harlow - the team's photographer
Actor I would cast to play him if it were a live-action show or movie: Howie Mandel
Phone Characters:
Frank and Joe Hardy - Nancy's friends and fellow detectives
P.G. Krolmeister - the businessman who sponsors the storm chasing team and hires Nancy to investigate
Other characters:
Brooke Tavanah - the leader of a rival chase team
The mice
The prairie dogs
My favorite quotes:
"You should ask Pa about it. He's got much more of a passion for the stage than you'd expect from a man in overalls." - Debbie Kircum
"And I know it's highly unlikely, but should you and my mama ever cross paths...." - Chase Releford
"You watch this dark, rampaging monster go tearing across the land, wrecking everything it touches, 'til all of a sudden it ain't there no more. Ya can't go after it, ya can't make it put everything back, ya can't get even with it, 'cause it's just...gone. All you can do is stand there thinkin', "Now that ain't fair. That just ain't fair." - Pa
My Thoughts: This game is toward the bottom of my list. I certainly don't hate it (I don't hate any of the Nancy Drew games), but I don't enjoy it as much as I enjoy many of the other games.
I saw a review for this game online whose title was "What's there is good..." I think that sums it up quite well. There just seems to be something missing, but I'm not sure I can quite put my finger on exactly what. I think it may be that the game was quite short and consisted mainly of completing tasks (which in the game, of course, are mainly puzzles) for the internship job. It makes sense that you'd have duties to complete for the team, but not too many of them lead to finding clues that help solve the mystery like they do in a lot of the other games.
One thing I didn't like about this game was that I sometimes felt I didn't have enough information to do what I needed to do. An example is the Doppler puzzle in Scott's truck. All Scott tells you to do is to flip three switches to make it light up. He doesn't give you any more explanation. Once I looked at a video walkthrough to see how I was supposed to do it I realized how simple it was, but I needed to look it up in order to figure out what I was supposed to do. In my opinion the games should have enough information to figure those sorts of things out.
I thought the storm-chasing plot was a nice change of pace. It made learning about tornadoes and other weather stuff very organic to the game. The mystery itself of the sabotaged equipment was good as well, but the solving of the mystery was lacking. You spend a lot of time doing work for the team and very little time investigating the mystery.
Something I liked about the game was the characters. There was a variety of personalities and they all had realistic characteristics and backstories. Another thing I liked was the graphics.
In conclusion, this game isn't my absolute least favorite but it's very low on my list. It had potential and probably would have been a pretty good game if it had focused more on the mystery and less on the chores/puzzles.
My random comment: I agree with Nancy about the awesome fact she learned about prairie dogs. It's very cute to know they have social visits with each other!
My Rating: 6/10
Based on the Book: The Mystery in Tornado Alley (Nancy Drew Mystery Stories #155, published in 2000)
How Closely Does the Game Follow the Book?: Not very closely. They both take place in Oklahoma and they both involve storm chasing, but the characters and the mystery/plot are different.
Location: Oklahoma
The Mystery/Crime: Sabotage
Mode Of Transportation: Car
Is there an alarm clock in this game?: No, but the days do change
What is learned about in this game?: Weather/meteorology (tornadoes, clouds, etc.)
Brief Plot Synopsis: P.G. Krolmeister hires Nancy to go undercover as an intern on a storm chasing team to investigate who is sabotaging the team's equipment.
Brief Character Synopsis:
Chase Relerford - the team's polite, Southern boy mechanic
Actor I would cast to play him if it were a live-action show or movie: Lucas Black
Debbie Kircum - the team's diligent project manager
Actress I would cast to play her if it were a live-action show or movie: Emmy Rossum
Pa Ochs - the old man who runs the town's general store
Actor I would cast to play him if it were a live-action show or movie: Barry Corbin
Scott Varnell - the team's grumpy leader
Actor I would cast to play him if it were a live-action show or movie: Sam Rockwell
Tobias "Frosty" Harlow - the team's photographer
Actor I would cast to play him if it were a live-action show or movie: Howie Mandel
Phone Characters:
Frank and Joe Hardy - Nancy's friends and fellow detectives
P.G. Krolmeister - the businessman who sponsors the storm chasing team and hires Nancy to investigate
Other characters:
Brooke Tavanah - the leader of a rival chase team
The mice
The prairie dogs
My favorite quotes:
"You should ask Pa about it. He's got much more of a passion for the stage than you'd expect from a man in overalls." - Debbie Kircum
"And I know it's highly unlikely, but should you and my mama ever cross paths...." - Chase Releford
"You watch this dark, rampaging monster go tearing across the land, wrecking everything it touches, 'til all of a sudden it ain't there no more. Ya can't go after it, ya can't make it put everything back, ya can't get even with it, 'cause it's just...gone. All you can do is stand there thinkin', "Now that ain't fair. That just ain't fair." - Pa
My Thoughts: This game is toward the bottom of my list. I certainly don't hate it (I don't hate any of the Nancy Drew games), but I don't enjoy it as much as I enjoy many of the other games.
I saw a review for this game online whose title was "What's there is good..." I think that sums it up quite well. There just seems to be something missing, but I'm not sure I can quite put my finger on exactly what. I think it may be that the game was quite short and consisted mainly of completing tasks (which in the game, of course, are mainly puzzles) for the internship job. It makes sense that you'd have duties to complete for the team, but not too many of them lead to finding clues that help solve the mystery like they do in a lot of the other games.
One thing I didn't like about this game was that I sometimes felt I didn't have enough information to do what I needed to do. An example is the Doppler puzzle in Scott's truck. All Scott tells you to do is to flip three switches to make it light up. He doesn't give you any more explanation. Once I looked at a video walkthrough to see how I was supposed to do it I realized how simple it was, but I needed to look it up in order to figure out what I was supposed to do. In my opinion the games should have enough information to figure those sorts of things out.
I thought the storm-chasing plot was a nice change of pace. It made learning about tornadoes and other weather stuff very organic to the game. The mystery itself of the sabotaged equipment was good as well, but the solving of the mystery was lacking. You spend a lot of time doing work for the team and very little time investigating the mystery.
Something I liked about the game was the characters. There was a variety of personalities and they all had realistic characteristics and backstories. Another thing I liked was the graphics.
In conclusion, this game isn't my absolute least favorite but it's very low on my list. It had potential and probably would have been a pretty good game if it had focused more on the mystery and less on the chores/puzzles.
My random comment: I agree with Nancy about the awesome fact she learned about prairie dogs. It's very cute to know they have social visits with each other!
My Rating: 6/10