Mobile game!

[Baron of Braganza]

Theory on Mobile Game Release Date

I thought I would share this theory that I've cooking up. In the letter from the CEO, he uses the words "early 2014" when discussing the release date for the mobile game.

Now, we can get a rough idea on what exactly "early 2014" can mean. We do know it will be before MED is released. Thats a good place to start working backwards. HerInteractive tends to release their first biannual game in either April or May. Neither of these months I would consider as "early 2014" so lets say for the sake of argument it has to be before April. We are left with January, February, and March. From here I like to compare what we have left to the expression "early in the morning". To me, "early in the morning" is anything before 9 AM. Now imagine a clock. 12 hours of daylight = 12 months. Lets say that June is 12 PM since its the halfway point. The halfway point of that is 9 AM, or March. So we're looking at a release roughly before March.

There are a few more suggestions on narrowing this down even further. The Nancy Drew Laptop Contest is one those "stepping-stones" events between game releases. The winner will be announced after the New Years and when the HerInteractive team finishes their holidays and return to the office. Therefore, the Laptop Contest will take precedence and I think it will be the focus of the first week of January. Another thing to consider is that HerInteractive released the Shadow Ranch Mobile Mystery (iSHA) near the end of February back in 2011.

I think it's safe to suggest that the release will happen roughly somewhere after late-January but before late-February.

February doesn't seem that far off.

[Vanilla Muffin]

I thought I would share this theory that I've cooking up. In the letter from the CEO, he uses the words "early 2014" when discussing the release date for the mobile game.

Now, we can get a rough idea on what exactly "early 2014" can mean. We do know it will be before MED is released. Thats a good place to start working backwards. HerInteractive tends to release their first biannual game in either April or May. Neither of these months I would consider as "early 2014" so lets say for the sake of argument it has to be before April. We are left with January, February, and March. From here I like to compare what we have left to the expression "early in the morning". To me, "early in the morning" is anything before 9 AM. Now imagine a clock. 12 hours of daylight = 12 months. Lets say that June is 12 PM since its the halfway point. The halfway point of that is 9 AM, or March. So we're looking at a release roughly before March.

There are a few more suggestions on narrowing this down even further. The Nancy Drew Laptop Contest is one those "stepping-stones" events between game releases. The winner will be announced after the New Years and when the HerInteractive team finishes their holidays and return to the office. Therefore, the Laptop Contest will take precedence and I think it will be the focus of the first week of January. Another thing to consider is that HerInteractive released the Shadow Ranch Mobile Mystery (iSHA) near the end of February back in 2011.

I think it's safe to suggest that the release will happen roughly somewhere after late-January but before late-February.

February doesn't seem that far off.

I agree with you.

[phoenix star]

I agree that February is a good estimate. That was my thought. Here's something I've been pondering. Will the game be released for smartphones as well, or just tablets? Because smartphones are pretty small for the Nancy Drew games that we're used to, unless the interface is changed drastically. I'm looking at mine right now and there's no way that we'd be able to properly click which inventory item we wanted, or which conversation option we wanted or scroll down the text box on something so small. I'd think they might as well make it available for as many devices as possible, so the interface is probably gonna be changed.

[Det.JA]

I agree that February is a good estimate. That was my thought. Here's something I've been pondering. Will the game be released for smartphones as well, or just tablets? Because smartphones are pretty small for the Nancy Drew games that we're used to, unless the interface is changed drastically. I'm looking at mine right now and there's no way that we'd be able to properly click which inventory item we wanted, or which conversation option we wanted or scroll down the text box on something so small. I'd think they might as well make it available for as many devices as possible, so the interface is probably gonna be changed.

It's definitely possible to shrink the Nancy Drew classic games down into a smaller resolution. The only differences that I would expect would be to have the inventory be on a separate screen than the actual enviroment. When Nancy talks to suspects, I would imagine picking responses by swiping between one response at a time. Or maybe even watching a video of the suspect talking and then have the game go back to the response mode. That's what the Myst games did; whenever your character had to move by cart from one place to another, a video played instead and then then when it was finished, the video switched back to the game.

[ND/AliceRoyLvr]

The first game will be The Ghost of Thornton Hall for the iPad! Little Jackalope revealed it on the AS blog!

[RecessiveGQ]

I would say more that the mobile game being GTH was suggested rather than "revealed." LJ didn't come right out and say that.

[phoenix star]

They said it on Facebook first that GTH was the mobile game.

[Baron of Braganza]

Interesting that GTH was chosen as the first. Personally it's a game with many layers but at the same time not one I would have chosen in putting my best foot forward, so to speak.

[tsukiakari]

I'm half surprised and half...not surprised that GTH was chosen

First of all, GTH seems to have been very popular. The scary games always seem to do well, and GTH's official trailer has around twice as many views as SPY's. So I can definitely understand why Her would want to port it first, since there's more of a chance that people would want to buy it.

On the other hand...I'm not a big mobile device user, but I can't say that GTH feels like the most mobile-friendly game. The environments are all very dark, it's dialogue-heavy, and the puzzles are pretty difficult - it requires you to be immersed in it, and it's definitely not the kind of game that you can casually play on the go. To me, SPY may have been a better choice, since it's brighter, a little lighter in dialogue and tone, and also has easier puzzles (plus a simple and addictive game to boot).

At any rate, I don't think I'll have an iOS or Android device by the time this is released, but if possible I'll still try to buy it to support Her. I hope that it sells well and enables them to continue releasing more mobile games

[Det.JA]

Not to be kicking a dead horse, but going back to the Microsoft App Store for Windows RT. If an adventure game like Adera can go on the same store and win a ton of rewards, I'm positive that GTH for the App Store RT will do just fine.
I would love to play GTH on my surface 2.

[LadyLinda]

Posted On Facebook:

Please make ND Games for tablet

HeR's response was...

We are working on it! Ghost of Thornton Hall will release on iOS in Spring 2014. To be followed by Android and Kindle. Stay tuned!

[HappyGirl05]

Posted On Facebook:

Please make ND Games for tablet

HeR's response was...

We are working on it! Ghost of Thornton Hall will release on iOS in Spring 2014. To be followed by Android and Kindle. Stay tuned!

Thanks for posting! This is exciting as we now know which devices it's for.

[Nancydrewgirl03]

Personally, I dont like the idea of a mobile game I really don't like the idea because they could stop making computer games and that would really really be bad because I love the computer games. I really really don't want them to be for tablet... I don't know why I just don't like the idea all that much

[Laura Jean]

Personally, I dont like the idea of a mobile game I really don't like the idea because they could stop making computer games and that would really really be bad because I love the computer games. I really really don't want them to be for tablet... I don't know why I just don't like the idea all that much

No worries, Stuart said here that the mobile game won't slow down their output of the computer games.

[Nancydrewgirl03]

No worries, Stuart said here that the mobile game won't slow down their output of the computer games.

Oh thanks. That helps!