The Hidden Theft -- Review

SkyWarp · October 27, 2008, 05:39:28 PM

So, how well have our favorite fictional crime fighting brothers moved from the printed page to the computer? After finishing the game, I have to admit, the transition has fared well....

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SkyWarp · October 27, 2008, 05:40:08 PM

So, how well have our favorite fictional crime fighting brothers moved from the printed page to the computer? After finishing the game, I have to admit, the transition has fared well.

When I first heard about an upcoming Hardy Boys game, I thought that the game would reflect the Nancy Drew computer games. But once I stepped into the Hardy Boys house, school, and Bayport police station this game took on a life of its own.

The music and graphics were my biggest surprise. The superb music fit the style of the game play and the title theme reminded me of one of my favorite TV shows, Alias.

Graphically, this game was unlike the Nancy Drew games I?ve played. It?s third person view gives you the chance to not only move your characters around similarly to an RTS game, but also allows you to see the Hardy Boys mouths move as they speak.

The story was also well done. I am not a reader of the original Hardy Boys books so any similarity to these classics would have been lost on me, so I played this game as a whole new Hardy Boys case. Even with the Undercover Brothers cannon fully influencing this game, I think the story line could have easily held up to any Hardy Boys book series.

At times, the direction of the story and character conversations did get a little confusing. But then I?ve never been a huge fan of the point-and-click games so I'll let others debate if it was just me or if the game flow was rough at times.

The choice of characters was excellent. Chet, Officer Riley, Iola, Phil, Chief Collig, the boys? parents, and a slew of secondary characters appeared throughout the game. However, I?m glad that not every character was included (Biff, Callie, etc) because there absence allows them to be introduced in future games.

Fans of the ATAC series will be delighted to see that Playback was an integral part of the beginning of the game and that the entire mission was delivered by a familiar game disc. The ATAC logo was also displayed during the game.

I was also pleased with the user interface. The game view area was clear of any unnecessary intrusions. In fact, the user interface was virtually non-existent on the main play screens.

Learning to play the game was pretty simple, even for someone like me who doesn't usually play these types of games. Looking for items on screen and listening to the clues from the characters? conversations was a nice simple approach to learning what you needed to do next.

My only big complaint would be the distribution. I've not seen the game at a Wal-Mart in my area and would LOVE to have this game be offered through STEAM. Adding in a few of the Steamworks Achievement functions would make this game a virtual seller of itself. Players would scramble to get each and every achievement created so they could brag to their friends who may not have accomplished the same achievement.

Overall I liked this game, would recommend it to any Hardy fan, and am ready to buy another one, especially if one of the Casefiles books is adapted next time.

tomswift2002 · October 27, 2008, 07:18:51 PM

Well, I played the game, and I was not as impressed withit as you obviously were.

First off, the designers messed around with a Classic Hardy Boys story: The Tower Treasure. I mean, Disney did his version of the Tower Treasure with penache in the 1950's. This version was very sloppily done.

Also, why did the game creators try to set The Tower Treasure in the Undercover Brothers universe? I liked the story of The Tower Treasure where it was just the Hardys by themselves, and with their dad, just fine.

One thing that I did like about the game was that the game action was not confined just to Spencer Mansion, like the authors of the Undercover Brothers series tend to do. In most UB books I find that once the Hardys get to their destination, whether it be a reality show set, a motel, or even a subway tunnel, the boys just stay there talking to other suspects trying to figure out the mystery. But in this game the Hardys actually got to move from the Hardy house to the school, to the police station as well as going to Manhattan and various places around there.

Rating: 6 out 10.

And hopefully, the next time that a Hardy Boys game is released, there will be no UB garbage in it, if the game is based on a book that has already been written. If the game is based on a Casefiles book that had the Network, then I hope the designers don't change it to where the Hardys are working for ATAC. Or if its based on an Original/Digest book, then no government agency, unless the book had like the CIA or FBI.

FrankJoeATAC · October 27, 2008, 09:35:56 PM

I thought the game was pretty good with the music, graphics, locations and characters, but I didn't think that the puzzles were very challenging, and the third person view wasn't as good as first person. But it was a good mystery with finding evidence and clues.

rating: 6 out of 10

Olivia · October 27, 2008, 09:36:51 PM

In all fairness, it is the HBs first game. But do you find Nancy Drew games to be a lot better? Even the earlier Nancy Drew games?

FrankJoeATAC · October 27, 2008, 09:38:15 PM

The earlier games didn't have as good graphics as the newer ones, and also the puzzles are alot harder in Nancy Drew games than in this HB game.

SDLagent · October 28, 2008, 01:15:06 AM

Haven't played it yet, so I can't weigh-in. I like your review though, SkyWarp. Reminds me of the reviews you did when the UB were first coming out. I really enjoyed those.

JoeHardyRocks · October 28, 2008, 05:14:09 PM

Hardy Boys game wasn't really challenging. I mean, when you had to make an aspirin, the solution was right there on the wall, with really easy instuructions on how to do it!

Rating 6 out of 10

SkyWarp · October 28, 2008, 05:19:37 PM

Quote from: JoeHardyRocks on October 28, 2008, 05:14:09 PM
Hardy Boys game wasn't really challenging. I mean, when you had to make an aspirin, the solution was right there on the wall, with really easy instuructions on how to do it!

Rating 6 out of 10

I am not going to disagree with you as far as it being challenging or not, but I am certianly not going to give a bad grade to the game because it was not as challenging as it could have been. It my opinion, many games over the years have been too challenging. Especially when they first come out. This gets players frustrated and makes them not want to buy future games.

Valve and its distribution of steam allows them to detect where games are too hard or too easy and then they can adapt that for future games (or even that game with patches on the fly as people play the game).

I would love to see the Hardy Boys game be distributed through steam with these feedback features built into the system.

But to get back on point, I personally thought the game was about the right level of difficulty for the average person. Those that play lots of these types of games would find issue with that perhaps. Especially those that come over from the Nancy Drew series of games. I on the other hand look for a fun/entertaining game, more so than one that will drive me nuts wondering why I can do anything.

JoeHardyRocks · October 28, 2008, 05:21:47 PM

Well, maybe I was a little harsh on my rating. What I did like about it was that it had a really good storyline/plot and you got to collect evidence for the crime and the mystery made sense.

Rating:7.5

tomswift2002 · October 28, 2008, 06:38:51 PM

Another thing that I really didn't like about the game was that a lot of the time I found that the clues to get you to go somewhere else were extremely vague.

SkyWarp · October 28, 2008, 08:03:18 PM

Quote from: tomswift2002 on October 28, 2008, 06:38:51 PM
Another thing that I really didn't like about the game was that a lot of the time I found that the clues to get you to go somewhere else were extremely vague.

I might have to agree with that and that was part of my review up above. It seemed that at times the game and conversations didn't always flow. But then I don't play this type of game very often so I didn't want to assume it wasn't just me.

tomswift2002 · October 29, 2008, 05:42:11 PM

Quote from: SkyWarp on October 28, 2008, 08:03:18 PM
I might have to agree with that and that was part of my review up above. It seemed that at times the game and conversations didn't always flow. But then I don't play this type of game very often so I didn't want to assume it wasn't just me.

Well, considering that about 2 weeks before I had just completed the Nancy Drew game The Secret Of The Old Clock, that game was still in my recent memory and when I compared the two games, I found that the Old Clock had a lot of action, but at the same time there was also something in the conversations that you would pick up on as to what to do, or there was also the notepad (in the Old Clock) that automatically recorded stuff that was important so that if you remembered hearing about something then you could go back to the notepad and be like "Hey, here's what to do next".

But, in the Hardy Boys there was no note pad.

JoeHardyRocks · November 02, 2008, 11:14:07 AM

Thats why I like the Nancy Drew. They let you know what to do next, not just make you guess.

Bigfootman · November 02, 2008, 07:01:01 PM

Quote from: tomswift2002 on October 27, 2008, 07:18:51 PM
And hopefully, the next time that a Hardy Boys game is released, there will be no UB garbage in it, if the game is based on a book that has already been written. If the game is based on a Casefiles book that had the Network, then I hope the designers don't change it to where the Hardys are working for ATAC. Or if its based on an Original/Digest book, then no government agency, unless the book had like the CIA or FBI.

I swear if S&S starts "updating" Casefiles and making them into UBs, with ATAC instead of the Network, they will be getting some nasty letters.