This review contains spoilers, click expand to view.
When Natalie Brooks grandmother passes away Natalie takes it upon herself to move back to her hometown to look after her grandmother’s estate. Unfortunately she arrives just in time to find out her house is up for demolition to make way for a new project. She needs to collect signatures for a petition to stop this happening however it soon becomes clear someone is out to stop our heroine. Is her grandmother’s old house the key to victory?
Attempting to create a likable heroine for the teen girl market Natalie Brooks: Secrets of Treasure House (2008) by Alawar Friday’s Games tries to succeed yet fails in key areas. Take the graphics for instance: we’re presented with 2D comic book style panels that’s quite nice to look at but when we get to the game itself characters Natalie meets are rendered in dated 3D textures that make them come across as ugly claymation. I don’t understand the reasoning behind this, either go completely 2D or go completely 3D. The game is very much a HOPA with entering certain rooms and picking up objects that are used to open doors, file cabinets, etc. The game for some inexplicable reason likes to punish you for asking for hints for difficult to find hotspots. If you need extra clues you can take part in some hidden object screens however these are on a time limit. Failure to visit and complete three tricky screens within the time limit will result in having to do the whole thing all over again. It becomes the hardest part of Secrets of Treasure House and it doesn’t need to be. I suppose if you’re real eagle eyed you might never need to visit a hidden object screen for hints but that leads to another issue: it’s a short game. It feels like we only got half a game with the ending wrapping things up in a confusing way. How do those in charge get brought to justice? Also what was the point of getting signatures for a petition when by the end it’s becomes an abandoned plotline? I read a comment under a review for this game that suggested the English localisation was edited as Alawar Entertainment couldn’t be bothered to do the entire game. If true that does offer a reason why it ends in such an anti-climatic fashion. These are annoying problems to have because the characters (what we see of them) are quite funny with the police chief getting angry about a lack of doughnuts and having to help find money for the vending machine. Natalie is likable yet I have to wonder however what kind of heroine is Alawar marketing when she feels no remorse breaking glass exhibits, most of the time right in front of owner!
I really want to like Secrets of Treasure House but the game feels unfinished. It’s all but a beta release. The 2D and 3D art design doesn’t meld together well, the game is too short and a rushed ending is unsatisfying. The game promises an exciting adventure but this never materialises due to a rushed and unfulfilling story. Even the title of the game is misleading. The house itself serves as the end goal, not what drives the story. As a result the only real ‘secret’ of the house I could find is at the end. If there were any exciting secrets in this game they were lost to development time.… Expand
