Dare to Play!

We have a lot of dedicated fans, so we thought it might be fun to see how well you really know the games. So we came up with a quote contest. From obscure phone conversation to obvious main characters, this is the ultimate who's who in the Nancy Drew games!



Every week on Wednesday morning, we'll post a quote on our Twitter feed and on the homepage. If you know who said the quote, then reply to @HerInteractive on Twitter with the game and person's name (otherwise we won't see your entry).



So for instance, the quote we tweet is "But then, I'm not that normal, so you can bug me all you want." You would tweet from your Twitter account: @HerInteractive Corine, Warnings at Waverly Academy.



If you have answered correctly, then you'll be entered to win a Nancy Drew game of your choice for downloading. There will be one lucky winner each week. We will announce the winner on Thursday via Twitter.



But don't worry, if you don't win this week, there's always next week! So brush on your Nancy Drew games and get ready to do some sleuthing!



Legal details

This year we're going to do something exciting for our fans. How often do you normally go to our website (not the message boards)? Once a month, twice a year? Well, we'd like to you stop by more often...

We're going to give you a reason to visit http://www.herinteractive.com/ EVERY DAY! Starting February, we will be updating content on our website with the following schedule:

Monday: Weekly download (we'll be creating new wallpapers, bookmarks, screensavers, etc.)
Tuesday: Dare to Play blog post
Wednesday: Twitter Quote contest (more on that next week)
Thursday: News, promotions, and game updates
Friday: Amateur Sleuth blog Weekend Puzzle

We're really going to take advantage of our website and make it THE destination for all of your Nancy Drew gaming needs. So make sure you tune in every day so you don't miss out on the latest and greatest!

What do you think your favorite day of the week will be?

"The best laid plans of mice and men
Gang aft a-gley"
~ Robert Burns
(the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry)

Note: Many people attribute this quote to John Steinbeck's novel, Of Mice and Men, which was inspired by the poem "Ode to a Mouse" by Robert Burns.

We're in our planning phase here at Her Interactive and trying to figure out what we want to achieve for the rest of the year. While we know that our summer title will be about a Tornado and what most of the game is going to play like, we are still in the design phases for our fall title. Sorry, I don't have any details for you guys yet, but keep on checking back. Besides our schedule for the games we are releasing this year, we also have to keep track of contests we're running, when ads for magazines are due, what we want to post about on the blogs, and what we're going to wear, etc. (just kidding about the what we're going to wear). This way, we make sure we don't miss any deadlines. We have deadlines to meet for project much in the same way you have to finish projects for class!

So take a page from Nancy Drew (in junior detective) mode and write down all the things you need to do and when you need to finish them by. You'll be able to check off each thing as you finish it and feel good about completing each task. Schedules are kind of like to-do lists, except they span over a much longer period of time. I personally have a weekly schedule and then a yearly schedule for much bigger projects we need to tackle. Nancy probably has a long list too...

What about yourself? What's on your schedule for 2010?

Creating a game is all about using your imagination! When we create a game, we take a theme or character from one of the Nancy Drew books and expand on it. For instance, Warnings at Waverly Academy is based on the book Curse of the Black Cat. Here are some of the similarities:
- the setting takes place at Waverly Academy
- there is a black cat
- the plot centers around pranks that escalate in danger

If you've read the book, are there any other similarities that you noticed?

The game adds different characters and creates more complexities around the structure of the school itself. From the gossip to the historical elements, we did a lot of research and found a lot of interesting topics to explore. You'll also notice that the puzzles in the game are all our own. While Nancy may have to pick a lock in the book, the way we pick locks changes from game to game. It's a lot of fun coming up with new ways to stump our fans. :)

And now it's your turn to exercise some of your creativity with our Cover Redesign contest! Pick your favorite Nancy Drew game and come up with a new cover based on what you know about the game. You can use anything you have access to such as markers, pictures, glitter, etc. All submissions are are due February 5, 2010 and should be sent to HIContest@herinteractive.com. Get the details on the Amateur Sleuth blog.

Get your creativity going! Good luck!

Happy New Year to everyone! Did everyone get a chance to get caught up on replaying their favorite Nancy Drew games or a new game that you received during winter break? We hope so! Nancy has a big year in store for her in 2010, but like everyone else, she's also making a few new years resolutions to start off the decade:

1) Buy a reliable flashlight that has at least a 2 week continuous battery.
2) Call Carson, Ned, Bess, George, and Hannah more often so they don't worry while she's on a case.
3) Catch more culprits!
4) Travel to more places (preferably not for cases)
5) Continue updating her scrapbook of cases

What others resolutions do you think Nancy Drew should add to her list?

Well I was hoping to get a holiday greeting from Nancy Drew up today, but it looks like she had a case to solve, so maybe we'll have a 2009 wrap up at the start of the New Year...

But in the meantime, how about a review of Her Interactive's year? We've had a pretty awesome year with lots of firsts.

1) Facebook Nancy Drew PC games page - with over 8,000 fans, we keep our fans updated with the latest information
2) Twitter Her Interactive account - we try to interact with all our fans and wish we could hit a 'like' button every time someone said they were going to play a Nancy Drew game
3) Redesigned website - we rolled out the burgundy and gold colors for the main site as well as the message board to match the new Her Interactive logo. Some fans love the new more sophisticated colors, some others think it's a little girly.
4) Game soundtracks - download all four volumes of Music for Mysteries with music from Secrets Can Kill to Legend of the Crystal Skull
5) Hardy Boys game - our first Hardy Boys game; they're still not nearly as popular as Nancy Drew is though
6) Nintendo DS game - we brought our adventure games to a new platform, also see #5
7) Watching Waverly Twitter soap opera - a real-time story from the girls at Waverly Academy including some of the secondary characters leading up to the beginning of the Warnings at Waverly Academy game
8) microsites - fun, interactive sites for each game with more information about each game's universe: www.TreasureOnTheTracks.com; www.RansomOfTheSevenShips.com; www.ResortingToDanger.com; www.WarningsAtWaverlyAcademy.com
9) Amateur Sleuth blog - updates daily about the inner working of the Her Interactive office and features a weekend puzzle for sleuths to solve each week
10) More fans - we're trying to get the word out to fans of the Nancy Drew books that they should play the PC games. So share your love for the games with all your friends and family!


We're looking forward to all that's in store for us in 2010!

The holidays are my favorite time of year. I love the Christmas lights, the cookies, and gathering with my friends and family. At Her Interactive, we have our own way of celebrating the holidays as well. A few of us are hanging up lights in our cubicles and setting out holiday candy in our candy dishes. There's even the holiday wallpaper from last year that some of us are using on our desktops.





Of course, I can't wait for the holiday cookie contest. We will all be baking cookies to see who gets voted for the best one! There's going to be a lot of cookies that we'll have to taste! We'll post pictures and try live Tweeting the event as it happens. Along those lines, we also do a cool gift exchange - the rules change a little bit every year, so we'll see what fun things people bring to share.

And finally, the holidays are about sharing. We'd like to share our latest game, Warnings at Waverly Academy with you for just $9.99! While a lot of you already played the game back in October (and have probably beaten it 3 times since), the game will make the perfect present for your friends or other family members. Share the Nancy Drew experience with them this holiday so they have a chance to step into the shoes of the legendary sleuth. Plus, if you order by December 15 11AM PST, you'll get free standard shipping just in time for Christmas.

One last thing, we made a fun Facebook Nancy Drew Clues game! If you can't share the full Nancy Drew game with your friends, then you can share clues from the games. Check it out!