The title screen is ugly, but the game is actually pretty fun. I think I might be alone in preferring the games that are set during the daytime, but I like the bright colors and being able to explore outside. Anyway, Nancy Drew goes to Paris! If I recall correctly, Nancy’s gone to Paris in a couple of books, but I’ve never read any of them. This one is apparently based on Death by Design. Goodreads tells me that in the book, Nancy gets poisoned and has three days to find the antidote before she dies. Exciting stuff! The game, however, is less about poison and more about the French resistance, which is really not the same thing at all.
This is the first game to have the “Welcome to my desk!” intro, which is pretty sweet. Nancy’s room is huge, good Lord. Anyway, Nancy shows us to her desk, where we can look at past case files and see what this game is going to be about. In summary: one of Carson Drew’s clients (“Amy Grunhild”) has hired Nancy to check in on a fashion designer named Minette. Minette’s behaving weirdly, and Amy, as one of her financial backers, wants to make sure that she’s not completely off the deep end. So Nancy gets to fly to Paris and work undercover as one of her assistants. “I took two years of French in school, so I should be able to get by,” Nancy says. And off we go!
Minette’s set up shop in an old windmill in Montmartre, which actually looks pretty cool.
When we walk in, Minette is flipping out on her assistant, Heather. There’s screaming and crying and breaking objects, but Heather’s just like, “Oh hi, what’s up? How was your flight?” Nancy’s like, “Okay, except they lost my suitcase, so I conveniently don’t have my phone or any money, as usual. Also, what the hell is going on here?” Heather chirps that Minette’s just having one of her tantrums and it’s perfectly normal. Anyway, she exposits that it doesn’t matter that we lost our suitcase as we’re staying with “Jing Jing”, and she’ll have lots of fashionable clothes for us to borrow. Behind the door, Minette starts cackling maniacally, and Nancy’s like, “I’m not sure I want to work here anymore.” Heather waves it off, saying that this is just how Minette rolls. Fair enough!
Heather tells us how the game works: our desk is across from hers, and our job is to answer the phone. Customer service, everyone’s favorite job. We’re not getting paid for this gig, but Heather has given us a free metrocard to get around on the subway. If we have any questions, we should go to Heather. Bothering Minette is verboten, because she is way behind on delivering her spring collection and couture projects. When we ask why, Heather just says, “She’s been…under a lot of stress.” Oookay. Our next question is “What’s couture?” Heather doesn’t say, “How did you get this job if you don’t know what couture is?”, but she should. She tells us that Minette also designs gowns for super rich people, and her big project right now is the dress the First Lady will wear to the World Summit. And that’s all our exposition for now.
Wait, I lied. When you back up from Heather, Nancy will notice an envelope slid under the door. It has Minette’s name on it, pasted in letters cut out from magazines. Not suspicious at all! Let’s go ahead and open it! Naturally, it’s a threat: “Make the most of the time you have left, BECAUSE SOON IT WILL BE ALL OVER.” Heather’s like, “Oh yeah, another one of those. You can just put it in the box over there.” She tells us that Minette’s been getting threats for a while now — not just letters, but someone also sent her dead flowers every day for a week last month. Pretty ominous! Heather doesn’t want to tell Minette about the new letter, though, as it will just distract her and make her fall even farther behind on her projects. Fair enough. We have to put the letter in a locked box, and Heather tells us that we’re not allowed to open it. So…we’re totally going to do that later.
With all that done, Minette finally remembers that she has a new minion, and summons us in to meet her. She looks bizarrely skinny under that cape thing, doesn’t she? Oh, and there’s also that white mask covering her entire face. Anyway, Minette basically is like, “Oh, I was just about to tell Amy Grunhild that I’m going to fire you, but you’re already here, so I guess you can stay.” She grouses that she hates being dependent on financial backers. Anyway, we’ve met, so now Nancy can go away. Wait, no, she also wants to lecture us not to go near the First Lady’s dress. And we have to make her a pot of tea. As we walk away, we hear Minette say, “Hugo Butterly, eat your heart out.”
Blah blah the tea puzzle is pretty easy blah. Minette tells us that the tea is “utterly rude”, because see, in Minette land, “rude” means “good.” She’s so impressed by our tea-making skillz that she’s sending us on a mission to find inspiration for her designs. She wants stuff — not things, stuff — new stuff that’s like her old stuff, but different. Ooookay. We can look at the old stuff to get an idea of what she wants — she’s looking for stuff with a circle shape. (Heather will tell us later that Minette has a “thing about curves.” That’s why she’s a plus-size designer.) We also have a few more errands: fix the plotter, pick up an envelope from our roomie Jing Jing, get some fabric photos at “Dieter von Schwesterkrank”‘s, and deliver the photos to “Jean Michele Traquenard.” Conveniently, those are the rest of our suspects!
Back in the main room, we can talk to Heather some more. She tells us that the windmill used to be owned by an old lady who died a couple of years ago. Minette said that the circular shape of the windmill would make her productive — untrue, but she is getting a lot of press out of it. And press attention is very important! Heather thinks that’s also the reason Minette wears that mask all the time. She also offers to pick up the photos from Dieter von Schwesterkrank for us, but Nancy’s like, “No can do, I gotta interrogate him before I even know there’s a mystery.”
So we go to the market to get Minette’s stuff. Some of the sellers will have objects from past games up for sale (that’s Spook #10’s arm up there in the screencap), which is a cute Easter egg. One of the sellers will let us do a minigame painting pictures to earn money if we ever run out (which we will). Minette wants “curves”, so we basically buy everything that’s vaguely circular in shape.
And in the middle of the park, we find…this. What on earth is that? Well, whatever it is, I bet we’ll need it later.
Anyway, our next task is to get the photos from Dieter von Schwesterkrank. He’s kind of a penis, but the game won’t progress without the fabric photos, so we ignore his commentary and very politely ask for the fabric photos. He’s like, “I mean, I could make them for you seeing as that’s literally my job and these photos are for an internationally renowned designer, or you could do it because I enjoy fobbing tasks off onto you.” Dieter’s been in this game for thirty seconds, and he’s already learning!
We wander around and notice a camera on one of his tables. “Is it digital?” Nancy asks. Ha! It is, because this is the year 2006 and cameras are digital, although not part of our phones yet. We pick up the binder with the instructions for developing film, although obviously you can’t look at it in the darkroom. Which is why I immediately blew myself up:
Second chance button away! So basically, you gotta click on the developing items in order (enlarger, developing pan, stop bath) and leave the film in each of them for the correct amount of time to develop the photos properly. Too little or too long time, and they explode. If you click on the wrong station, they explode. And this is why I take my film to Walgreens. Or I did, before they got rid of their machine. That was a dark day. Moving on!
Success!
So we have our photos, and Dieter snarks that we get the pleasure of delivering them to Jean Michele Traquenard. He is not a fan: apparently nobody wants Jean Michele to write anything mean about them in his magazine column, so they all stay on his good side. Dieter, on the other hand, is…too German to suck up to him? I don’t know. Anyway, so the two of them don’t like each other, and Dieter’s making us do his work for him again. Well, in that case, the least he can do is help us out with our mystery: what does he think of Heather? Dieter sniffs that Heather’s a bright girl, apart from her embarrassing crush on him. Whoa, Heather has a crush on him? “Dealing with models the way I do, day in and day out, I’ve gotten pretty good at knowing what women are thinking,” he says. I mean, he thought we were a lost American tourist instead of a detective-slash-fashion assistant, so maybe don’t brag so much, Dieter. He tells us that models respond better to him if he develops an air of compassion and trustworthiness, with the unfortunate side effect that women constantly fall in love with him. He sounds a little like a serial killer, not going to lie. Anyway, our final question is what “Jean Mi” needs with the prints, and Dieter says they’re for an article he’s writing. I don’t know why we’re suddenly on nickname terms with Jean Michele, but okay. Off to meet him!
Jean Michele — Jean Michel? The subtitles aren’t consistent* — spends all day at the Café Kiki, so we go meet him there. We introduce ourselves in French, to show off Nancy’s two-year high school French skillz. Jean Michel is not impressed, and tells us to speak English so he won’t have to hear his native tongue butchered. Why you gotta be so mean, Jean Mi 🙁 Anyway, he thinks we’re Heather’s replacement, and remarks that she lasted longer than Minette’s past assistants. We correct him, and he says that Heather wants to leave her mark on the world of couture. Does Nancy? “Would it be bad if I said yes?” Nancy says. Jean Michel says that ambition is a good thing, because fashion is a dog-eat-dog world. Also, he thinks Dieter is a douche.
*”Michel” is the more common masculine variant (“Michele” is Italian, not French), so I’m going to spell it that way. The subtitles seem to have settled on this spelling too, so I think “Michele” was just a typo.
Jean Michel makes us order lunch, and he gossips about Minette and her mask. He thinks she wears it because of a botched plastic surgery. “Self-image — it can make people do strange things,” he notes. We ask who Minette’s worst enemy is, and Jean Michel tells us that it’s definitely Hugo Butterly — he and Minette have similar style and so compete for the same clients. Plus, they’re both self-centered assholes. Not that that stops Jean Michel from having Hugo Butterly’s number in his phone, or handing it over to us. (He also has the numbers for a “Anne-Lucie Croix” and “Pace Carroll,” who I don’t know if I tried calling or not.)
Final question: can we meet Jean Michel anywhere besides the cafe? Nope, he does have an office at “GlamGlam”, but he only takes visitors at the cafe. We can call him, as he has a phone that “can do everything except sing ‘The Marseillaise.’” Because he’s French.
Time to meet our roommate and last suspect, Australian supermodel Jing Jing “JJ” Ling! Dig that apartment. My broke ass can only dream of living somewhere with ivy-covered columns in the kitchen. JJ. tells us we can borrow her clothes — she totally knows what it’s like to lose your luggage, as it happened to her once. The airline gave her $100 as compensation, and then five years later, they found the luggage and returned it to her, along with a bill for the $100! “What, don’t you believe me?” Nancy says she does, but…hmmm. Anyway, JJ’s making cookies, and she tells us she has to eat a lot, because she’s underweight for a plus-size model, and Minette needs her to be “full-figured” and “curvy” in order to use her as a fitting model. You know, I used to be super obsessed with ~fashion~, collected all kinds of obscure Vogues from Italy and China and Turkey, knew the names of really obscure models, blah blah blah. I think it’s nice that the game is trying not to promote skinniness, but can I just say, it’s so unlikely that A) anyone cares about plus-size modeling enough for JJ to be famous and B) Minette would ever become renowned solely making plus-size clothing. But whatever.
We can ask JJ about our suspects as well, seeing as she’s known them all way longer than we have. She tells us that Dieter and Minette used to date! Scandalous! They dated for about six months, then Minette ended it out of the blue. She says we’d have to ask Dieter for more details, though. “Just watch out while you’re in that studio of his. He lets his pet boa constrictor around loose in there.” I bet he does. Oh, she meant a literal boa constrictor, because this game is rated E. Nancy says she doesn’t think that’s true, and J.J. laughs and says sometimes she makes stuff up just to see if people will believe her — in order to be a good model, you have to be a good actress! So we can surmise her story about the luggage wasn’t true, but she says that Dieter really does keep a snake in his studio.
We’re meant to get an envelope from JJ, which she hands over. She says it’s her information so they can pay her, and she didn’t want to give that information over the phone, because she’s a little paranoid. Fair enough. We can poke around the apartment a bit more, and we find a magazine (“Utne”) which has an article about the catacombs of Paris, and a guy named “Zu” who illegally explores them. There’s also a newspaper article about a growing mint shortage.
Before we go back to Minette’s and get yelled at some more, let’s tell our friends that we made it to France, yes?
Bess is all twitterpated that we’re interning for a famous fashion designer; George, not so much. Nancy tells them that Minette uses “rude” to mean “good,” and Bess is all excited over that. “That’s got a ring to it,” she says. “Like, ‘He is one rude dude.’ I’m gonna start using that.” If you’re going to say things like “rude dude”, please don’t, Bess. We also talk about Minette’s bizarre behavior, and Nancy muses that Heather must really want to be a fashion designer if she’s willing to put up with Minette just to make some contacts. Bess and George think that Heather’s ambition means she’s probably pretty ruthless. George is like, “Watch out or she’ll stab you in the back!” Then we bring up Dieter and mention Heather’s crush on him, and George is like, “He better be careful, or her crush could turn into something a little less harmless.” What’d Heather ever do to George? Anyway, we tell them a bit about Jean Michel and Hugo Butterly, and Bess opines that Hugo Butterly makes really nice clothes. (You’ll recall that, per the books, Bess is kinda chubby.) And that’s it for Bess and George!
The Hardy Boys are our other phone friends in this game. I think I just threw up in my mouth a little. But for the sake of completion, let’s talk to them. Joe picks up and yells at Frank to get on the line. Frank comes running in all, “Nancy, Nancy, I still love you!” Nobody cares, Frank. “Everything okay?” Joe asks, because he knows I wouldn’t call the Hardy Boys unless I were on fire and needed them to put me out. Maybe not even then. Anyway, the Hardy Boys are busy moving furniture so the carpet-layers can redo their basement floor. Ha! They continue to be completely terrible detectives! I should keep track of how many games actually have them working a case when Nancy calls. Nancy tells them she’s staying in the Latin Quarter and Joe derps, “I thought you were in France, not Central America.” Joe is really testing his title as my favorite Hardy Boy. We name-drop JJ and Joe completely flips out. I feel like he’s the kind of dude who looks at bra ads because they’re the closest he’s ever gonna get to seeing boobs. ANYWAY, we tell them about Minette and her studio — Frank says, “You mentioned it was in a windmill or something?” and Nancy says, “It’s in a moulin — that’s French for windmill.” That’s what he said, Nancy. Don’t be a show-off. Wait, am I defending Frank Hardy? I feel gross. We exposit a little more and the Hardy Boys offer their commentary, and that’s that for them. We can call Hugo Butterly, but we can’t actually talk to him. Back to Minette’s!
Back at the moulin, we can look around some more. There’s a notebook on Heather’s desk, and she says she’s supposed to be working on a project for Minette. (Spoiler: we are going to have to do this project for her, as usual.) If we look in our desk drawers, we see a bunch of notes belonging to Minette’s old assistant, Sonny Joon. Hey, we know him! I wonder how he got this job. I don’t think Joanna gave him a glowing reference. He keeps calling Minette “Mean-nette”, which is a sensible if not particularly inspired pun. Anyway, our first actual job is to fix the “plotter,” which according to Wikipedia is a type of printer for vector graphics. I did not know that until I looked up to write this recap. It’s pretty easy, so whatever. Once we’re done, the phone will ring, and it’s a historian who wants to talk to Minette about “Noisette Tornade.” Heather tells us to tell the historian that Minette can’t get back to her until after her collection is done, but now we have a clue! A clue about a mystery we don’t know exists yet, but still!
Let’s talk to Heather again. We give her the envelope from JJ, and ask about her ambitions to be a fashion designer. Heather tells us that she’s studied at RISD and Central Saint Martins, so she likes to think she already IS a designer. Fair enough, though I note she says that she studied at these places, not necessarily finished their programs. She tells us that she’s working as an underpaid intern so she can get some contacts and experience in the business end of things. We ask when she thinks she’ll go off on her own, and Minette cuts in to yell at Heather over the intercom. When she’s done, Heather says, “When Minette fires me — that’s when I’ll go off on my own. And as you just heard, that could be any day now.” Aw. I feel bad for Heather.
We try to give Minette the stuff we’ve bought for her, but she’s trying to beat a high score on a computer game. Heather tells us we have to beat the game for her, or Minette will never get anything done. Minette’s rage issues aside, being her assistant seems like a pretty sweet gig? Like, I wish I could get paid to fuck around playing computer games all day.
So as you might surmise from Sonny’s constant doodlings of “CAROL” and “RUDE” all over his notes, Minette’s username is “Carol” and her password is “rude.” This takes us to “Jane’s Game Portal,” designed by Jane from Blackmoor Manor. It’s nice she found something to occupy her besides crime. Anyway, we have to beat the high score on “Model Match”, which is basically Petroglyph Punch from Blackmoor Manor. Once that’s done, Minette will want to look at the stuff we’ve bought. She’s all pleased and tells us to get JJ so Minette can start designing with a model. JJ’s not picking up her phone, so Heather sends us to get her. “Go like the wind,” she tells us.
Okay, but first let’s do some side puzzles! The phone rings, and who should it be but our old friend from Secret of the Scarlet Hand, Prudence Rutherford. She wants to know if Minette’s done putting together Prudence’s various seasonal outfits, as “winter’s almost upon us.” I always like trying to nail down a timeline in the games, even though I know it’s totally futile. Prudence’s designs are in that folder on Heather’s desk, and Heather predictably foists her work onto us.
We put together a bunch of ugly-ass outfits for Prudence, although I might want that pineapple bag? I have bad taste, ignore me. Once that’s done, we head off to find JJ. She’s at the apartment, making mint chocolate chip cookies. “You have to come! Minette is freaking out!” Nancy says. “Too bad. I’m not going anywhere until these cookies are finished,” JJ says. I think in the real world, JJ wouldn’t be so flippant about standing up a famous designer. Anyway, she agrees to go if we finish the cookies for her. She’s going to call us as soon as she gets to Minette’s, and if we’re not done, she’s ditching the fitting. Also, the game will kill us. So this is pretty serious business.
I love the cooking minigames, so I’m pretty excited about this! Naturally, it’s not so easy as just throwing all the ingredients in: JJ’s run out of mint and brown sugar, so we’re going to have to find a way to get those. The ingredients are all in French as well, but the recipe’s in English, so whatever.
Instead of like, just going to the store and buying more brown sugar, Nancy decides she’s going to MacGyver some out of molasses. In order to do that, we have to go back to the market and buy a book of ingredient substitutes from one of the vendors. I don’t have enough euros to buy it, so I have to do the painting minigame to earn some more money.
I can’t believe they put the Mona Lisa in the Louvre. It’s like, not hard to paint at all.
We can also buy the mint while we’re there, but you’ll recall there’s some kind of mint shortage going on in France, so it costs hella money. Remember the Norwegian butter shortage? I’m picturing something like that. Anyway, you can just sit there and paint a bunch of crappy knockoffs until you have enough money, or you can not spend 50 euros on a moldy mint sprig. That’s some bullshit.
What up, Jean Michel? We tell him that we’re making cookies for JJ, and he corrects us: “GiGi.” See, ’cause in French, “J” is pronounced like a soft “G.” Yeah, but we’re not speaking French, are we Jean Michel? Anyway, he lets it slip that Minette “tricked” JJ into her contract with Minette’s fashion house, and JJ is not happy. But that’s none of his business. So we’ll have to ask JJ about that! In the meantime, we can order an ice cream topped with mint for 5 euros, and steal the mint sprig on top. Fuck that vendor lady, trying to rip us off. Although I really don’t feel like these two leaves are going to flavor a whole batch of cookies?
Back at the apartment, we dig around in JJ’s cabinet for molasses, to make the brown sugar substitute. We find it, along with some engineering books! “What in the world is JJ doing with books on electrical engineering?” Nancy gasps. What, she can’t be continuing her education? Anyway, with all that done, we can finally start baking. Dang, how much time has this taken us? Minette’s studio must be clear on the other side of Paris.
Blah blah baking blah. If they come out round, you have done it wrong. JJ yells at us and tells us to try again before Minette gets pissed.
They’re supposed to look like this, with the edges curling up. JJ’s happy, Minette’s happy, and with that, day one ends.
Up next: Nancy learns what every college student knows — being an intern sucks. Dieter brings us a new mystery, and Nancy finds secret tunnels, as usual.
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