Dream Inn: Driftwood is a new game put out by Crown Adam. It is their first game in the pc/mac genre. They have another game coming out for the iPod/iPhone. So it will be a matter of time to see what direction they will take.
The game starts off with a very nice narrative story. Apparently you play an older individual that has long missed the days of an Inn by the ocean. And upon reading the paper you find that the Driftwood Inn (of your childhood days) is up for auction. You, of course, become the owner (otherwise there is no game LOL). When you arrive you see that things are not what you remember. In short the place is in shambles. The inn manager comes out to greet you and tells you of their financial problems, but since you are there, things will soon start to look up..
The game play is very well put together. In short, you get a tour of your new Inn only to find all of the suites are a wreck. Many items in the (themed) suites are either not where they should be, belong to another suite, or are just miscellaneous items left behind and can be sold off.
You start off in the first room and are told that you need to find items in a list that show only six at a time (so yes, while you see an item that may not belong, you cannot select it until you see it appear in the list). Some of the items you find belong to other suites, and upon finding these, you are alerted to an icon at the bottom, telling you what room they belong to. Other items bring you money, that you can use to renovate the Inn.
Finding items that belong to other suites gets you a key that allows you to go into that suite and do the same. But first you have to take the items that you found from a prior suite and put them where they belong, then return to the room and pick up the mess (which of course will yield more items belonging to other suites thus allowing you access to those).
The object of all this of course is to get the rooms cleaned up so that they can be rented out, which brings more money. At the start when you clean a room, the items you find can easily be placed in the corresponding room, then cleaned up. However, as you progress throughout the game, you will need to clean more than one room to complete another. Once the rooms are cleaned, someone comes buy and rents ones out (of course). And you make a nice profit. Other ways of getting money is looking for hidden coins. Nice thing about this is you get two chances to find them. Once while cleaning, and second time when plcaing the items where they need to go. Down side(from programmer point of view) the coins are in the same spot all the time.
Unlike many HOG games, all the items found actually serve a purpose, as they should(This is the primary reason I do not enjoy HOG games. There is no reason for searching for the items and the "rewarded" item you get after finding your million pieces, was not amongst the items being searched). When you find items they either belong in another room, or they can be sold off (not a choice, its game controlled).
The fun part (for me anyways) is the cleaning up the place. With the money you get you can buy one of three different options of whatever part of the In you are working on. Want a really nice wall? You have three options to choose from, Good Better Best! All aspects of the inn can be renovated. I spent a lot of time cleaning and redoing rooms so I could get the money I wanted to make a very pristine looking inn.
Over all this game is great. Decent music, the graphics work really well. The managers voice can get on your nerves a little. And the do a wonderful job of making a HOG game work well. The game should actually have a sub genre of "builder" as well since you do have to build up your Inn. There are lots of little surprises I left out, because I did not want to spoil the game. The hint structure is very unique and fun. And they actually blend together as well - in other words, more than one type of hint can be found in a single room. Play it, you 'll know what I mean.
Skip Johnson is an avid game player. Both in the MMO world as well as the casual gaming community. He spends much of his free time working on his gaming site and contributing resources as well as reviewing new casual games as they arrive.
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