Nancy Drew Dossier: Ship of Shadows! (lost build of unreleased PC game; 2010)

The cover art for the unreleased Nancy Drew Dossier game Ship of Shadows.

Status: Partially Found

Nancy Drew Dossier: Ship of Shadows! (hereafter referred to as Ship of Shadows; also commonly abbreviated as "SOS") was intended to be the third installment of the Nancy Drew Dossier series, a hidden object PC game series developed by Her Interactive. The Dossier series launched in 2008 and was designed to be a casual series complimenting the long-standing Nancy Drew Adventure series.

Shelving of Ship of Shadows and Discontinuation of the Dossier Series

Ship of Shadows was teased at the end of the second installment of the Dossier series, Resorting to Danger, which was released in 2009. Although the teaser trailer did not include a release date, it is estimated that Ship of Shadows was going to be released in 2010 since one Dossier game had been released per year up to that point.

On March 15, 2011, then-Her Interactive Community Forums administrator Inter_Sleuth posted an announcement about the game on the "Notes from Her Interactive" message board. According to Inter_Sleuth, Ship of Shadows was originally delayed in order to make the game "the best the series had to offer," in response to feedback from fans on the first two installments. Development of the game was further held up due to work on other projects, including the Nancy Drew Mobile Mysteries series. This unfortunately led to the removal of Ship of Shadows from the company's release schedule and the shelving of the Dossier series.

On October 14, 2011, then-Her Interactive CEO Stuart Moulder indicated during an interview with GameZebo that there were no plans to continue the Dossier series at the time. According to Moulder, fans of the Nancy Drew Adventure series "didn’t feel that the Dossier line met their expectations." He went on to say that "if we [Her Interactive] were to try our hand again at a Dossier game or something like it, we will need to figure out how to ensure that any new game meets the expectations of our current fans."

On October 28, 2011, then-Her Interactive marketing coordinator Little Jackalope posted the game's cover art to the Amateur Sleuth Blog.

Game Premise

The game would have followed Nancy Drew aboard a haunted cruise ship. The following is a transcript of the teaser trailer audio, as spoken by Nancy:

When a recently renovated cruise ship invites me on a "sneak peak" passage, I immediately say yes. I mean, spending a couple of days aboard an antique luxury liner? How fun is that?

But as soon as we leave port, it becomes apparent this is not your ordinary cruise ship. Ghostly faces at portholes, eerie lights in the dead of night, people vanishing into thin air -- things quickly go from slightly weird to downright scary!

Help me figure out why before I end up going down with the ship in my next case, 'Ship of Shadows'...

Found Images

Found images from Ship of Shadows include:

• 2 background photos posted by artist Cody Flynn to Drawing Thunder
• 1 puzzle background posted by artist Jeff Fisher to his personal website
• 1 puzzle background posted by artist Zack Rock to his LinkedIn page
• 1 art asset posted by artist Jeff Fisher to his personal website
• 4 character concepts posted by artist Ayu Othman to her personal website

Gallery

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  2D view of the cover art for SOS.

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  3D view of the cover art for SOS.

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  Unidentified artwork of the SOS ship.

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  Background photo for SOS.

• Ship of Shadows Game Background Photo

  Background photo for SOS.

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  Background for a matching puzzle.

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  Background for a token puzzle.

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  Art asset showing a diagram of a heliograph.

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  Character concept art for Aiden Bodh.

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  Character concept art for Eva Morucchio.

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  Character concept art for Julia.

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  Character concept art for Maurice Badeau.