Nancy Drew®: Shadow at the Water's Edge

Nancy Drew®: Shadow at the Water's Edge

Skip · Narrative · 2011

Steam Deck Playable

The verdict

WAIT.

It has sold at a fair price before.

Today

$19.99Skip

On its price record

$14.07Fair

Length
8.5h 16.3h to 100%
Value
$2.35/hr
Reviews
82% of 428 positive
Reviews or length hold it below the tiers even at a deep discount.
Watch this gameOne alert at $14.07 or less.

Buy now or wait

Discounted in each of its last 8 seasonal sales. Last cut ended 11 days ago.

Next sale
Winter Sale, Dec 17 to Jan 4

Sources: IsThereAnyDeal, Valve.

What drives the score

How to read this

Grades run S to D, read from the buyer's side. ▲ marks a lift, ▼ a drag or a dock, ? an input we do not have, • a fact this genre's score does not use. How the grades work

Holding it back
Value$2.35/hr
Price per hour of game. It moves the score inside the ceiling reviews set
Reviews82% positive
Gates the score. Weak reviews cap it, and nothing reaches BANGER without strong ones Scored as 81% after the small-sample adjustment
For context
MonetizationNot known
No monetization record for this game, so nothing is assumed either way
Refunds1 of 292 reviews
Steam-purchase reviews sampled whose writer refunded the game. Nothing is docked
AI contentNone disclosed
From the developer's own Steam disclosure. No disclosure is not proof of none, so it does not move the score

About the game

Confront Terrifying Secrets in a Haunted Japanese Inn!
Description from the Steam store page.
Minimum specs

Minimum on the Steam store: 512 MB of memory, 64 MB DirectX 9.0 compatible video card, 2 GB of storage. Runs on Windows, macOS.

The value story

52 discounts in the 14 years on record, a median of 40 percent off across all of them, roughly 12 weeks apart. Today it is at full price, and its last discount ended 11 days ago.

On value it sits in the top 27 percent of its genre. It is pricier than 94 percent of its genre, and better reviewed than 72 percent. Among the games that feel like it, Broken Sword 5 - the Serpent's Curse ($24.99, scores 60) beats it on value, while it beats Nancy Drew®: Midnight in Salem ($21.99, scores 3).

More about Nancy Drew®: Shadow at the Water's Edge

This site sampled 292 of its Steam-purchase reviews; 1 was written by a buyer who refunded it, sampled from reviews written April 2020 to August 2026.

Players

Players online
10 when we last checked, on Oct 4, 17:54 UTC

Player counts from the Steam Web API.

What players say

great atmosphere that offsets how much i don't LOVE some of the other aspects. a slim cast means a slim plot and that is definitely on display here, and unfortunately "Japan" seems to equate to "doing a ton of sudoku" in the world of puzzles - i really did not like how incredibly focused on basically Japanese newspaper puzzles this was. HOWEVER the setting is great and it does often take the crown for spookiest Drew...
QWEAVERecommendedafter 11hJun 2026Read on Steam
2 more reviews
my first ever nancy drew game. very enjoyable. my favorite part was when the phone glitched and we couldn't get the final text message to complete the game. I ate an entire block of mozzarella cheese that night and gave myself a stomach ache. 8/10
Woppy the WeatherbotRecommendedafter 9.4hJun 2026Read on Steam
My absolute favorite ND game to date (tied with Alibi in Ashes probably) given its setting in Japan and its puzzle heavy content. I loved the spooks, and I am not a horror fan at all! It just suits the game so well and after having replayed this one often I know all the jumpscares by heart. Making bento boxes is still my absolute favorite mini-game, I can play that for hours and have a save file handy just to play...
NibletRecommendedafter 49hJun 2026Read on Steam

Steam reviews, mixed to its ratio and rotated daily. Opinions are theirs.

No data upstream: critic score (Metacritic), achievement curve (Steam global achievements).

Cite this score

BANG Score badge
Nancy Drew®: Shadow at the Water's Edge scores 46/100 on the BANG Score (a skip) as of Oct 19, 2026. The BANG Score rates what a game is worth for the money. Via Steam BANGERS. https://steambangers.com/game/200080/nancy-drew-shadow-at-the-water-s-edge
Embed the live badge

Reviews set the ceiling, and price against real length moves the BANG Score inside it. How it works, and where it is weak → Steam reviews as of Sep 29, price as of Oct 18. A number here look wrong? Tell me and I will check the inputs.

Tags

Steam user tags as SteamSpy recorded them

Details

DeveloperHeR Interactive
PublisherHeR Interactive
GenreNarrative
Released2011
Players75Kowners, SteamSpy estimate