Gabriel Knight 3: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned

The Good
An adventure game that is both new and old in many aspects, Gabriel Knight manages to dazzle the mind once again as he stars in yet another perfectly crafted storyline written by series creator Jane Jensen. As usual for the series, the game puts you in the middle of a complex and genuinely interesting plot that revolves around actual facts sprinkled with some supernatural elements and with some dashes of lighthearted sexual comedy. The results are once again, as usual: magnificent.

The storyline progresses smoothly, and introduces plot-points and revelations at a pace that manages to keep you interested yet doesn't overshoot, even if it does lean heavily towards being a "Whudunnit?" plot and ditches most of the supernatural elements (more on that later). Further praise must be awarded to Mrs Jensen for finally putting a closure to one of the most annoying aspects that plagued the series: the Gabriel/Grace love/hate relationship, It always seemed like a cheap gimmick to keep ratings up and this is Gabriel Knight, not "Friends". The resolution is open to interpretation, but for the most part ends the "will they ever get toghether?" question, and lets us focus on the storyline instead of the shitty "loves me / loves me not" soap opera. I personally would have preferred it to be more final, but at least it's something.

The real innovation in the game comes of course, in the gameplay and graphics area. It seems that the GK are the only game series that have passed all the major gameplay/graphic fads of the videogame industry, first the SCUMM-ish sprite-based engine, then the FMV interactive-movie one, and now the flashy polygonal world comes to the GK franchise. As far as I'm concerned, the engine and the gameplay mechanics work perfectly with the game since nothing allows you to explore with as much leisure and freedom as a fully-polygonal world. Basically, you don't just control the characters, but you also have full control of the "camera" that serves as your pov, so you can move anywhere you want and get a good look at whatever the hell you want. The puzzles respond to this engine change, and tough there are still plenty of "typical" inventory/deduction puzzles, there are also new ones that involve visual coordination and less obvious mind skills. In all, the new engine is a marked improvement, and the puzzles and general gameplay are extremely well made.

The production values for the game are also top-notch, with great voice acting (who the hell says this game has bad acting??? The accents are a bit on the rough side, but it's still far from being Deus Ex!) fantastic music (tough a bit far too folky for my taste), and (on a more superfluous note) a kickass box and documentation. The manual is as flimsy as they get nowadays, but the game includes a wonderfully drawn (if a bit to artsy) comic as a prologue to the game just as in the original.

The Bad
Well, I loved GK3 and in fact the entire GK series is one of my personal favorite adventure series, but regardless of my enjoyment, I am not fanboyish enough to ignore the game's flaws.

First of all the gameplay introduces a highly controversial addition to me: time-based puzzles. In other words, there are some actions in the game that take place in real-time whether you are there or not, and if you manage to get them good, if not it sucks to be you pal!!.... Geez, I assume this was done as a means of artificially enhancing the replayability factor, but it's a very anal way of doing so. Plus most of the time there are no logical pointers to tell you whether X thing is going to happen at Y moment, you just have to pray that you are at the right time in the right moment. None of these moments are game-stoppers if you miss them, but that doesn't mean it doesn't suck to miss them.

Furthermore, the storyline is good and all, but unfortunately ditches all the horror and suspense the previous games were known for. Jane Jensen focused on telling a tale more about conspiracies, secrets and developing her characters. So that leaves little place for the terror. In fact, if it weren't for the occasional murder the game pretty much forgets about it's "vampiric" setting and instead plays more like a whudunnit adventure with a lot of historical and occult references. There just isn't enough room between Gabriel and Grace's romantic comedy, the conspiracy theories and the historical mumbo-jumbo to jam in the terror, which leads me to believe that the series has finally turned into it's creator's fetish outlet where she just does whatever the hell she wants regardless of whether it fits the role or not. That's respectable, but Mrs Jensen would benefit from going back to the humble roots that started her road to fame instead of using GK as some sort of open mike for her historical interests. When you think about it, it's better to have the series die now instead of having to endure sequels that fully cross the border into "edutaiment" brrr.... Now THAT's terrifying!!!

Sure, the GK games were as scary as forgetting the keys to your car, but at least they had a lot of suspense, and managed to create some serious atmosphere. The game still retains the quality in writing and all, but suspense/horror-wise it doesn't hold a candle against the previous GKs. And don't get me started on the vampires!! I meet scarier anorexic black trenchcoat-wearing dumbasses on my local goth-club... mmmmh.... goth chicks.... hmmmmm!....... What? Oh yeah, the vampires on GK3 suck. And what's with the Indiana Jones ending sequence??? Let's just move on...

Last but not least there are some weird graphic issues. I don't have a monster system, yet I can perfectly run massive 3D games like the new Wolf, GTA3, etc.. yet GK3 still chugs like a bastard whenever I try to turn on full detail! Furthermore there are clipping issues and other interesting glitches that make it seem as if the engine needed another couple of hours on the Q&A program, but the main issue that I bring this up is that while far above average, the quality of the graphics never justify the problems it causes! I still laugh whenever I remember Gabriel's "cardboard" underwear or the visible joints on every character model. To be fair tough, the quality of the textures is still amazing.

The Bottom Line
GK3 is a perfect example of when an artist has waaay to much power. Even if she were on drugs and with handcuffs, Jane Jensen could still write a fantastic storyline. Yet I feel if someone had bothered to remind her aim should have been making a great game instead of "Jane Jensen's Gabriel Knight 3" the game would have been as memorable not just as a well-crafted 3D adventure but also as a horror/suspense classic. As it is now it's a great adventure, but don't let the box deceive you, this is a "conspiracy mystery placed in a history lesson". That doesn't mean it's bad, mind you, but it's far different from the "suspense thriller based on actual historical facts" that the previous games had us used to. Ask yourself what your interests are before you dive in. Regardless of that it's a fantastic game that should keep you interested for quite a while.

The Good
I'm a big fan of the Gabriel Knight series. I admire Jane Jensen, the creative talent behind them, and all the designers and programmers who managed to turn deep and complex stories into engrossing and fascinating games.

Gabriel Knight 3 is no exception. The two previous games did wonders in combining the natural and the supernatural, or, better to say, in making the supernatural look completely natural, feeding the player information on history, religions, philosophy, and occult sciences without becoming boring. In the third game, the story goes even deeper, into the heart of Judaism and Christianity, and shocks you with unconventional ideas about their origins and historical development. If you are, like myself, interested in this kind of stuff, you will be amazed at what Jane Jensen has achieved in this story. Of course, she didn't invent the most shocking revelations; she took them from the same sources Dan Brown later did for his poorly written and overrated Da Vinci Code. The alternate history of Christianity and speculations about apocryphal biographies of Jesus are not new; but it is commendable that Jane Jensen was not afraid of treating such stuff in a video game narrative.

What's more, she treats the material much better than Brown; she doesn't engage in cheap and badly motivated attacks on the Catholic church, or presents fictional accounts of Gnostic philosophy which anyone who has some knowledge about the matter will immediately deem ridiculous. She also adds some cool plot twists which are most probably fruits of her own fantasy. For what it's worth, Gabriel Knight 3 is a great and rare example of a very ambitious narrative that actually passes the test for credibility.

But don't think the story is all about Jesus and the Masons. As much as the historical part of the game is interesting, there are also plenty of more "earthy" moments, mostly involving the relationship between Gabriel and Grace. The new supporting cast is perhaps more interesting than in both previous games; but for the sake of nostalgia, you also meet an old pal from first game's New Orleans.

The gameplay is for the most part even deeper and more varied than it was in the previous games. The game lets you perform many actions which are not necessary to complete it. In fact, it is possible to finish the game and miss a good deal of non-vital, but interesting information. You can really play the detective in this game, spy on everybody, lurk at places that you know will be visited by somebody, take pictures and fingerprints, work with data on your laptop, and so on. The amount of pure adventuring here is huge, from tricky inventory-based puzzles to logical detective work and clue-gathering. Many puzzles need to be solved with the help of your special computer, using all the data you managed to gather. Some puzzles are extremely tough and are sure to give you a headache, but most are fascinating and unusual - such as, for example, connecting particular locations on the map to create a hexagram.

The game is divided into small time periods, that will end and begin according to the actions you performed in order to trigger this change. Although it is not real-time in sense of Last Express, it is quite refreshing and makes the game more realistic.

The game's world is done entirely in 3D, with great graphics and a fantastic engine that allows you explore the world with the camera, and also move Gabriel around - so to say, a combination of first-person exploring and third-person navigation. This works really great, allowing more immersion into the game world and also more interesting gameplay possibilities, such as being able to examine from different distance and angles everything you see on the screen. I could never understand why adventure games kept stubbornly refusing to incorporate real-time 3D. Under a Killing Moon clearly showed the way, but only few followed it; this game is one of those few.

The Bad
The game's biggest weakness are its so-called "traditional" puzzles. The detective/spying work and all the stuff you could do with the computer was really cool. On such background, the few "classical" puzzles, taken directly out of old-fashioned comedy adventures, looked completely out of place. The obvious example is the infamous "cat mustache puzzle" - I won't give you the details for fear of spoiling you this product of mastermind puzzle design, but if you imagine a kind of a weird, illogical, and downright silly action you would normally avoid even in Day of the Tentacle, you'll get the idea. Now imagine you'll have to solve such a puzzle in a game with a highly serious, detailed narrative that deals with religion, mythology, horror, and vampires. This is the equivalent of being kicked out of the story for the duration of the exercise.

This is unfortunately not the only inappropriate puzzle in the game, though probably the most notorious one. There were some other tasks that just made me shrug my shoulders. On the other hand, some of the more clever, narrative-influenced puzzles were extremely hard. The work with the computer was fascinating, but often I was simply overwhelmed by the research possibilities, without always knowing exactly how to conduct this research.

The narrative has some problems with the pacing. Sometimes days pass before you are able to learn anything interesting; at another time, plot twists are thrown at you from all the sides. In particular, the final confrontation felt rushed and not fully satisfying.

The Bottom Line
Cat mustaches and other minor problems don't change the fact that this is an awesome game. Gabriel Knight 3 should have become a bright beacon for adventure games to come; unfortunately, the rapid decline of the genre's popularity brought the series - and the genre in general - to an undeserved demise.

The Good
A game can't go wrong with Jane Jensen at the helm. This third, and likely final, installment of the classic adventure series is once again endowed with a rich plot, fascinating characters, and mind-boggling puzzles. The new interface and free-form approach to the mystery (puzzles have multiple solutions, and you can miss a good 30% percent of the game if you're not on top of it) provide an added level of depth. Fingerprint kits and a functioning laptop computer bring Gabriel's archaic and intuitive techniques a modern flare. This time, Gabriel fully shares the bill with Grace as co-protagonists.

The Bad
While the previous two games were practically honed to perfection, this one retains some significant, if excusable, flaws. Infighting meant the development was rushed, and you can feel this at the end, when the game abruptly shifts into climax mode without provocation, leaving a significant puzzle introduced only a short time before unaddressed (Lady Howard's fang picture). The polygonal models are awkwardly shaped, and Curry's voice acting, while familiar, sometimes falls ridiculously flat. The atmosphere is distinctly lacking in this game -- the environments are almost cheerfully colorful and bright, and the free-roaming camera ability eliminates suspense in key elements of the game. Unlike the previous two entries, Robert Holmes' powerful and pervasive score is missing, a key element of the series success, replaced with David Henry's sometimes-obnoxious lounge jazz ambiance. The final puzzle of the game is a bit Tomb Raider-ish, but that's not necessarily a negative.

The Bottom Line
All in all, this is a fantastic game, and a good note for the series, and indeed the genre as a whole, to go out on. While not as timeless as its predecessors, it's replayability factor gives it added value. The plot is deep and interesting enough to be a novel (and was indeed portentous of Dan Brown's DaVinci Code), and its an essential play for any fan of the series or the genre. Unfortunately, it spelled the death of intellectual gameplay. Play it once through for the experience, and again with a walkthrough to cover the things you inevitably missed.