Grim Fandango

The Good
In 1997, LucasArts released, what is considered by many to be it’s finest game, Grim Fandango. From the twisted mind of Tim Schafer. The genius who brought us other gems of gaming such as: Full Throttle, and the recent, Psychonauts. An adventure game harkening back to the days of old. Grim Fandango is a fun and hilarious game. But how does it compare to the classics?

“An Epic Tale Of Crime And Corruption In The Land Of The Dead”

In Grim Fandango, players assume the role of Manny Calavera. He is stuck in between Heaven and Earth, in the land of the dead, a sort of purgatory. Working for the DOD, or Department Of The Dead, where he takes the recently deceased and sells them travel packages. The more virtuous a soul was in life, the better packages they earn. From a walking stick, to the ultimate, a ticket of the #9. A luxurious train that takes it’s passengers to the afterlife in style.

On one particular Day Of The Dead,( a Hispanic holiday in which deceased family members are honored.) we find that Manny is in a rut. He was once the DOD’s top agent. Now the only clients that he qualifies for were scumbags in life. This only serves to make Manny spend more time in purgatory. (The better clients, and the more # 9 tickets an agent sells, the quicker they can move on to heaven or hell.) On this fateful day Manny meets Meche. When he cannot find a good travel package for her, she wanders off. Manny then begins to uncover a conspiracy to steal the tickets of honest souls, and use them to gain wealth. From here Manny will set off on a four year journey, to find Meche, and set things right.

Manny: “I’m gonna go. That sound makes me want to kill someone.” Clown: “You two?”

The world of Grim Fandango is a very unique and interesting one. The sights and sounds are inspired by Aztec and other Hispanic design. The land of the dead looks interesting. And is filled with many wacky characters.(My favorite side characters is the Angry Clown, you meet in Year One;) And the inhabitants of the world seem real due to the excellent graphics and voice acting.

The script is also well written. And filled with jokes. Humor is often hard to pull of in a video game, but in Grim Fandango, it is pulled of every time.(I suspect that Tim Schafer got his comedic timing down during his years writing for the Monkey Island series.)

Most games fail, to make the world seen believable. Grim Fandango does not stumble here.

“Can You See What I’m Smelling?”

The Graphics in Grim Fandango are just as sharp and clean as they were ten years ago. Either with or without a 3D card. As you can set the game to use software rendering.(One of the few games with this option.) The pre-rendered visuals are some of the best of the era. And the often photo-realistic backdrops still look gorgeous.

The polygonal inhabitants of the game look great as well. Better with a 3D card, as it smoothes out the edges, and gives everything a clean look, with no jaggies.

“Ohh Ohh Ohh, Bonewagoooon,” -Glottis, The Bonewagon Song-

The music in Grim Fandango is excellent. The music fit’s the game very well and is inspired. Off the top of my head I can’t think of a track I don’t like. It’s that good.

The voice acting is also excellent. Since timing is so important in comedy. A lot of the funniest parts of the game are thanks to the great voice work of the cast. Some you may recognize from other games/TV shows. The voice acting in this game is better than that of most TV shows(particularly anime) and some animated movies!

“Is it you, or am I you?”-The Collected Poems of Manuel Calavera-

It may disappoint some to find, that the controls of Grim Fandango, are not the standard mouse based.(Therefore, Grim Fandango, is not a point and click, as some have called it.) But once you learn the controls of the game, I think you will find that they are just as good, if not better than mouse based adventure games of old.

You use the directional keys to move around, and scroll through your inventory. There are even quick keys to pull out crucial items, such as a Manny’s scythe.

The controls can also be changed to suit the camera settings. Either camera relative. That is to say fixed camera angles. Or Character relative, which as I am sure you have surmised is based on Manny’s movements. I prefer the camera relative.

The Bad
Well the game can take a bit of work to get it up and running of Windows XP.

And I don’t really care for Year 3. It just felt lacking.

The Bottom Line
“Clambake!”-The Collected Poems of Manuel Calavera-

Grim Fandango is one of the best Adventure games every made. Perhaps the best. It is such a well made game and filled with the most hilarious moments in the history of video games. I love the part in Year 2, when at the beatnik bar you can read poems, the sillier, the better.(And any parody of bad poetry is automatically funny.)

And in the end it is simply one of the best games ever made. Fans of adventure games owe it to themselves to play this one. And fans of games in general.

The Good
There's one scene in the game, where you stand on the ceiling of your own club and look at the town, where you are. This was one of the most beautiful, calm moments in my computer games-history. Just beautiful, as you'd be there. And then, the story of GF is so weird, the characters so cute, the settings detailled and the music perfect - love it or leave it! :)

The Bad
Some puzzles are a bit too difficult - you has to do stuff, you wouldn't do - and you'll find out, what to do, by pure trial & error... Then, the controls are a bit odd from time to time.

The Bottom Line
Classical point&click adventure + film noir + cuba + casablanca + surrealism + black humor + love = a wonderful, intelligent game!

But be careful - one couldn't like it, because of: film noir + cuba + casablanca + surrealism + black humor + love ;)

The Good
I like the humor in the game, some things are laugh out loud, some you may only understand 10 minutes later. The cuts scenes are very good quality, they come quite frequently breaking up the game into smaller segments. Manny's voice - it seems strange but if the main characters voice got on your nerves you would not play, but Manny (main character) is alright, quite pathetic, I sometimes feel sorry for him. The storyline is engaging right from the start, Get a good case in the department of death or your fired! I like the land of the living, it is more surreal than i first thought, you have to see it.

The Bad
Using the keyboard, I never play games like this, finding things in the game world is quite hard. It took a while to get the hang of it, but there is a control menu to help learn them. Getting stuck, once you are stuck you are very likely to stay that way as talking to characters for inspirations certainly does not help unless you need to do something with them directly. Camera angles are very tomb raider style, i got lost in them somethings are hidden from view.

The Bottom Line
It's great, not for a total puzzle game beginner though. Pleasure to the eyes and ears, You need brains and finger dexterity.