"Love is for the living..." (Grim Fandango (PC))

Member Name: Mutalisk

Product:	Grim Fandango (PC)
Date:	11/09/09 (51 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: wonderful score, characters, environments, style, design, plot, premise, simple, riveting, quips

Disadvantages: Might be too challenging for kids,

Grim Fandango is a 1998 LucasArts PC graphic adventure game which takes place in The Land of The Dead. Its mechanics are in a similar vain to that of Monkey Island, in that the player must converse with NPCs through simple conversation trees, collect items, and utilize items in their inventory in conjunction with their environment in order to progress.

The player assumes the role of Manuel Calavera, a man who has long passed on, and now eeks out a living in one of the many afterlifes, The Ninth Underworld, working as a Grim Reaper for the Department of Death. Sound interesting? The game is incredibly stylish, drawing heavily on such classic noir movies as Casablanca and On The Waterfront, whilst simultaneously including a great deal of influence from ancient Aztec and Mexican art, much of which is highly reminiscent of the later work of Russian artist Frida Kahlo.

Manny's job is essentially an after-death travel agent. Almost everyone in the game has died some time ago, and the newly-dead are delivered to Manny, who checks up their information in a database and assigns each "client" with a travel deal package in order to reach the NEXT afterlife, a place which nobody knows anything about. The travel packages are based on whether or not the souls have led a worthwhile life, and can include anything from a simple walking-stick with a compass attached, to a golden ticket on the Number Nine, an express train headed for the Tenth Underworld, reserved only for the most moral and true of heart. Manny just can't seem to get his big break, always getting stuck with deadbeat clients, but why? Something smells rotten in The Land of The Dead... It is only when Manny begins to question this that he uncovers a Worldwide conspiracy, and with his missing client Mercedes Colomar, so begins an epic tale of love, crime and corruption.

The game takes place over four years, each day on The Land of The Dead, a real Mexican festival. Manny really travels the World, seeing all kinds of places, all teeming with originality and brilliance of concept. Never have I seen a game with such flawless style, the beautiful environments are all perfectly rendered and brilliantly conceived. Looking at the game, with its simple (but still amazingly playable) mechanics and ever-so-slightly pixelly character models, its easy to tell that its not new, but thats not what matters. The game is very much carried by its myriad characters, all of which are superbly written and well-voiced with SO many highly memorable quips! This is not a game that takes itself seriously, with its crazy elaborate puzzles and unlikely situations, it has a huge amount of humour injected in it, but nonetheless, any player would still feel an enormous amount of investment in every one of the characters. It also has a truly tremendous score, one of the best I have ever seen. 31 tracks, fusing latin-jazz, mexican parade music, noir, atmospheric and bepop. The soundtrack is also available for purchase, but isn't really worth it, as they can be manually ripped from the game's .pak file if you're clever, albeit in slightly lower quality.

Sound effects, rendering, replayability, writing, longevity, style and plot are all nothing short of brilliant. Although puzzles can very occasionally be somewhat montonous and complicated, and its impossible to actually lose the game, (without just giving up on it altogether.) its impossible to find yourself bored whilst playing this truly superb game, due to the amazing design and fantastic overall feel and atmosphere.

It runs perfectly well on XP, and will run on pretty much every modern computer. Its suitable for all ages, despite its adult themes, but kids might find the puzzles a little too tricky.

It has received a great number of awards and critical acclaim. If you're into adventure\puzzle games, noir film, or even just games in general, you simply must play Grim Fandango. Its available at Amazon, Play, and second hand in many game shops. Well worth paying up to £15 for, but you can probably get it much cheaper on eBay.

Summary: An epic in story-driven gameplay. The definitive adventure game.