Luxury Travel And Dodgy Dealings: Review of The Classic Game Grim Fandango

This adventure game starts in El Marrow where Mexican Manny Calavera is a travel agent in the land of the dead. When people die he goes to the land of the living to collect their souls, brings them back to El Marrow and sells them tickets for their four year journey to eternal rest. The best tickets are for luxury packages and can only be bought by those who have led a good life.

Manny needs to sell lots of luxury packages to earn his way to eternal rest. Something strange is happening. None of Manny’s clients merit a luxury package – they have either led bad lives or somebody has fixed the computer to make it look like they have.

Enter Mercedes Colomar (Meche), who Manny falls for *sigh*. She swears that she has lived a good and honest life and he believes her and not the computer. She leaves without the ticket for the luxury package that she is entitled to and Manny starts to become suspicious of his boss Don Copal and fellow travel agent Domino Hurley. He encounters Salvador Limones, the head of the resistance to the dodgy goings on; who recruits him to investigate for the cause.

Manny needs to find Meche who has already left El Marrow. He can’t leave on foot and the only way for him to get out is to be driven by a demon in a bonewagon. He finds demon Glottis and off they go to search for Meche with lots of adventures on the way.

Despite the title the game is not grim. It’s funny in parts and really interesting. There are 55 different characters and most of them have a human form but look like they have a paper bag on their heads with features drawn on them. Demon Glottis looks like the Honey Monster – remember those Sugar Puffs adverts a few years back. He’s big, friendly and cuddly and manages somehow to squeeze into the bonewagon that takes them on their journey.

There are hundreds of puzzles that give clues to help Manny in his quest. The clues are usually in the dialogue that Manny has with Glottis and others that he meets. Phrases appear on the screen and you point your curser and click on the ones that you want to hear spoken and hear a reply to. There are always several choices including some funny one-liners. When you spot and work out the clues you know where to go and which items Manny needs to pick up to use or save in his inside jacket pocket until later. It’s amazing just how many things he can get in that pocket without it bulging!

The game is split into 4 years. The first year is set in a petrified forest and Manny and Glottis have to find their way through and past some beavers with flaming tails. The forest looks appropriately spooky but it was a little too dark in places for my liking.

The second year is in Rubacava where you meet more of the characters and search for clues in bars, casinos an old boat, a lighthouse and a morgue. They meet the top man in the crime ring, mobster Hector Lemans who is one dodgy character. Manny and Glottis want to sail on a ship in the morning and need to find and overcome certain things before they can do that. I liked the Rubacava scenery, it was interesting moving from one location to another but I did get lost a few times.

The third year sees them travelling to the Edge Of The world, on the sea and under the sea and encountering a huge octopus. They have more things to overcome before they can go on to the fourth level and end their journey at the Ninth Underworld with a few more adventures back at the others and some new locations first.

The 3D graphics are great and according to the package Art Deco and Aztec inspired environments. I have never played a game like this before and certainly found the graphics and the whole idea impressive. I was captivated by the game but being honest I didn’t understand how to solve the clues at first and had to refer to a cheat site to help me. Once I got the hang of it the game ended all too quickly, but I still got several weeks of fun playing it.

As the characters are already dead they couldn’t be killed again. The designer gets round that cleverly by providing guns that turn the characters into flowers. It sounds naff I know but in this game it works well.

The background music is jazz and apparently swing era be bop. I was too enthralled in the game to notice it much but liked it when I did.

Grim Fandango was released by LucasArts in 1998 and was selected the best game of the year by Cnet Gamecenter and Gamespot, I can’t say that I’m surprised. It’s typical good versus evil with lots of entertainment and atmosphere on the way.

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
Windows 95/98 DirectX-compatible computer
Pentium 133 or faster
32MB or higher
Quad speed or higher
2MB PCI Graphics card
100% Windows 95/98-compatible 16-bit sound card
Optional support for joysticks and gamepads
Microsoft DirectX 6.0 is available on the Grim Fandango CD and must be installed to play the game
Your system may require the “latest” Windows 95/98 drivers for your particular hardware
3D Acceleration: Optional 3D graphics support requires a 4MB PCI or AGP 3D accelerator

I bought my copy in a second hand gaming shop for £5 but would have been happy to pay more for it I’ve enjoyed playing so much.

I wasn’t too sure what to say about difficulty and complexity. For me Grim Fandango was very difficult at first but for players used to this type of game I would guess that it would be much easier but difficult enough to keep you playing for a while.

Obviously I can highly recommend it and will play it again in the future once I’ve forgotten what the clues mean. I just feel disappointed that there doesn’t appear to be a sequel, if there was I would be rushing to buy it.

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Review Source: http://creativewriter.me.uk