Posted December 14, 2014
Back when the Earth was young and dinosaurs roamed the tropics, I played Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers (1993), probably on my doughty 486DX machine. Games came in boxes, back then - cardboard things, with printed manuals and comics and maps and the like. It was a different time.
I was curious about what it would be like to play it now. I've bought a lot of old Sierra games here - damn you, GOG sales! - but I haven't played any of them yet. Big crude pixels, parse-y controls: I wasn't sure it would be any fun.
It is! It is super fun. Gabriel Knight has aged exceptionally well. It's a bit crude and clunky, sure, but the story is great and the gameplay is largely satisfying. Kicking around a restricted New Orleans (which seemed very large way back when) and checking for clues is engrossing, and trying to figure out the Sierra puzzle logic is still good for some quiet victories in front of the monitor. The voice acting is spectacular, and the game walks a fine clever line between goofy and grown-up.
The game is voiced by Tim Curry, Mark Hamill, Michael Dorn, Leah Rimini, and more: the characters are distinct and interesting (and the atmospheric and sometimes hilarious narration by Virginia Capers deserves mention). The plot is ludicrous enough, but it keeps the gameplay moving, and it's generally easy to pick up after a break of a few days. There are only a few screens to most locations, and only a few objects are active in any given screen, but the rest of the screen spots will return snappy messages when you click on them. The puzzles range from minor moments of moving inventory from place to place, to more involved problems which require figuring out how to relocate characters so you can tinker with their stuff while they're gone, or how to survive through a few action sequences (these tend to be the weaker moments, I thought). Most of these are responsive to a little bit of consideration, and a couple are admittedly obscure. But, hey, Sierra. That's how it is.
I did hit a walkthrough a couple of times, on the grounds that I just don't have a schedule that lets me devote weeks to figuring out what on earth the devs were thinking. Gabriel Knight is a game that plays well with hints, I find - once I'm pointed in the right general direction, I'm able to work the rest on my own. But sometimes the right general direction is unclear. Still, none of the puzzles stand out as being ludicrous or unfair.
I had a fair amount of spotty audio on my system - lots of clicks, and wildly varied volume levels. Sometimes it was impossible to hear a few lines, though nothing critical was lost. Audio lagged very badly starting after Gabriel's trip to the airport, which did get a bit frustrating - I'd click on something, and nothing would happen, and I'd click on something else, and then the recording from the first click would start to play and cut off when the game realized there had been another click. Not the end of the world, but it was irritating.
The endgame action sequence was also fairly hard to play, both because there were lags in the action sequences and very short intervals in which the game would accept input, and because the final big move in the closing sequence is not an obvious choice, to me at least. In some point and click games, the protagonist is immortal; Gabriel can die, starting somewhere around Day Five or Day Six, so this is a save-often game (the first time he died, I was caught off-guard and had to play through a couple of days to get back).
It turns out that I did not finish the game when I played it the first time; I don't think I made it past the airport, and may not even have gotten to the first of the voodoo ceremonies. My clearest memories were from Jackson Square, with the musicians and vendors - I remember getting stuck there several times, the first time I played.
Overall: this game is a treat, though it does require a little adjustment on the sound and graphics front. I was given a copy of the new remake in an IAmSinistar giveaway, and I'll be playing that soon to compare. I finished with 339 of 342 possible points, and have no idea what three points I might have missed - nothing serious, I trust.
My list of finished games
I was curious about what it would be like to play it now. I've bought a lot of old Sierra games here - damn you, GOG sales! - but I haven't played any of them yet. Big crude pixels, parse-y controls: I wasn't sure it would be any fun.
It is! It is super fun. Gabriel Knight has aged exceptionally well. It's a bit crude and clunky, sure, but the story is great and the gameplay is largely satisfying. Kicking around a restricted New Orleans (which seemed very large way back when) and checking for clues is engrossing, and trying to figure out the Sierra puzzle logic is still good for some quiet victories in front of the monitor. The voice acting is spectacular, and the game walks a fine clever line between goofy and grown-up.
The game is voiced by Tim Curry, Mark Hamill, Michael Dorn, Leah Rimini, and more: the characters are distinct and interesting (and the atmospheric and sometimes hilarious narration by Virginia Capers deserves mention). The plot is ludicrous enough, but it keeps the gameplay moving, and it's generally easy to pick up after a break of a few days. There are only a few screens to most locations, and only a few objects are active in any given screen, but the rest of the screen spots will return snappy messages when you click on them. The puzzles range from minor moments of moving inventory from place to place, to more involved problems which require figuring out how to relocate characters so you can tinker with their stuff while they're gone, or how to survive through a few action sequences (these tend to be the weaker moments, I thought). Most of these are responsive to a little bit of consideration, and a couple are admittedly obscure. But, hey, Sierra. That's how it is.
I did hit a walkthrough a couple of times, on the grounds that I just don't have a schedule that lets me devote weeks to figuring out what on earth the devs were thinking. Gabriel Knight is a game that plays well with hints, I find - once I'm pointed in the right general direction, I'm able to work the rest on my own. But sometimes the right general direction is unclear. Still, none of the puzzles stand out as being ludicrous or unfair.
I had a fair amount of spotty audio on my system - lots of clicks, and wildly varied volume levels. Sometimes it was impossible to hear a few lines, though nothing critical was lost. Audio lagged very badly starting after Gabriel's trip to the airport, which did get a bit frustrating - I'd click on something, and nothing would happen, and I'd click on something else, and then the recording from the first click would start to play and cut off when the game realized there had been another click. Not the end of the world, but it was irritating.
The endgame action sequence was also fairly hard to play, both because there were lags in the action sequences and very short intervals in which the game would accept input, and because the final big move in the closing sequence is not an obvious choice, to me at least. In some point and click games, the protagonist is immortal; Gabriel can die, starting somewhere around Day Five or Day Six, so this is a save-often game (the first time he died, I was caught off-guard and had to play through a couple of days to get back).
It turns out that I did not finish the game when I played it the first time; I don't think I made it past the airport, and may not even have gotten to the first of the voodoo ceremonies. My clearest memories were from Jackson Square, with the musicians and vendors - I remember getting stuck there several times, the first time I played.
Overall: this game is a treat, though it does require a little adjustment on the sound and graphics front. I was given a copy of the new remake in an IAmSinistar giveaway, and I'll be playing that soon to compare. I finished with 339 of 342 possible points, and have no idea what three points I might have missed - nothing serious, I trust.
My list of finished games
