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Sefir - 02 February 2015 10:13 AM

Detective Mosely - 01 February 2015 09:58 PM

More memorable story: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango
Better lead characters: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
More interesting side characters: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
Better graphics, compared to the date of release: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango
Better puzzles: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
Better music: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile

Better game: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango

Fixed.

Grim Fandango is far superior in ALL departments (by many, many miles) and easily gets my vote.

I always found the weakest part of Grim Fandango to be its puzzles. Not weak, mind you - still fairly good - just clearly weakest of all these aspects.

Gabriel Knight 1
it’s one of the very few (only one I can remember?) non-comedy games where pure classic gameplay still manages to work pretty well.

GK1

Grim Fandango!

Sefir - 02 February 2015 10:13 AM

Detective Mosely - 01 February 2015 09:58 PM

More memorable story: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango
Better lead characters: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
More interesting side characters: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
Better graphics, compared to the date of release: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango
Better puzzles: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
Better music: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile

Better game: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango

Fixed.

Grim Fandango is far superior in ALL departments (by many, many miles) and easily gets my vote.

So untrue.  Someone mentioned how memorable the characters and the music were in Grim Fandango.  The only side character that’s memorable at all to me is Glottis, and I don’t remember a single musical track from the game, despite playing it a couple times.

By comparison to Gabriel, Manny just looks like a blank character to represent the player.  Meche is more of a concept for Manny to chase after than an actual 3-dimensional character, and the bad guy is also one-dimensional.  And I literally remember no one else from the game besides those 4 characters.

In GK1 literally every single person you meet is an interesting person to talk to.  It’s probably the only game I’ve ever played that you can say that about.

And honestly the game probably has even longer conversations than The Longest Journey, but no one ever calls it long-winded because the characters and the dialogue are so well written, and the voice acting is so good, that it’s a pleasure to listen to.

Detective Mosely - 02 February 2015 01:45 PM

Sefir - 02 February 2015 10:13 AM

Detective Mosely - 01 February 2015 09:58 PM

More memorable story: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango
Better lead characters: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
More interesting side characters: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
Better graphics, compared to the date of release: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango
Better puzzles: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile
Better music: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango by a mile

Better game: Gabriel Knight Grim Fandango

Fixed.

Grim Fandango is far superior in ALL departments (by many, many miles) and easily gets my vote.

So untrue.  Someone mentioned how memorable the characters and the music were in Grim Fandango.  The only side character that’s memorable at all to me is Glottis, and I don’t remember a single musical track from the game, despite playing it a couple times.

By comparison to Gabriel, Manny just looks like a blank character to represent the player.  Meche is more of a concept for Manny to chase after than an actual 3-dimensional character, and the bad guy is also one-dimensional.  And I literally remember no one else from the game besides those 4 characters.

In GK1 literally every single person you meet is an interesting person to talk to.  It’s probably the only game I’ve ever played that you can say that about.

And honestly the game probably has even longer conversations than The Longest Journey, but no one ever calls it long-winded because the characters and the dialogue are so well written, and the voice acting is so good, that it’s a pleasure to listen to.

I remember all tracks from GF. It is one of the most memorable soundtracks of all time. Totally unique too. On the other hand, I have no memory from the GK soundtrack (if it was of any quality I would have remembered it, while the voice acting is honestly quite attrocious, for Gabriel at least. He sounds like reading a phone book).

With the exception of a couple of characters, I really never found the characters in GK anything special. On the other hand, GF offers a great number of really interesting characters (and yes, Manny is much more interesting than the stereotypical Gabriel-type hero.). Of course some of them are more caricaturistic due to the humorous side (like Hector), but I think that this works really well, compared to the equally caricaturistic stereotypical version of characters in a serious game like GK (Donut-eating cops, Voodoo profesors, etc).

I do agree that the dialog in GK is well written. In GF is written even better. Much more cheecky. Noir privillage.

On the riddles department, I also think that some of GK riddles are of the greatest quality. However, they sometimes disrupt the flow of the game. This is something that doesn’t happen in GF where they are instrumented within the game’s pace in a much better way (though sometimes with not such an originality as in GK). And yes, dead-ends (like the ceremony) are a - too in my books.

I won’t even bring matters like the uniqueness of each game’s setting and storyline etc, because it will be kind of unfair for GK too.

I guess we agree to disagree.

Sefir - 02 February 2015 02:10 PM

On the other hand, I have no memory from the GK soundtrack (if it was of any quality I would have remembered it)

Don’t blame Robert Holmes for your bad memory!   

The Gabriel Knight theme is as iconic as it gets, dude ——>

And remember this is music from a game from 1993, when most games weren’t putting anywhere near as much effort into music as they do today.

Of course some of them are more caricaturistic due to the humorous side (like Hector), but I think that this works really well, compared to the equally caricaturistic stereotypical version of characters in a serious game like GK (Donut eating cops, Voodoo profesors, etc).

And this part just seems ridiculous.  How on earth is a professor that teaches about voodoo some kind of stereotype?  Or do you mean Dr. John, the curator of the voodoo museum?  In any case, neither characters are just stereotypes.  Both are very fleshed out as characters.  The professor at the college is more of another great example of a very small character having a surprising amount of personality and depth given his small amount of screentime.

And yes, some characters may fit some stereotype or another, such as a cop that eats donuts, but still nearly every single character you can talk to in detail in the game is extremely fleshed out.  None of those characters are just a stereotype and that’s it.

The police desk Sergeant Frisk may not even be in the games list of 50 most important characters, but he was more fun for me to talk to than anyone in Grim Fandango outside of Glottis.

We’re obviously both very biased when it comes to comparing these two games.  And we probably would both be a bit less so if we replayed the other game, as our memories are clearly foggy on many details.

But while I think there are many areas where one could debate which one is better (graphics, overall story), the depth of the characters is one area where I think there’s absolutely no comparison to be made by anyone looking at it with any objectivity at all.

Detective Mosely - 02 February 2015 02:52 PM

Sefir - 02 February 2015 02:10 PM

On the other hand, I have no memory from the GK soundtrack (if it was of any quality I would have remembered it)

Don’t blame Robert Holmes for your bad memory!   

The Gabriel Knight theme is as iconic as it gets, dude ——>

Ok, ok. I stand corrected. It does have a good soundtrack.

Still prefer the GF one (

), but they are so different that any comparison is pointless and comes totally to personal taste…

Grim Fandango. Easy choice

Grim Fandango

Grim Fandango

A difficult choice, as both are excellent adventures.

I gotta go Grim, and it’s not even my favorite.