Amazing! Wonderful! Such great characters and story and humor. The game itself is hard as heck. But the produciton value, cinematics, story, movie quality is so good. Truly memorable.

An excellent adventure game

two big things got me to pick up grim fandango. first, its reputation: it's lauded as one of the best adventure games out there—and i can understand why! second, its aesthetics. there's something endearing about playing a low-poly, early 3D game from the '90s, and its art direction holds up incredibly well. the game's technical limitations tend to compliment its art direction: the blocky models work with the art deco and day of the dead aesthetics, and the fixed-camera 3D motivated every screen to be composed with intent. even despite some backgrounds and assets being low-res, everything just looks really, really good. the soundtrack ties it all together: its dramatic, punchy, and elevates the game.

my favorite part about the game was its writing. it's witty, delightful, and really a treat to listen to. i love hearing manny talk and interact with other characters and the world. i love the way that you can't tell who would pan out as a side character or as a main character; everyone is written equally well and all contribute to fleshing out the world and its story. the backbone of grim's story is its characters, and it's a solid structure: my main motivation was to see where the story would lead and what conversations i would get to witness as a player.

while the aesthetics and writing make the game feel timeless, the gameplay was a stark reminder that, yes, this is a ten year old remaster of a twenty-seven year old game. i'm willing to place some of the burden on myself: this was the first real point-and-click adventure game i've played, so there was some onboarding in understanding the puzzle structure and design. a common gripe, though, is that some puzzles can get frustrating and esoteric. i referred to a guide often. readability issues didn't help, either: sometimes i would get stuck because i couldn't tell what was an interactable and what was a background element. it was hard to tell what was an interactable and what was a background element. sometimes puzzles required waiting a LONG time to try again, which sucked. that's not to say that the gameplay wasn't all bad, though. when it clicks, it CLICKS. while a lot of the game is composed of linear puzzles, year 2 involved tackling several problems at once and unraveling a web of connections, which was fun to sit back and piece together!

the controls were also a big issue for me. i played primarily with a controller using tank controls which, although there was a learning curve, i got used to. unfortunately, sometimes the collision would be buggy and make playing with tank controls impossible. stairs and other areas would be impossible to climb, and i would have to switch to keyboard and mouse for a time. there were also some interactables, like ladders or items, that wouldn't work properly with tank controls, or would be inaccessible without mouse and keyboard. the game can also be a little unstable at times: even though it didn't happen to me, softlocks are a known issue in the game. cutscenes would sometimes hang, and i got a crash at the very end. the best remedy was, unfortunately, to save often, grin, and bear it.

while the game's design philosophy was sometimes outdated or at odds with itself, i still found this game to be a fantastic time. if you can look past the occasional bugginess or frustration, grim fandango's a real gem!