Long Live Grim Fandango

[Ben]

This is an interesting article, including an interview with Tim Schafer, that i ran across.

In 1987, Tim Schafer sat in a lecture hall at University of California, Berkeley. Professor and anthropologist Alan Dundes spoke about a ritual found in Mexican culture, where family members welcome the dead back into their homes. Stories of The Day of the Dead, or El Dia de los Muertos, fascinated Schafer, then a budding writer and computer programmer. A decade later, he wrote a videogame—ambitious, over-budget, late—inspired by these tales. Grim Fandango was the last of a dying breed, a PC adventure game beset by constantly advancing hardware and an audience raised on faster, louder, flashier alternatives. You have likely never played the completed work.

That's because, like so many of its characters, Grim Fandango died. It succumbed as any late-'90s computer game on CD-ROM would, its jewel case an inevitable coffin. In 2015, the only way to play the original Grim on a modern computer is to download special files modified by a fanbase that put years of effort into keeping the game alive, the work of a patient and overzealous mortician.

There is no wrong way to mourn those lost to us. Some remember. Some let go and wait for their return. But no matter the macquillage, an ugly dead thing remains ugly. Grim Fandango—the long-deceased original—is beautiful and strange and smart, an improbable marriage of disparate cultures and time periods, of plots and puzzles and balloon animals the shape of Robert Frost's head.

There is an old interview with Schafer from 1997, the year before Grim came out. A reporter  is asking him about LucasArt's next big game, wondering what the next "holy grail for gamers" is. The interviewer surmises a few: "Better graphics, better sound, better interface?" Schafer answers. "We try to do a real story, a complicated story, with real human involvement."

http://blog.longreads.com/2015/01/29/lo ... -fandango/

[Shadowrunner]

Good article. I've never played the game before, but now that it's been remastered and available on PS4 and Vita I may just give it a try.

[Ben]

I have to say Shadowrunner, I have not played this remaster, but the original really does deserve all of the praise it has gotten over the years.  I actually kept my last Windows PC laying around just to play it and Betrayal at Krondor, IMHO at least it's the best LucasArts game.

[Lorfarius]

We also did a Grim Fandango podcast several months ago:

http://rvgpodcast.podbean.com/page/2/

[Ben]

I completely overlooked that podcast, thanks for the link.   

EDIT:  After listening, I thought one comment was worth making.  Some of the fan made patches are (from what I've been reading) supposedly better than this remaster; apparently the remaster completely ignores the shadows of the original.  Having said that, this remaster would still let you have the game across a variety of devices at a cheap price, so I guess it depends on how authentic an experience of the original you want to have.

Here's an article with some nice examples: http://www.goodgamers.us/2015/02/02/gri ... lls-short/

[Lorfarius]

I wasn't too happy with the overall look. It was nice it got a bump but it felt like the atmosphere was off and no that's not just because I'm so old now!  The shadows and darkness of the world all really drew you in.