Back in 1998 when Grim Fandango was released, I did not have a gaming PC, but I would always look at the box when I was in the game store as it looked so interesting. Fast forward well over a decade later and Tim Schafer and Double Fine are taking on the task of remastering the game for a new generation and those who played the original alike.
How to Download Grim Fandango Remastered
To download the game from a digital store of your choice, click on the Download button at the end of the review. If you like remastered adventure games classics, check out also our review of Sam & Max Save the World.
The Game Review
So, what kind of game is Grim Fandango Remastered? It is a story-driven adventure game and one of the last great ones that Lucas Arts did back in the day. What makes this such a great game is the story which is just fantastic and centers around our main character who is called, Manny.
Manny is a skeleton looking guy who has a job in the land of the dead. Here he works making sure people get to the afterlife in the correct manner. If you were a good person you get a first-class ticket, if you were not so good you have to walk! Many always ends up having to deal with the less than desirable souls and he has had enough.
One day he takes one of the “better souls” and this opens up a whole can of worms that results in a four-year adventure to try and make things right! The game is played in chapters and each chapter is like a different year of Manny trying to get things right. It is a wonderful story that has a real mystery to it all wrapped up in an old-school film noir kind of vibe which is awesome.
The gameplay is what you would expect from a game like this. You move around, talk to people, pick up items, and solve puzzles. Most of the actual gameplay is finding items and figuring out how to use them. Manny will give the odd hint here and there, but I will admit that I did end up using a guide to solve a few of the more obtuse puzzles that the game threw my way.
In Grim Fandango Remastered you have some more “modern” controls that you can use which is great. For fun, there are also the tank controls of old and you even get an achievement for playing through the game with tank controls turned on which I thought was pretty funny and so typical of Tim Schafer!
As this is a remaster, the visuals have been given a fresh coat of paint and they look great. To be fair Grim Fandango was already a great looking game, but the better lighting and improved character models really do make it look extra special. You can toggle between the new and the old graphics which I thought was cool
As well as looking good, the sound in this game is fantastic. The voice acting is great and Manny has a real charm to him and a great sense of humor that is delivered superbly by the voice actor. The rest of the cast has a lot of charm to and there was not a character that I did not like in terms of their voice acting.
The music in the game is also awesome. The visuals have that film noir look to them and the music is very fitting to this. It is all jazz and big band kind of music and it is incredible. I could not think of a more fitting soundtrack to the game than the one that they went for. From what I understand the sound in the game was cleaned up a bit to make it clear which is great.
While a game like this is usually a one and done, Grim Fandango Remastered does give you a reason to play through it more than once. To start with the game has plenty of achievements for you to do. Also, there is a director’s commentary that is well worth listening to on a second playthrough.
I think that this game is a prime example of how those classic point and click adventure style games should be brought back to life. Even without all the awesome extra touches they did, Grim Fandango is still a great game, but the extra work that they have done here makes it the best it possibly can be.
