While storyline and humor still hold water, remastered classic Grim Fandango is a little out of touch in this day and age.
Grim Fandango is a respectable classic.
However you want to define the term “classic” is entirely decided by the audience, but given the comical writing of creator Tim Schafer and the idiocentric, Mexican-underworld setting that the players traverse through, and it’s difficult to find a reason not fall in love with the remastered version of Grim Fandango.
That’s of course if you can sit through 8 to 10 hours of taxing, laborious puzzles that players are put through during Grim Fandango.
Story
Similar to other Tim Schafer games during the 1990s, Grim Fandango’s plot is a blend of tongue-in-cheek, slapstick humor and off-beat characters that symbolize uncommon human characteristics.
Players take control of Manuel “Manny” Calavera, a travel agent for the Department of Death who helps souls transcend from the Land of the Living to the afterlife — acting as a replica to the Grim Reaper towards newly dead souls.
Instead of gloomy, omniscious feelings that the setting may entail, Manny is portrayed more as a skewed businessman, as he attempts to find Mercedes "Meche" Colomar after a mishap in the first act.
Pending on how clients morally lived their lives, the better sale Manny can give them and the less time they have to spend in the Land of the Dead. Like the name entails, “Meche” is the golden prize Manny is striving for and arguably his one way ticket to getting out of the Land of the Dead himself.
It’s a rather complex setting and story to establish, but in typical Tim Schafer fashion, Double Fine conjures characters that are unforgettable during Manny’s 8 to 10 hour odyssey.
Split into four acts, or “years”, Tim Schafer pits players into grotesque puzzles that include Manny using dirty hookah water to poison a sailor, who’s in the middle of getting a new tattoo, just so Manny can steal his dog tags.
The way Schafer elaborates and runs away with one microscopic idea, like Manny using balloons and breadsticks to capture bird eggs, can either be wildly entertaining or infuriating. It just depends on the player’s patience.
Trust me, you will need it if you want to finish Grim Fandango.
Gameplay
Age is relatively Grim Fandango’s weakness — while the humor is still profound, the way the game carries itself and the amount of patience required is exasperating and archaic at times.
Players can spend hours beating their heads against the wall trying to figure out how to solve a simple puzzle, which is connected to another, which ofcourse, is connected to a larger objective Manny has to untangle.
Not saying point and click puzzle games aren’t fun, but Grim Fandango can be frustrating.
Gamers, on average, just don’t have the time to meddle around, mindlessly pointing in a 2-D area until they figure out that item X interacts with item Y to produce outcome Z. That’s a very old school way of gaming.
Grim Fandango is difficult and doesn’t hold the player’s hand whatsoever. There is no tutorial, no hint system and almost no help when it comes to solving Schafer’s diminutive puzzles design.
On parts that took me well over an hour to figure out, I had to succumb to using a walkthrough. Hey, at least I can admit it.
In terms of the port itself, Double Fine did a sloppy job with it.
Not only did bugs hinder some of my play, but at one point I had to rest my whole game because the save system was broken.
Double Fine updated character models and it does look nice, but the backgrounds still look muddled and untouched. The game also runs at 4:3 ratio.
Not saying these are problems, or disrupt the experience, but it does feel rushed.
Final Verdict
Grim Fandango jump started Tim Schafer’s career, but the recent remastered port to Playstation 4 is lackadaisical and not an excellent port. Grim Fandango is hilarious, but a little out of touch.
Score: 3/5
@Lukeoroark
