Full Review for Grim Fandango by John Woodman

Introduction

Grim Fandango is a strange but absolutely funny and interesting adventure, that took place in an unique background: the land of the dead, based on a 1950 theme and the Mexican Day of the Dead habit (as a Mexican friend of mine told me.)
LucasArts always did unique and strange adventures, and this time it's not differtent from the others, because it's unique, strange and fun!

Graphics

The game was tested on a Pentium 3 450 Mhz, with both 2D then 3D graphic card, and I have to say that I have never seen the game going slow.
All the characters are very well designed, with good 3D models and simple but good looking textures, all the game is full of a colored and very well detailed Mexican style, that you can see on buildings, walls and a lot of other places... It's a quite particular style, but it's very fascinating.
All background are not moving, but are seen through a camera like the Resident Evil serie on PSX, and often they show some animation and looks very detailed and fascinating.

Sound

I have bought the Italian version of the game, and even this time they did a wonderful work with voices, crystal and flawless, I never had any problem listening to all game characters and I understood everything they said. They also chosen good voice actors, good for their parts.

Music are not always present in all locations, but they are very adapt for their background, sometimes music feel a little noir, often with a little point of melancholy... You will like them.

Gameplay

This time the mouse won't work for you, you have to do everything with the keyboard.
The game will help you with the controls: for example Manny (the main character) will turn this head (skull, in this case), looking for every interaction point, when he is near them.
Of course, if you are used to classic mouse adventures, you will need a little time to get use to this new way of play the game, much more similar to a console layout than a computer.

Lastability

You live in the Land of the Dead, as Manny Calavera, and you work as a travel agent for the recently departed people. But one day something very strange happens to one of your best clients, and you start a sort of quest to find what is going on.
Four years of travel to the Land of Eternal Rest, this is what will wait you in this game. Four big locations to explore, uncovering a noir story of corruption, sex and violence in the land of the dead.
But don not worry too much, the game will offer you a lot of laughs when you will not expect, I promise you.
Like a lot of games like this, you can�t lose.: if you fail to solve a puzzle, or something similar, you can try as many times as you want, until you success, it's a good thing to not being timed or other things, you have all the time you want and you need to think, try, and tast all the backgroud of the game and of every single puzzle.

Overall

It's a long and strange adventure that you will surely like. Of course, when you will finish it, you won't play it for a while, but it's a so fascinating background that soon or after you will play it again, even if you so expert that you can complete it in a little time.

Final Score: 90%