Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers is Sierra’s 1993 point-and-click adventure, set in New Orleans and based on a tale of voodoo and murder. A game full of mystery, intrigue and a little bit of horror – perfect for Halloween.
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Under the direction of acclaimed writer Jane Jensen, the first title in the Gabriel Knight series was among the first adventure games to feature fictional stories based on real legends. In an interview with Game Informer, she said that she was given a great deal of freedom in creating the title’s concept: “One of the great things about Sierra was that Ken Williams really believed in the artistic vision. If he gave you the chance to do a game, that was your responsibility. Nobody told you what to do with it. If it didn’t sell, then you wouldn’t do another game for him, but he would let you have that freedom.” And it looks like his ‘hands-off’ approach worked, because Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers won the Consumer Electronics Show’s ‘Best of Show award in 1993 and two ‘Adventure Game of the Year’ awards in 1994.
I downloaded the title from GOG because the 1001-Up.com team were planning some articles on horror games for our Halloween week, believing that I’d never played it before. But there was something about it that seemed too familiar and now I’m not quite sure whether I’ve picked it up in the past or not! Whatever the case may be, the retro opening screen and pixelated graphics were a welcome sight and I couldn’t wait to get engrossed in Gabriel’s world.
I couldn’t wait to get engrossed in Gabriel’s world.
The story takes place in New Orleans and follows Gabriel Knight, a struggling author who’s a bit of a ladies’ man. Hoping to use the investigation as the basis of a new novel, he uses his friendship with old pal Detective Mosely to his advantage and starts looking into a spate of murders which apparently have voodoo overtones. As the case progresses, his recurring nightmares get more horrific and he finds himself drawn to a mysterious and beautiful socialite. Who is the lost relative from Germany who keeps trying to contact him about his ‘destiny’? Why do the killings seem to always lead back to him in some way? And when it comes down to the line, will Gabriel choose between love and forgiveness or fulfilling his duty?
The depth of background material that the game is based on is amazing. The history of New Orleans, the slave trade in the West Indies and United States, the Haitian slave rebellion, Voodoun and African tribal religions all figure into the story, along with some real-life locations. It’s a well-researched, gripping tale that’s guaranteed to keep you glued to your seat from the beginning until the very end.
Gabriel gets cosey with the mysterious socialite.
Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers is a classic point-and-click adventure. Actions such as examine, move and talk are completed by right-clicking to rotate through their icons or moving the cursor to the top of the screen to uncover a hidden bar. This has the benefit of freeing up visual real-estate allowing for more of those lovely old-school graphics but unfortunately, the lack of a smart cursor does tend to slow down gameplay a little. Also, the correct icon to use can sometimes be a bit ambiguous; for example, the ‘move’ and ‘open’ actions seem to work on the same object at different points in the game.
The story unfolds over a sequence of days, each of which has a required set of actions to be performed before moving onto the next. This means that the story is mostly linear but play within each chapter can take many different routes. Each opening sequence begins as Gabriel wakes up, grabs a cup of coffee and discusses his current situation with his assistant Grace Nakimura at his rare book shop in the French Quarter. Her part in the game is limited at the start but does increase over the duration of gameplay; this wonderful character acts as a resource for the lusty author completing any research requested, while continuing to bat off his advances.
Grace and Gabriel have a love-hate relationship.
As with most classic point-and-clicks, conversations are frequent and very important to story progression. Gabriel has access to two talk actions, ‘chat’ and ‘interrogate’, the former being a great way to get to know more about the characters and their personalities. If the latter is selected, players are presented with close-ups of our author and his subject along with a menu system, which then allows them to ask pertinent questions which may open up further lines of enquiry. Only eleven characters throughout the game can be interrogated and while this may not seem like many, they actually have quite a lot to say for themselves; gamers who prefer a faster-paced action may therefore not find Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers to their taste.
Gabriel is equipped with a tape recorder and he uses this during his investigations. It means that the player can replay any past conversation they’ve had with an interrogation subject and this proves to be invaluable when piecing together puzzle solutions. The only annoying thing about the device is that it records absolutely everything that’s said – so, if in error you click on a line of enquiry that has already been exhausted and the character repeats what they’ve just said, you’ll hear them say the same thing twice when you replay the dialogue.
Interrogating subjects results in a wealth of new information.
This game is generally regarded as being a difficult one and some clues are extremely subtle. In some cases, you’ll only realise there was a clue after completing the related puzzle! There are a few points during gameplay which seem to intentionally leave players unsure how to proceed and for me this was great way of conveying Gabriel’s feelings. It may be a case of revisiting areas already seen, interrogating subjects already spoken to, or replaying conversations using the tape recorder. Some challenges will require you to make leaps of intuition based on the information you’ve managed to discover, which means that Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers probably wouldn’t suit novice adventure gamers.
There are a variety of puzzles, the usual conversation- and inventory-based ones you find in similar games along with some that rely on timing and conditions. There are a few points at which Gabriel can die if he chooses the wrong decision or hesitates to act; one such situation took me by surprise and, although it wasn’t difficult to solve, I can imagine some players finding Gabriel coming to a sticky end here. Personally I’m not a fan of challenges like this because I prefer puzzles that are based on logic and reasoning. But they do add a sense of danger to the storyline, and if you’re going to chase a voodoo murderer you’re probably going to encounter at least one risk along the way.
Speaking of puzzles, the graphics unfortunately do make some of these a bit tricky. The backgrounds are easily identifiable but the limitation of technology at the time of the game’s release means they’re lacking in finer details. This makes it hard to identify interactive items or symbols sometimes; for example, when trying to complete the clock challenge, I knew exactly what I had to do but found it difficult to tell which icon was which.
Saying that though, the graphics are excellent if you love a retro style: lots of lovely pixelated environments, each of which manages to convey depth and personality. The home of Gabriel’s grandmother looks warm and inviting, while the ‘wheel within a wheel’ in Africa looks like somewhere you’d do well not to explore, and the comic-book-style cutscenes add to the game’s graphic look. The character portraits displayed in the interrogation interface are excellent but I’ll admit that I couldn’t help laughing at some of them; it’s great that their lips move to add to the realism of the scene, but they kind of look like the Annoying Orange!
That line would have more effect if Gabriel didn’t look like the Annoying Orange.
There’s just one other thing that I’d like to pick up on with regard to Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers’ visuals. What the hell is going on with Gabriel? Maybe it’s just me but there seems to be several different versions of him: one on the title screen, one in the interrogation scenes and another in the title’s manual. Add to the fact that he looks entirely different again in the sequel, The Beast Within: A Gabriel Knight Mystery, and here’s one hero who’s got a bit of an identity crisis on his hands.
The voice-acting is all done by Hollywood talents including Mark Hamill and Michael Dorn. Leah Remini is great as the sarcastic Grace and at conveying the love-hate relationship she has with Gabriel; when I first heard her I knew I recognised the voice, then I realised that she’d played Stacey Carosi in Saved by the Bell! In fact, the only voice-acting I wasn’t keen on was that of the Narrator. Virginia Capers lilt really suits the New Orleans setting – and don’t get me wrong, her acting here is excellent – but her slow pace had me clicking through some of the dialogue because I was eager to the next part of the game.
The Narrator has some amazing insights into Gabriel’s character.
During my research I found that Tim Curry received mixed reviews for his portrayal of Gabriel. Admittedly, his New Orleans drawl is extremely over-the-top at times but I absolutely loved it! Our hero comes across as a total ladies’ man who’s definitely the ‘love-‘em-and-leave-‘em’ type. Some of his lines will go down in history because he’s just so pleasingly sleazy, and I completely agree with the Narrator: “Gabriel’s mini-stereo isn’t exactly high-fidelity. Then again, neither is he.”
Similarly, opinions on the title’s soundtrack were mixed but I kind of liked it. There was the odd track that was possibly a little out of place when considering the setting but overall I thought they were pretty good. There’s obviously a wealth of inspiration that can be taken from New Orleans and it was nice to see the different bands playing in the Jackson Square park. The theme from the Detective Mosley’s police station was probably my favourite and the same can be hard in Kriminal-Kommissar Leber’s office in the sequel.
I’m not sure that’s the forking that Gabriel was thinking of.
Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Father does have some replay value as, in keeping with other Sierra games of the time, each completed puzzle or new discovery adds to a score displayed in the hidden bar at the top of the screen. Players won’t be allowed to progress unless they’ve finished all essential tasks for the current day but it’s possible to leave some lesser jobs behind, resulting in a lower score. If anyone can tell me where I may have missed the final point I’d be really glad to hear it!
There’s good news for fans, as creator Jane Jensen recently confirmed on Twitter that she’ll be remaking the title in HD. This is due out next year on Android, iOS, Mac and PC, and the writer hopes this will launch a line of new Gabriel Knight adventures. In an interview with Game Trailers she mentioned that she has ‘two fairly developed game ideas’ for future titles sitting on her hard drive and waiting to be developed, so here’s hoping!
Another game would mean even more money for Gabriel.
Towards the end of the game the pace is fast and furious, and players will hate having to tear themselves away from the screen for any reason. I absolutely loved Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers and it’s now included in my list of favourite retro games. Its mysterious premise is a great hook to pull anyone into the supernatural world of Voodoo-haunted New Orleans, and it’s the perfect game if you want to get wrapped up in some risk and intrigue.
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