Gabriel Knight 2: The Beast Within

Strangely enough, up until now I’ve never played Gabriel Knight 2: The Beat Within.  Part of that was its availability in no adventure games allowed Sarnia, part of it was my family computer’s inability to process anything not on a floppy disc, but after that it was this weird trepidation I developed when contemplating playing the game.  Even when I bought the trilogy online, I played the first and the third, but left the second to sit on my harddrive.  Which I shouldn’t have…because it’s a damn good game.  Warning!  I do discuss a couple of spoilers, so anyone wanting to play it for themselves should do that first.  I figure this is old school enough that most people have played it.

This game got me through a lot of rehearsals and shows.  It was pretty much the perfect game to calm me down after a particularily intense rehearsal.  The story is engaging, the music just sort of soothes you, the puzzles are challenging without being rage inducing.  I couldn’t help but play it without slipping into a contended calmness.

The Beast Within takes place about a year after the events of the first game.  Gabriel is now living in Rittersberg, Germany in the family castle in order to settle the family estates and to work on his new novel while Grace is running the bookshop back in New Orleans.  Far from the starving artist he was in the first game, Gabriel is now quite comfortable after having written a bestseller called “The Voodoo Murders” based on the first events of the game.

Unfortunately, he’s not having nearly as much luck with his most recent writing endeavors and very quickly hits writers block.  Before he has time to dwell on it though, who should appear at his doorstep but a mob of German stereotypes seeking the aid of the Schattenjager.    It seems there have been wolf attacks in the area, the most recent of which was a small girl.  The village believes it’s the work of a werewolf, hence the need for a supernatural detective, of whom Gabriel is now the last thanks to the death of his Uncle Wolfgang.  So Gabriel sets off to solve the mystery, a mystery that brings him to Munich investigating hunting clubs, zoos, and a possible lost opera of Wagner for King Ludwig II…wait, what?

Once again, the story is much more complex than it initially seems and it just continues to gain momentum throughout the game.  It’s the best type of story where if you stop and think about it you realize how weird and slightly preposterous the concepts seem, but because it’s told so well with great characters you barely notice the wild conspiracies involving werewolves and mad German kings.

This time around you get to play as Grace as well, who travels to Germany upon hearing that Gabriel has a new case.  Gabriel doesn’t really have much interest in including Grace and actively attempts to just send her on a wild goose chase, but that doesn’t stop her from researching her little heart out.  Grace’s parts, as it turns out, are actually the more interesting ones to play.  That may depend on your preferences for puzzles, though.  I enjoyed doing the research, solving riddles and puzzles and putting it all together.  Gabriel’s job was mostly to sneak around and gain access to a secret club , interrogate suspects, and just generally be a bit of a dick.

In fact, Grace does a lot of the leg work for Gabriel, and more than kind of saves his ass on more than one occasion.  Gabriel mostly bumbles his way from situation to situation and relies on dumb luck to get him through many situations.  I suppose that fits his character, but in the first and third games he seemed a bit more on top of things in terms of detective work and figuring things out for himself.  Sure, he bumbled and smooth talked his way through things, but he wasn’t nearly as dismissive or moronic when it came to actually putting together theories.  If I have any qualms about the game, it’s that.  It’s not a huge thing, but it was noticeable enough to bother me.

You smarmy bastard, you.

The "villain" for instance is pretty obviously the villain.  I mean, as in all Jane Jensen games, he's complex enough and ambigous enough to not to be a black and white villain, but the game makes it pretty obvious from the outset that he's the guy you should be suspecting of wrong doings.  Okay, that may not be fair, there is an accomplice too, but the fact that the music gets all dark and eerie whenever he enters a room is a pretty dead giveaway.  So it gets a bit frustrating to continually to see Gabriel going down other avenues when you yourself know that it's the wrong solution.

 

In the end, through all the discovery of conspiracy and history and supernatural events, you realize that what the villain's ultimately searching for is just a good bromance.  And I have to say, this simple plot point was far more effective than say someone trying to destroy the world.

 

 

A match made in heaven.

The puzzles in this game are just awesome.  Yes, there were challenges, and yes on the odd occasion I had to break down and just go to a walkthrough, but this was more for the inventory based puzzles than the more intellectual riddles.  Honestly, there's just something about the puzzles of these games that has a calming effect on me.  I enjoy the challenge of it, and when I finally solve something, I feel like the smartest person alive enen though somebody smarter clearly had to think of the puzzles in the first place.

You can't hear it, but there's a clock in that room that drove me crazy.

I think part of my trepidation came from the fact that it was an FMV (full motion video).  FMV’s are pretty much dead.  Myst clung on to the format right into the 2000’s, but it was about the only game franchise to do so.  FMV was at one point the most popular (and most expensive) way to get realism into games.  But you really can’t help but notice the fakeness when seeing real actors being integrated into a CG background.  But even then, for the most part, I enjoy FMV’s.  This one was different because I had enjoyed the first game so much, ESPECIALLY the voice actors.  To see them replaced entirely made me nervous to say the least.

For the most part, the actors do a good job.  Dean Erickson as Gabriel gets a little twitchy at times.  Seriously, the guy just can't stop moving.  Joanne Takahashi does a bit of a better job as Grace, but she has a tendency to be a bit too forceful and unpredictable when it comes to being angry.  To be fair, even though Grace and Gabriel are barely together in the game, the actors really do a great job portraying the love and sexual tension between them whenever they are together.  The supporting cast are all great, and kudos goes to the game creators for choosing to have German characters speaking German as often as possible (even if a couple of them are dressed in lederhosen...sigh...).

They haunted her dreams too.

Honestly, this old school game really holds up still today.  I wasn't playing it for nostalgic reasons, so it could have easily been dismissed as outdated.  But it's pretty apparent why this game is considered one of the greatest of its time.  The sheer amount of research that went into it is really impressive and the integration of that historical research into the story was done extremely well.  For crap's sake, an Wagner style opera was written JUST for this game.  It's an entire 8 minute sequence that you watch in the game (one that Dean Erickson's acting kind of makes a bit silly, but impressive nonetheless).

I am very very glad I got around to playing this.  It's one that I'll definitely play again.  It just...makes me happy.  I actually had to stop playing for a while just so that I could draw out the gameplay just a little longer.  If you haven't played this game yet, I'd really recommend it.  Considering I was going in thinking I wouldn't really like it, that's saying something.  Now I must find another show calming game....