Posted on: May 21, 2016

mpcheu

Games: 112 Reviews: 6

Best of the Gabriel Knight Games

The game has the most realistic feel of the series, and it's not just the FMV. In addition to the story, your interactions with the characters and environment make you truly feel like a tourist in Germany. It feels real. The puzzles are mostly logical and are built into your surroundings, so nothing feels out of place. The exception being a awkward sequence at the end. It's too bad that the windows version doesn't seem to get along well with modern versions of Windows (though I understand the issue is more with Quicktime than windows). The DOS version works fine through DOSBox for the most part, but if I remember right, the image and sound quality is a bit better under the windows version.

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Posted on: January 25, 2021

Shantih1

Verified owner

Games: Reviews: 17

The pinnacle of the FMV genre

Gabriel Knight 2 is as good a game as can be made with full motion video technology. It gets away from the big-name stunt casting and instead tells a truly engaging story. But it also shows up all the problems of this genre - trading in intriguing puzzle mechanics for a lot of clicking the screen and watching videos. GK2 basically goes like this: you see an FMV scene and then you move the cursor around to find one a hot spot to click. You see a video clip as your character performs an action or moves to a new spot. And then you repeat: You click. You watch movies. For some, that's the death of an interactive experience. But here's the thing: GK2's movies are generally so good you can’t wait to see the next one. There's a fantastic story here spanning hundreds of years and which has been written to take advantage of the fact that we are seeing real human characters interact instead of low-res pixelated versions. For those who played GK1 it feels like a natural progression from a game which tried to bring different periods of history to life and elicit emotions with very limited graphics. It's not so much that GK2 is a great movie, but it's clearly been made with care and attention both in front of and behind the camera. There are a few high points to the gameplay which are worth mentioning. A tape splicing puzzle is fun - as is the novelty of clicking items on a telephone and discovering you can actually call the numbers. Sadly, the puzzles aren’t intrinsically linked to the FMV format. It would have been great to have a puzzle manipulating security camera footage, or trying to detect if someone is lying. But that demonstrates the limits of the mid-90s technology. Ultimately your experience of GK2 will be dictated by how much you're invested in the story and these characters. Basically - by how much you're enjoying the movie. There probably isn't enough game here to make a convert of anyone, but for those who are already on board: it doesn’t get any better.

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Posted on: June 15, 2014

ComradeAart

Verified owner

Games: 471 Reviews: 30

Fun but predictable

"Gabriel Knight II" was by no means a terrible game, but it's not a stellar one either. The game was extremely linear and predictable. With the exception of a few occasions where the puzzles were convoluted and far-fetched (i.e., the tape cassettes), this game was quick to play and fully anticipatable (for a "whodunnit" story, this one kills all mystery). The eggregious over-acting was also distracting. I know this is part and parcel of FMV, but the characters did not feel like they carried over from part I at all. Despite this, the game was surprisingly nice to play, and the music was excellent and the environments were cool (even if they were a tourism plug for Baveria ;).

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Posted on: October 15, 2014

sirgamble

Verified owner

Games: 86 Reviews: 2

Excellent sequel

I've held off for some years because I had the feeling that the 'movie' style adventure just didn't work. Wow I was wrong! As a GK fan of many years, I felt that GKII not only captured the same feelings provided by GK, but went one further. The retro graphics/movies take you back to the nostalgic 90's, where adventure games were cool! Glad I gave it a go... now for GK 3... and Dreamfall Chapters... and Broken Sword 4/5... the list of adventures I NEED to play goes on. One at a time I suppose!

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Posted on: April 18, 2014

elitegundam

Games: 74 Reviews: 1

Great gem of a game

I remember playing this when I was younger, such an amazing jump beyond "point and click" adventures like the quest series (space, kings, police). Great story, some wonderful locations, and still a good play after these years.

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