Gabriel Knight

Gabriel Knight is the title character in a series of adventure games produced by the Sierra Corporation in the 1990s. Three games were released in the series: Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Father, Gabriel Knight 2: The Beast Within and Gabriel Knight 3: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned. It is unlikely that any more will follow, however, due to Sierra being dissolved by parent company Vivendi and disappointing sales of the third game in the series.

The Gabriel Knight characters and games were created by writer Jane Jensen, who also worked on King's Quest VI with famed game designer Roberta Williams. All three games in the series focus on the adventures of Gabriel Knight, a New Orleans author and bookstore owner who finds that his destiny is to become a Schattenjäger, or "Shadow Hunter". Gabriel's assistant, sidekick, and sometime romantic interest Grace Nakimura is a major supporting character in Sins of the Father. In The Beast Within and Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned, she shares the role of protagonist with Gabriel. The player alternates between Gabriel and Grace for different portions of each game.

The first episode of the series was released in 1993, and was one of many of Sierra's games at the time to feature a nonlinear format. The first game used a system of "days", each of which had a required set of actions to be performed before proceeding to the next. As a result, linear dependencies of actions in the game are guaranteed to be resolved: a puzzle on a given "day" must be completed in order to reach the next "day". This format was used throughout the series, replacing "days" with "chapters" and "time blocks" respectively.

With a balanced mix of historical facts and fictional elements, as well as an emphasis on character development (e.g. the relationship between Gabriel and Grace is an important subplot throughout the series), the Gabriel Knight games have been praised as outstanding achievements in storytelling. The music in the series, composed by Robert Holmes (Jensen's husband), contributes significantly to the atmosphere.

The games

Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers (1993)

The first game in the series follows Gabriel Knight on his daily life in New Orleans managing his bookstore and struggling to write a mystery novel. When a series of strange murders with voodoo overtones occur near St. John's Eve, Gabriel begins an investigation for his book. He uncovers his heritage as Schattenjäger very early on, when a relative tries to get in contact with him, and Gabriel learns of an ancient curse placed upon his family centuries ago, when an ancestor in colonial Charleston failed in his duty. The curse has plagued Gabriel's family ever since and intertwines Gabriel's life with that of the voodoo killer. The reluctant Schattenjäger finds himself travelling as far abroad as Germany and even Africa to uncover his future destiny. Gabriel's decision whether to choose love or duty as the priority in his actions provides two possible endings.

The CD-ROM version featured voice talents of such well-known actors as Tim Curry as Gabriel, Mark Hamill as his friend Detective Mosely, Leah Remini as Grace and Michael Dorn as Dr. John, a proprietor of a voodoo museum in central New Orleans.

Gabriel Knight 2: The Beast Within (1995)

The second game in the series (also referred to as The Beast Within: A Gabriel Knight Mystery) follows Gabriel as he wrestles with writing a followup to his successful novel The Voodoo Murders. He has moved to his ancestral home, Schloss Ritter, in the town of Rittersberg, Bavaria, Germany. The local population is well aware of his family's reputation as Schattenjägers, and soon Gabriel is called upon to investigate what is believed to be a werewolf attack in Munich. Grace, when she learns of what Gabriel is up to by way of a letter, refuses to be left alone in America without anything to do with the case, and so she travels to Rittersberg to assist in the investigation. Thus, the "chapters" of the game alternate between Gabriel and Grace. Together they uncover the legend of the Black Wolf of Bavaria, the secret behind Ludwig II of Bavaria's tragic end, and a lost Wagner opera.

The game was created using techniques developed in Phantasmagoria, with the characters and many objects captured in real-time video and appearing on "virtual sets" consisting largely of photographic backgrounds (a technique known as Full Motion Video, or FMV). Unlike Phantasmagoria, however, The Beast Within is considered one of the few successful examples of FMV computer games. The scenes that take place in Munich give a surprisingly accurate depiction of the city. Dean Erickson plays Gabriel Knight and Joanne Takahashi plays Grace Nakimura. The game contains a magnificent soundtrack by Robert Holmes, who even composed an original opera for the story, titled "Der Fluch Des Engelhart" ("The Curse of Engelhart"), which is performed by a full accompaniment of players during the pivotal final chapter in the restored Wittelsbach Theater.

Gabriel Knight 3: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned (1999)

A family of nobles summon Gabriel to France to investigate the abduction of an infant boy near the town of Rennes-le-Château. The town's legendary treasure, sought for centuries and rumored to be linked to the Knights Templar and even the birth of the Christ, makes for an intriguing enough backdrop, but soon it appears that vampirism may be involved in the abduction. Portions of the plot are loosely inspired by the theories presented in the book Holy Blood, Holy Grail.

As in the second episode, the game shifts back and forth between Gabriel and Grace as main characters. The engine used in this game is a brand new 3D engine created specifically for the game, and Tim Curry returns as the voice of Gabriel Knight. Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned is the last adventure game published by Sierra Entertainment to date.

Gabriel Knight 3 received the dubious honor of being named "the last title of note in the adventure game genre" in an article on Old Man Murray where the author posits that adventure games died out because their puzzles became too non-sensical and absurd. In it, the author lambasts a sequence of puzzles in the game and their highly unintuitive solutions.

The books

The stories of Sins of the Fathers (ISBN 0451456076) and The Beast Within (ISBN 0451456211) were adapted into novels by Jane Jensen. Both books are currently out of print. The Beast Within was criticised by some as having been poorly edited, as there is an abundance of errors whenever German language is used.

The Future of Gabriel Knight

The stories may or may not continue in another game, Gabriel Knight 4, but several fans (which are very vociferous on the Official Gabriel Knight Message Board (link)) are eager to help Jane Jensen, VU and Sierra begin another episode in the universe of Gabriel Knight. A serious campaign (The Gabriel Knight 4 Campaign link) is underway by fans to raise awareness of the Gabriel Knight series, with a view to creating sufficient demand for VUG to give the go-ahead for Jane Jensen to create GK4. The site contains a plethora of articles covering topics of interest to GK players, as well as a great deal of other unique content, and ideas for promoting Gabriel Knight awareness.

Trivia

In Sins of the Fathers, when he uncovers the Schattenjäger library in Schloss Ritter, Gabriel can examine the bookshelves to browse their contents. Among the books he finds are reference material alluding to werewolves and vampires -- which would turn out to be the supernatural antagonists in his next two games.

The second game, The Beast Within, was originally going to be much longer. Its original design indicated eight chapters rather than the published six, including one that required the player to act as Ludwig II and hide the Lost Opera in his castles. However, according to game designer Jane Jensen, the game ran over budget (its original budget was estimated at 3 million dollars and ended up going over budget by almost a million) and the required material could therefore not be filmed. It would also have taken up too much space as the game already had enough data to fill 6 cd's and would have required as many as 9 cd's to incorporate all the additional story. This helps explain why the transition from chapter 5 to chapter 6 is so jumpy and why chapter 6 itself is so vastly larger than the other chapters. (This information comes from e-mail correspondence with Jane Jensen and can thusly not be substantiated by written sources.)

External links

The Gabriel Knight 4 Campaign – Site promoting awareness of the GK series and ideas for promoting the games and encouraging GK4 to be made.
Gabriel Knight 2000 – A website with patches for the first and second game, allowing them to run correctly in Windows XP. (Moved to http://vogons.zetafleet.com/gkpatches/)
Quest Studios – Music from many of Sierra's games, including the Gabriel Knight series.
Schloss Ritter - Ancestral Residence of the Schattenjagers – A detailed fansite.
Who Killed Adventure Games? - article on Old Man Murray

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