Grim Fandango Remastered

Grim Fandango Remastered is Double Fine's 2015 restoration of Tim Schafer's 1998 LucasArts adventure, rebuilt with repainted textures and a re-recorded orchestral score. Its defining quality is the writing: Manny Calavera, a travel agent to the dead, works a four-year murder mystery through a neo-noir underworld fusing hard-boiled crime plotting with Mexican Day-of-the-Dead folk art. The detective work happens entirely in conversation and inventory: cross-examining suspects, combining objects, never firing a weapon. The script and voice acting rank among the medium's best.

The trade-off is age. This is classic point-and-click design, and its puzzle logic is often obtuse enough to send players to a guide, while the controls remain stiff and the 2015 remaster shipped with bugs and occasional softlocks. Critics settled around a Metascore of 80, praising the story while conceding the mechanics have dated. Players who prize atmosphere, dialogue and a genuine noir mystery will find little to rival it; anyone wanting brisk, self-explanatory detective puzzles should pass.