Gray Matter

I really like Angela, so lovely

Delightful little game. I will echo the sentiment that if you have difficulty starting this game on Win11, there is a guide on Steam that was able to help me overcome that predicament. After which, my experience of the game was exceptionally smooth engine-wise.

Loved this game, it fills me with nostalgic joy of the old darker but adventurous tales of video games yore. Unfortunately, it did come with some minor bothers. I wouldn't say I were able to play this game completely without guidance. There were certain actions that were not prompt by the game itself, leaving you quite puzzled on what to do next to progress the chapter. Mostly revolving around the use of your phone. You use it more frequently that you'd think and you wouldn't know when sometimes. Besides that, the puzzles were quite the mix of good ol' logic and occasionally, there was some big braining involved there that requires you to just about bash every option until something works hahaha. But what is an old adventure game without rubbing all your inventory against an interactive location. :P

You'd adore the graphics of this game if you're a huge fan of prerendered backgrounds. They're so stunning, much nicer than the preview screenshots the store page has set up. A pleasant surprise. There were a lot of locations that were hardly utilized, their only purpose is as if to make the world seem bigger than it is, but hey, I like prerendered backgrounds so I appreciate the extra flavors.

I also enjoyed the usage of real life locations and information, definitely a Jane Jensen production if I've ever heard one. Felt like I had a glimpse of what it'd be like to tour around the town.

I'll reiterate that I didn't really encounter any bugs in my experience. I can't vouch for anyone else. All the puzzles functioned as intended and nothing caused the game to crash or lock me in.

The magic feature is like a fun test of literacy and not so much a puzzle but it certainly added some interactive-ness to the game.

That said, go play the game! It's a fun experience that hopefully won't take you long, I'd say about 6 hours. Don't look at my hours, my mind likes to wander between gameplay. Not because it was boring or anything, just have a life LMAO!

This game is a mixed bag - I would give it about 6 out of 10. On one hand, there it's obvious there was a creative ambition to create a layered story with character development. On the other hand, the writing is not very inspired, and rehashes the immortal myths and hoaxes about the supernatural (like that humans can "awaken" the brain to use 100 percent capacity at once in contrast with normal usage). The main protagonist is very hard to relate to - she routinely lies, cheats, and irresponsibly puts others to danger or shifts blame to them, but it could be argued that a young girl from foster care could be like that. The visuals are also a mixed bag, with some anatomically wrong 2D art and really wooden and clunky 3D animation, but the game has unique atmosphere. Gameplay-wise, it's often hard to understand what the player is expected to be doing, there is a lot of backtracking involved when suddenly a previously unusable item becomes crucial, it's easy to get stuck while playing.

This was a charming mystery adventure game, but fair warning, it is a bit dated and has some bugs. Cutscene videos would stay on a loop for me until I hit the skip scene button. The inventory UI was also very fickle and only seemed to work on the top half of the bar. And I had to follow one of the steam guides to get it working on Windows 11.

Aside from that it was playable enough and I enjoyed my time with Gray Matter. The gameplay is pretty standard point-and-click for the most part, though there is a "magic trick" mechanic to this game that is kinda unique. The two characters you play as contrast each other well, with Sam being sneaky, headstrong, and caring whilst David is somber, moody, and tragic. There is a good variety of side characters you meet, and the story features a great buildup of mystery toward it's conclusion. One thing that also really surprised me was the soundtrack. It not only has some lovely instrumentals, but several vocal themes, performed by "The Scarlet Furies" are featured as well!

great game with intriguing magic related puzzles and a cleaver story.

Gray Matter is an adventure game written by the legendary Jane Jensen. It has an intriguing plot, where your player character Samantha Everett (in some of the game chapter's you play as her employer, Dr David Styles) investigates supernatural occurrences happening around Oxford that coincide with the conducting of a series of neurobiological tests by Dr Styles.

Samantha is a stage magician, and this features in the gameplay, as you can consult her magician's handbook to play tricks on people, in the form of minigames. I really enjoyed these portions of the game.

This game's graphic are absolutely GORGEOUS, and the sound design and voice acting are very good too.

I have a minor gripe, which is that the exterior scenes can be large, so it takes several agonising seconds for the player character to walk across the screen. This is mitigated by the availability of a map screen, that allows for fast travel from place to place.

If you are into story driven adventure games, Gray Matter is worth checking out.

As a life-long fan of 2-D point & click adventure games, particularly the Gabriel Knight Trilogy, I was eager to dive into Gray Matter, a game also penned by Jane Jensen. The game’s premise of blending magic tricks with puzzle-solving intrigued me, and I appreciated the unique twist this brought to the gameplay.

However, while Gray Matter does have its strengths, it falls short in some areas compared to Jensen’s earlier works. The characters felt rather shallow, especially when compared to the rich, complex personalities in the Gabriel Knight series. Additionally, the game leans heavily on "moon logic" for many of its puzzles, making them frustrating rather than enjoyable. Without a walkthrough, some of these puzzles would have been nearly impossible to solve.

The atmosphere and story have potential, but the overall execution lacks the depth and polish of a classic Sierra title. While I wouldn’t rank Gray Matter among the greats of the genre, it’s still worth a play for fans of Jane Jensen and those who enjoy unique puzzle mechanics, though with some reservations.

This game was great a really enjoyed it the art work is amazing. I would've loved to see the next game sadly the company went out of business. If anyone Owns the ip Get Jan Jensen back and create the pride of frankenstein will u thank you

A great, well-written point & click adventure game from the creator of Gabriel Knight! There are some really cool plot points and twists and turns that are well hidden even in hindsight, and I could easily see there being a sequel to this at some point in the future. One note, if you are buying the game now, you may have to download some additional drivers to help you play it as the software is built for older computers.

I had a rough start because it was too easy to start. Then I got into it especially getting into chapter 2 the difficulty increased somewhat. I then got stuck and thought it was me until I got bored running around with no idea what to do. I'm at 85% total progress in Chapter 2 with these quests: 100% on "Strange Events at Horspath Track", 100% on "The Mysterious Dr Styles", 100% on "Sam Plays Lab Assistant", 100% on "Sam gets carded", 60% on Chapter 2 Bonus, BUT...25% on "The Betrayer's Price - Part 2" I have the mouthpiece to a horn, but I can't click on the horn to operate it. Earlier in the game I had come into the pub where the horn is and could click on the horn, but I left the pub assuming I'd get the right piece later because I didn't realize the bartender had the mouthpiece all along. Well, now that I got the mouthpiece from the bartender and I'm done with all the other quests, so I assume there's nothing else to do, except blow the horn...but I can't. If I click space bar it doesn't show the horn as an option. I tried restarting then reinstalling the game hoping maybe it was a local cache glitch or something like that. It's not worth replaying this game up to this point, so I'll call it there and won't finish the game. I'm done. I'm not replaying. Gameplay is ok. The dialogue provides too much guidance, there's a lot of things to interact with that are pointless. Quern is a similar puzzle game and but has a way better story and game play by a long shot.