3. Gabriel Knight: Sins Of The Father (1993)
In Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Father, Luke Skywalker gets to hang out with Dr. Frank-n-Furter, Alfred Pennyworth, and Worf. The nerd fourfecta strikes again. Sierra Entertainment was among the great adventure game studios, on par with LucasArts and Infocom. Sierra told a wide variety of stories - kid-friendly fantasy games, sci-fi comedy, adult games with pixelated nudity, police procedurals, and one certain detective/horror franchise that owed a debt to Kolchak: The Night Stalker. Gabriel Knight is my favorite Sierra franchise. I love the fusion of the detective story with the horror genre. Of having some gumshoe or reporter take on what seems like just another job, that leads him or her down the rabbit hole and into all manner of unspeakable horrors. Gabriel Knight: Sins Of The Father fits that bill rather nicely. Without spoiling the story, let's just say Gabriel Knight doesn't start the game as a traditional detective and ends the game being something all together different. Sins Of The Father is a perfect example of Sierra at their peak. The puzzles are well-balanced and fair. You can count the pixels, but the graphics have a lot of charm. And it also has an incredible voice cast, who give life to Jane Jensen's involving story and memorable characters. And it's Jane Jensen that I would like to talk about for a minute. She was one
of two prominent female game designers at Sierra back in the day. Having even one female lead designer at a game studio was a rare thing back then, and I'm sad to say it's still a rare thing today. There are notable female game designers working today - like Jade Raymond and Kim Swift - but there still aren't enough female voices in gaming.