Gray Matter

Are there any games similar to Gray Matter? I just finished it and really enjoyed the story, atmosphere and soundtrack.

I mostly play the Nancy Drew and Sherlock Holmes series, and found Gray Matter to be a fun, puzzle free, change of pace.

to GameBoomers, lostlibrary.

I am sure that other forum members will have suggestions for you, but I will ask the obvious first. Have you played Jane Jensen's (the designer of Gray Matter) other games including the Gabriel Knight trilogy?

Thanks Marian!

I haven’t played anything else by Jane Jensen. I’ll have to check those out.

I just noticed I have Sins of the Father 20th anniversary and Cognition on my steam wishlist. Maybe they’ll give me Gray Matter vibes.

The Gabriel Knight series is from the 1990s and the early 2000s, but if you like Jane Jensen's style of storytelling, I think you would like them.

You can purchase them from GOG - they are tweaked to run on newer computer systems (the 20th-Anniversary remake of the first Gabriel Knight game, of course, is a much newer game for newer computers).

Jane also designed a game called Moebius; some of our forum members here had good things to say about it.

My favorite of the Gabriel Knight series is this, which is the second game in the series, following Sins of the Fathers (of which you have the remake). Definitely a classic.

Gabriel Knight 2: The Beast Within

The Gabriel Knight games are still Jane Jensen's best work, and I agree with Marian that the second game is the best in the series. They are more difficult games than Gray Matter, however. Moebius is an easier game, and I think it's pretty great also, though not on par with the GK series. I'm replaying the game now and am enjoying it very much. It looks similar to Cognition as far as the graphics are concerned.

Cognition is another good one, although it was written by the Phoenix Online team. Jane Jensen was a story consultant for the team.

If you don't mind something dark, The Cat Lady is not very hard at all and has an excellent story. Again, it's very dark, though, so it depends on whether that appeals to you or not.

Some other fantastic games that aren't too difficult (though more difficult than The Cat Lady for sure) are Culpa Innata and The Lost Crown. You may have already played these, I'm not sure? The play-style of these games is very similar to Gray Matter, and they're both story heavy games with rich game worlds. I assume you've already played The Longest Journey and the Syberia games, but if not, they are strongly recommended classics as well.

Are you looking for detective/mystery games?
There are some fairly recent ones, like The Raven: Legacy of a Master Thief.

Not sure what you mean by "puzzle free" because all those games you mentioned, including Gray Matter, had puzzles.

Thanks venus! I've only played the first Syberia game, and that was over ten years ago. I'll have to check out The Longest Journey.

Definitely looking for mystery/ detective games. The Raven looks like it's up my alley.

By puzzle free I just meant no Nancy Drew type sliders or timed puzzles. I tend to die a lot in those games

Lostlibrary,
Im happy to say that I have played ALL of the games mentioned here, including Gray Matter. Enjoyed them ALL (with the help of some good walkthroughs). LOL
Sandy

Enjoy The Longest Journey, lostlibrary! It's generally considered one of the best adventure games ever made. If you like it, you can always play the sequels as well, if you don't mind the different controls and the action elements of the first Dreamfall. Dreamfall Chapters is a better game than Dreamfall, I think (no combat/action and more in depth characters) and also my favorite in the series, although that's not a popular opinion. The first one (The Longest Journey) is objectively still the best game as far as gameplay is concerned.

The Raven is a terrific detective game, you should enjoy that one. Since you mentioned detective games, have you played Murder on the Orient Express? I'm not sure if you would be interested, as the only place it appears to be available is here as a disk version - https://www.amazon.com/Agatha-Christie-Murder-Orient-Express-PC/dp/B000GCGQ6Y. I'm not sure which version of Windows you have? I have a dual boot with Windows 7 and 10 and play this particular game on Windows 7. I haven't tested it on 10 yet, so I'm not sure if it would work or not. I can try it if you're intersted, to see if it will run.

If you don't mind retro graphics, The Blackwell Series by Wadjet Eye is excellent. They are mystery games of a sort that involve ghosts and are available on both Steam and GOG.