I MIGHT be downloading that.

Oh dear, so many anxious people about to get very VERY disappointed *laughs*
Phantasmagoria is in my top 5 of worst games I ever played (and I've played thousands). Sorry for saying this GOG, but we have to be fair.
A few examples why: (this is from memory so it may be slightly inaccurate in places)
- it has 7 CDs yet it takes maybe 3 hours to complete: on those 7 CDs there's nowhere near as much content as you'd believe because most content is repeated on all 7 CDs
- "puzzles" consist of going from room A to room B to watch a new clip being played.
- There's very little logic to the game. The events are triggered in order so if you have to go to room B, you won't be able to do ANYTHING until you go to room B. And there's no reason WHY you should go to room B so you end up going to all rooms until you trigger the next event or .. you can "cheat" and ask for a hint.
Seriously, to me this is the anti-game. It's a disgrace as an adventure game yet certain people still love the game for its horror elements. It's a good game for starting adventure gamers though - if they don't mind terrible acting and cheesy horror sequences :P

Can't wait to pick this up, i remember it fondly. Just like the Space Quests..Great Addition!

GOOD GOD NOSTALGIA BOMB!

Clasic good (but not excelent) game, but price is too high even for Vista compatibility.

while you wont find me saying this is the best adventure ever. a big appeal (if not the biggest) of gog is the nostalgia factor. and i have a lot of fond memories playing this when i was like 13. and since this was one of sierras best selling games im sure there are thousands who feel just like me. yes its simplistic, yes i love bad but awesome acting, yes i love the gore. oh yeah, and i still have a crush on the main character.
and it has one of the BEST title theme music in any video game ever:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18tm6eCuNhI
i definately prefer phantasmagoria over every kings quest (except 7 heheheh)

I think that last part (the crush) probably had a lot to do with the reason why you liked it ;) and being 13.
I was 17 at the time and it fades quickly when put next to games such as Tex Murphy. This game received a LOT of hype and exposure so the sales are no surprise - it's a disgrace this sold more than Under A Killing Moon, though. Just goes to show how important marketing can be to a game regardless of quality.
And heck, I'm a huge retro gamer but despite that, there's hundreds of excellent games which don't need pink glasses to be enjoyable. I can see why some people would enjoy it, but it definitely won't be because of the puzzles because, as a game, this is terrible. As an interactive movie, the accentuation is definitely on the "movie" part here. Beast Within really learned a lot from the mistakes made in Phantasmagoria.

Mea culpa guys, I was indeed confusing the two since I have both! Let me also add that the top 3 FMV games that I have played are these two plus Gabriel Knight 2 which is probably the best of the bunch.

This game i have wanted to buy for many years but either another game i wanted was there or i couldnt find it now i have a chance to play it.

@red_avatar
i do agree with you essentially and your points are great. but i think you're going a bit overboard saying the game is terrible. not counting all the awesomeness like the FMV, music, atmosphere etc, i'd give the pure adventure gameplay a 6/10. the whole package depending on how critical you wanna be 7-8/10.

Err you just summarised the entire interactive movie genre. They were invariably shallow hype driven failures where the most interaction you got out of them was to get up and walk away in disgust.
A harbinger for the modern movie industry really.

How you like this game very much depends on how much you can suspend your disbelief, identify yourself with the main character and just go with the game's story and flow.
If you do, there is a pretty good atmosphere of dread and despair to be experienced. If not, you will find the game repetitive, cheesy and quite silly (and even that can still be a fun experience).
I'm pretty curious myself what I will think of it now, since last time I played this game was quite a long time ago. I played it together with my sister and we were both far too young for the extremely graphic and gory murder scenes, which is why they left quite an impression in our fragile little minds.
Thanks GOG for the opportunity to play this game in English, the German localization was beyond terrible.

I remember being so excited when I bought this game. I was like 'Wow, 7 CDs. It's like participating in a movie.'
And then while playing it I found you go through a CD in like 30 minutes.
And it's like watching a movie where it pauses every few minutes and you have to click to unpause it to continue watching.
And make that a cheesy B-horror movie.
There is some difference in the eye candy if you go to a chapter directly, but no noticeable difference otherwise.
I can see why Adventure games went downhill after games like this.

I remember this game, I think it was a four disk set. Its been a long time. I love GOG,its bringing back alot of memorys from games past.

Thanks for the warning Red Avatar, but this is a game I never played the first go round because my computer at the time just couldn't handle games like this. I would see these FMV games on display at Software Etc. and just be wowed by the graphics and so upset that I couldn't play them. I especially wanted to play the horror ones. Now, I've played a few FMV games and I know how crappy many of them are, but for some reason (probably related to the fact I couldn't play them as a kid) I simply enjoy the hell out of them, kind of like how I enjoy watching crappy old horror and kung fu movies. I'm looking forward to playing this release.