Sebastian Grünwald from Adventure-Treff.de and Dominik Weber from GK4ever.com made a small interview with Dean Erickson, the actor who played Gabriel Knight in the second part of the series. The game consists of real actors acting in front of a blue box which was replaced by scanned photographs and SVGA graphics on the screens of the developers.

It was also planned to integrate Dean in the third installment of Gabriel Knight, but then Sierra and Jane Jensen decided to use 3D characters instead of real actors.
In this interview we talked with Dean Erickson about his career and the work on "Gabriel Knight: The Beast Within".

GK4ever: Hi Dean!
Beside your diary reports on your webpage, fans haven't heard anything of you for a long time. Could you tell us what your daily shedule looks like? What other jobs did you do during the last years? What do you make living of?

Dean: I had made my living as a personal trainer during the past few years until I hurt my back. I'm currently getting my real estate license in California and will pursue that livelihood unless an artistic endeavor pays off financially. I write pretty much every day and currently have a screenplay under consideration at a production company. As an actor, I've played Hamlet and Macbeth since playing Gabriel Knight, but haven't pursued the business rigorously enough to make a career difference. I have recently gotten back into acting class and back on stage (Macbeth) and am putting more energy into acting than I've done in years. Unfortunately, I hardly ever get to audition, but I'll keep trying.

GK4ever: Is there any movie genre or movie character in general you like the
most? Or would love to play someday?

Dean: I like to play good guys with a rough edge, some dangerous flaw. Basically, your everyday movie hero.

GK4ever: Full-Motion-Video (FMV) games like Gabriel Knight 2 seem to had their best time already. However, there are still some independent studios that try to produce such type of adventure games like the recently released "Zelenhgorm" from Sweden or "Darkstar" with the crew of Mystery Science Theater 3000. Do you sometimes still follow that developments? Can you image, that this genre could come back to life another time?

Dean: Anything can happen, but I don't hold my breath that it will. Businesses generally go in cycles, and the cycle now is geared toward computer generated effects. At some point, there may be a backlash as human beings go back to carinsg about other human beings, rather than animated characters.

GK4ever: On your webpage you write that making GK3 a 3D instead of a 2D FMV game was a mistake. Can you still rememeber when you got to know that a third GK part would be without you?

Dean: I don't remember saying that it was a mistake. If I did, I was wrong. It's not my place to say such a thing. Obviously, I would have preferred to be in GK3, so I was hoping for live action. These decisions are business decisions and not up to me. If someone wants to hire me as an actor, then I have a business decision to make whether I want to do their project or not.