Review – The Secret Of Monkey Island: Special Edition

Adventure

Point and click without the mouse.

Lurk

This is the third time I’ve bought The Secret of Monkey Island. I have owned it on the Amiga and bought it together with the sequel. This is one of the definitive Lucasarts SCUMM point and click adventures. Point and click games fell out of sorts for a while, but they’ve seen a resurgence of late. Thanks to Telltale games and their releases of Sam & Max as well as the Wallace & Gromit game.

Finally, a true HD remake and not just a filter.

So nearly twenty years on from the original release, a special edition is released with all new graphics and sound. For a start this game has a full voice cast, with all of the voice actors from the last game reprising their roles. Also the original midi music has been replaced by proper music using real instruments, none of your Casio keyboard shit here.

The graphics are lovingly updated from the dated early ’90s pixellated mess that they once were. Instead you get backgrounds and characters that look as if they were painted on the screen. My only reservation about this is the look of Guybrush Threepwood, who actually looks a little gangly as well as having some sort of flat-top pony-tailed mullet going on. If you want to relive the good old days you can just press the back button on your pad and it reverts to original graphics and sound.

The original Amiga graphics option still looks great also.

As far as the gameplay goes its exactly the same as the original, none of the puzzles have changed. This meant even though I hadn’t played the game in a very long I knew the solutions to the puzzles. Which is one of the great things about this game, none of the puzzles are overly convoluted or obscure. Though if you do get stuck they’ve added a hint button. They all make sense in their own way, even the rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle which has to be an iconic item from this game.

This brings me to another thing that’s iconic about this game and that’s the humour. Unlike many games which seem to be very much a part of their time, when it comes to any humour in them this it is timeless. The sword fighting where you have to use insults and their matching responses is still really funny. As are many other sections of the game, which is the reason this game is considered such a stone cold classic.

Tiq Secondary Review I’m a geek, pure and simple. Cut me and I’ll bleed red pixels all over you. So hopefully you’ll understand how important the original Secret of Monkey Island is to me. So on the day I downloaded The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition, with trembling hands and powerful anticipation, I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I’m happy to say I wasn’t disappointed. TSOMI: SE is as much a labour of love as the original, filled with completely redrawn artwork that’s much more cartoony looking than the original, but still manages to look bloody fantastic. The Special Edition touts brand new voiceovers. (With most of the main voice actors from Curse of Monkey Island being brought back for the occasion) At the best of times, this is absolutely perfect, and ever so slightly jarring at the very worst. (I’m looking at you, Governor Marley) Along with the new voice acting and beautiful art is the brilliantly remastered orchestral soundtrack, with fantastic new iterations of the music most of us fell in love with the very first time we played the game. Best of all, if you’re feeling nostalgic, you can switch back to the original version of the game (with pixelated graphics and beloved MIDI music included) at any point in time, with the click of a button. As a long time Monkey Island fan, I highly recommend this to new and old gamers alike, as MI is a fantastic series of games, I think everyone should experience at least once. I really hope this is a sign of things to come and look forward to Monkey Island 2 receiving the same treatment. Secondary Score: 9/10

Not only is it funny, but it is all in the context of the game. There’s none of the jokes that date the game apart from the guy in the Scumm bar who is wearing an “ask me about Loom” badge. Which is another Lucasarts point and click adventure from 1990. Which really was a bit of a flop, it was going to be a part of a trilogy of games. Yet for some reason this game is often mentioned during the other Monkey Island games.

Not everything is all great though, some of the voice acting for the second and third string characters can be a quite poor in places. Also whilst the control are fine for 99% of the time there is one puzzle where they become annoying, due to the fact it is time based. Apart from that its a very good update on this great classic game

All this make me hope they do an update of the second game and re-release the third game. After playing this I’m also tempted to buy the newest Monkey Island game for the PC. I’ve also downloaded another Lucasarts point and click adventure from Steam. So because of this I’m currently starting to play Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis.

This is a genre that I’ve sorely missed and quite frankly I can’t see why it ever went out of fashion. Sure the Sierra point and click titles weren’t always that great. Especially due to them making it far too easy to die and some extremely obtuse puzzles. Thankfully a lot of Lucasart games are being released over Steam and at £2.99 each they’re great value.

At 800M$P this game is a bargain and is definitely worth picking up whether you’re already a fan of the original title, or if you’ve never played a  Monkey Island game before. There’s something here for everyone, so go and buy it.

Rating: 9/10