LucasArts’ classic The Secret of Monkey Island was originally released in 1990 and quickly became the pinnacle of the point-and-click adventure genre. It’s much-loved by… look behind you, a three-headed monkey!
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Ron Gilbert conceived the idea of a pirate adventure in 1988 after completing Zak McKraken and the Alien Mindbenders (review coming soon). He pitched it to Lucasfilm Games as a series of short stories and the concept was warmly received, but production was postponed until 1989 as the company had assigned its developers to work on Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade. Gilbert soon realised that it would be difficult to design the game by himself so he joined forces with Tim Schafer and Dave Grossman, and they went on to create one of the most-loved adventure titles of all time.
LucasArts’ game producer Craig Derrick and his team conceived the idea of a remake in 2008, deciding to make “something fresh and new while staying true to the original” after researching the Monkey Island series’ history. The developer displayed the title to the public at the 2009 E3 expo and reviews are still favourable today: The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition features hand-drawn visuals with more detail, a remastered musical score, character voices and a hint system (we never had those in my day!).
The Secret of Monkey Island was the first title I played on my prized Amiga as a nine-year-old kid and I fell in love with it instantly. I learned from it, wished it would never end, and it caused me to seek out other adventures and then branch out into other genres. I’d therefore be lying if I said that it didn’t have a substantial effect on my gaming history, so I’m going to be completely upfront: some of the opinions in this review may be somewhat rose-tinted.
Personally, I found the remastering a little hard to accept as the original was such a big part of my childhood. I particularly didn’t like the fact that our hero had been redesigned to better fit in with the ‘cartoon’ makeover the series received after its third instalment – no pirate worth his salt would be seen dead with a haircut like that. But the benefit of downloading the Special Edition is that at a press of a button, you can be transported back to the good old days when graphics were blocky, music was tinny and hint systems were but a glimmer in the future.
This review is therefore based on the original The Secret of Monkey Island, but we’ve thrown in some comments about the Special Edition for good measure. Anyone who doesn’t like it probably fights like a cow.
Players take on the role of fresh-faced Guybrush Threepwood, starting from his arrival on Mêlée Island and quest to become a pirate. Despite finding out that other swashbucklers in the area are too afraid to sail because of the evil ghost pirate LeChuck, he completes the Three Trials and learns the arts of thievery,sword-mastery and treasure-huntery (argh!). But then LeChuck kidnaps the beautiful governor Elaine Marley so Guybrush, in true adventure hero style, must find a way to the legendary Monkey Island to rescue his amour.
While the original game makes use of LucasArts’ SCUMM interface as seen in other titles such as Maniac Mansion (review coming soon), with verbs such as ‘pick up’ and ‘talk to’, the Special Edition has been redesigned so options are tucked away into pop-up menus. While this has the benefit of freeing up visual real estate, the downside is that actions in the new version require a lot of menu-opening; this causes a few pain-points in timed challenges such as the grog-and-mugs puzzle. Sometimes the old ways are simply the best.
The Secret of Monkey Island is one of the first games to incorporate dialogue trees and it uses these to great comedic effect in the sword-fighting scenes. These were influenced by swashbuckling movies starring Errol Flynn, in which the pirates often taunted their opponents rather than attacking them; this gave the designers the idea to base duels on insults rather than combat. Writer Orson Scott Card helped Gilbert, Schafer and Grossman write the invectives during a visit to Lucasfilm Games’ headquarters and they came up with well-known lines such as: “You fight like a dairy farmer.” (“How appropriate. You fight like a cow.”)
In fact, this title is credited for inventing the concept of humour in video games. One example is where Guybrush goes through a series of off-screen battles in Elaine’s mansion, which are presented to the player through non-interactive action prompts. We might never see the tremendous yak, wax lips, heavily-armed clown or army of gophers but this makes the scene far funnier than any sprites could be.
The puzzles are somewhat secondary to the story but for they get the tricky balance of being challenging but not too hard spot on. Players will be stretched but never entirely stumped although, as mentioned above, a hint system is available in the Special Edition if they need a bit of guidance. As can be expected with most classic adventures, a lot of travelling between locations and pixel-hunting for interactive items may not to be to the taste of more modern gamers – but they just don’t realise what they’re missing out on.
While the visuals in the remastered version are obviously more up-to-date, it’s possible to go retro and revert to the original by a simple button press. It’s lovely to see the modern cartoon-like visuals merge into the blocky sprites that a lot of older gamers will remember fondly. The Secret of Monkey Island graphics may now appear dated to some but they still hold a lot of charm with their pirate town, desert island and fiery hell settings; and the overhead maps shown when navigating the islands are a treat.
Characters are pleasantly animated in the same ‘jerky’ way as the original, as though the updated visuals have been drawn over the old title for the Special Edition. Sadly however Guybrush has been given a different look and this may disappoint hardcore fans like myself; while most characters look fine, his new image really doesn’t fit in with that I have of him in my head. After seeing the still dialogue scenes in the original I had a huge crush on the tousle-haired buccaneer as a kid, but now my childhood dreams have been shattered, and all by one dodgy blond toupee.
With the remastered version comes voices for the characters and overall the acting is very well done. The soundtrack has also been revamped and ambient effects have been added to most scenes, so switching to the original results in what seems like very quiet gameplay. However, it’s a treat to hear the old tinny midi tracks and for those who played the title back in the day, the theme tune will be instantly remembered and bring back lots of great memories.
It took me five hours or so to complete The Secret of Monkey Island because most of the puzzle solutions came back to me, but anyone should be able to do it in around six to eight. As with a lot of old adventures, once the game has been completed that’s it – roll credits and start again from the beginning if you wish – and here is where the issue with the Special Edition comes in. While the title itself is special enough, it would have been nice to have an extra bonus such as a video documentary or commentary. Something from Gilbert, Schafer and Grossman would have been really well received and made the return of Guybrush even more of an occasion.
Playing The Secret of Monkey Island will take you back to a simpler time, before games needed to bash us over the head with violence to get our attention. It has characters you’ll end up caring about, puzzles that require some thought and a script that’s actually funny despite being over two decades old. If there was any game I could play again like it was the first time, it would definitely be Guybrush’s first adventure – they certainly don’t make them like this anymore.
A final piece of trivia for you: a fictional recipe in the game for grog was mistakenly reported as real in 2009 by the Argentinian news channel C5N, which urged teenagers not to consume the dangerous drink. Kerosene, battery acid, pepperoni… mmmmm.
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