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I'm sorry.

Oh, gads, no, that would never happen. This baby's coming and ain't nothing stopping it 😄 Now, if we're talking about any potential for Ron's future involvement or the likelihood of other things happening with Monkey Island after RMI... that's a completely different story, and that DOES concern me. But I'd be a lot more worried if this game weren't so stinking good. I don't want to set myself up for disappointment, but I have a hunch the reaction is going to be magnificent to behold.

This is very satisfying to look at

So the secret was never about Monkeys, but about a Frenchman looking for "Mon key!"

Incase you're wondering if they're reading your Tweets, I sent a nice message of support to the team (@grumpygamer @phrenopolis @JennSandercock @DavidBFox) and got likes back from them. Why not let them know that there are people who there who are super excited about Return!

I haven't read any comment section, Reddit boards, Twitter, anything! And I couldn't be happier about this: I loved the trailer, the art style, the music, Dom's voice-over, everything, I am still 100% psyched! Nothing and nobody has managed (or will manage) to put down my excitement! I'm just waiting for the moment when I'll be in my pajamas, plausibly with an autumn breeze coming from my window, my earl grey tea, and the game up and running either on my PC or my Switch (or both? ). Aaah Do yourselves a favour, if you can and if your job allows for that of course, suppress the FOMO and try not looking at Twitter/YouTube/anything Because at the end of the line, it's just not worth it to have our excitement artificially put down by an uneducated mass of people who think writing mean stuff on the internet has no consequence on the real world.

The same fellow who made that scrapbook also made this:

Speaking of remasters…

And while I went that far, I thought there was no better time than now to display these posters, and the few other physical pieces of Monkey Island merch that I've acquired over the years, plus my physical editions of the games themselves, and display them in one location. Introducing Monkey Corner! (Overlooking the fact that I clearly need ink in my printer, I'm happy with the result nonetheless!)

In anticipation for the new game, and in celebration of the new trailer, I decided to use the assets to hand to Photoshop a ReMI poster that would line up alongside the other Monkey Island posters in last years' LimitedRun box set. (I simply cropped the ReMI key art to the appropriate size (25.5cm x 20.5cm) and pasted the logo onto the top of it.) If you'd like to print one out for yourselves, see the image attached.

I actually think that Ron himself is probably rather thick skinned about all this, despite being visibly annoyed. My sense is that his concern is more for his team. And it's them and particularly Rex that I feel sorry for in all this. I have happened to meet Rex on a couple of occasions - quite accidentally, since we appear to have a few mutual friends. On both occasions that I've met him he's really come across as very sweet and kind, which is maybe why some of the harsher criticism eats at me a bit. I don't know who people think Rex is, but he's just this very genuine, humble guy who is a true Monkey Island fan who has managed to land a dream project, and all I'd want for someone like that, (just the same as I felt when I found out that Jake was working on Tales) is that people would be encouraging and accepting of his efforts. And if they couldn't find it in themselves to do that, at least to believe that he was making said efforts in good faith, and that he's not here to ruin your favourite thing. I can't imagine how I'd feel if I'd been handed a project like this, only for the headlines on gaming websites to be filled with stuff about how Ron's having an argument with fans over my art, instead of people just being excited that the months-ago-impossible game exists and maybe giving the people who worked on it the benefit of the doubt. And I don't know exactly how I'd feel in Ron's shoes, having handed someone a project like this knowing that for them it's something they never thought that they'd get to work on in a million years. But I imagine I'd feel very protective of them, and hope that this would be a joyful project for them to be involved in, and not soured by years of nostalgia meeting reality.

The good news is Disney does acknowledge FOA, as they have featured Sophia’s necklace at Jock Lindsay’s Hangar Bar (their Indiana Jones bar) at Walt Disney World.

There are several reasons: Like all cross-platform frameworks, SDL trades off compatibility for lowest common denominator. I can almost always tell when I'm running an SDL app because it has the "feel" of one in its UI behavior, and it just doesn't feel as polished as a natively written program. On top of that, DREAMM has a number of extra-game behaviors (e.g., the frontend, installation, etc) that fit better with the native GUI, versus writing custom UI controls and logic to run in an SDL context (though to be fair I ended up customizing a decent amount of the native Win32 controls, but that wasn't my initial plan). As a personal programming preference, I am generally framework-averse. My experience with most frameworks is that they get me 80-90% of what I want, but I spend an inordinate amount of time fighting that final 10-20%. It usually ends up being a wash, time-wise, and a net negative, frustration-wise. I also prefer writing code with minimal dependencies. As it sits today, all the code in DREAMM is 100% my own, and its only dependency is bog standard Win32. I'd call it lean & mean in general, though the template explosion from my i386 emulator makes the final product a bit of a chonk. All that being said, there is enough interest in other platforms that I will probably do an experimental port to SDL in the not-too-distant future to see how well I can make it work, and also to evaluate just how much work I'm looking at for extra-game behaviors. (And, now that you pushed me to articulate it, I will import this into the FAQ!)

I know it’s just a dream wishlist and may not likely happen, but I’m curious what games you all would like to see remastered and what features you’d like to see included. My list is below: The Curse of Monkey Island - Remastered Graphics (That ESRGAN upscale that Laserschwert made was perfect, and/or Bill Tiller was shopping around his examples as well) - Live Orchestration Soundtrack because banjos. - Additional cutscenes added would love to see the Elaine cutscenes from the finale - “Plank of Love” music video - developer commentary Escape from Monkey Island - Remastered Graphics - similar to the Grim Fandango treatment - Add in the Monkey Kombat Chart to keep track of combinations Tales of Monkey Island - Remastered graphics - the Skunkape team did such a great job with Sam & Max that my hope is that they could someday give the same treatment to this series - Developer Commentary - Flow the chapters together similar to Sam & Max Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis -You guessed it, remastered graphics - Live orchestration - Because I love this soundtrack - new Voice acting - controversial, but as much as I Love Doug Lee as Indy, the rest of it feels a little dated If I was feeling extra I would add Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine too but I’m not sure what I would want from it. But I’m curious to see what your dream remasters are!

😏 Good call! I just threw this together, really! Give us a minute... EDIT: Updated!

Avril Harrison drew the classic Deluxe Paint King Tut illustration. What a powerhouse team Monkey Island had in seemingly every version.

The things I want most in this order are: A do-over of MI1SE. When it's a remaster I think the graphics should at least be trying to be in the spirit of the original, otherwise it's more of a remake. Also adopt the interface and other features of MI2SE. Add in the ability to mix and match any elements of old and new, including being able to switch between EGA, VGA and special edition, switch voices and music over in any mode, independently, etc. Fix the stuff that went wrong in MI2SE. Again, lemme hear the new music with old graphics, if I want. Fix the MT-32 stuff or even better, emulate it so that it's closer to the original. Tales. The Sam and Max ones give some precedent for doing this so it feels less out of reach than the other remasters. Curse. It's well loved enough to deserve an upres and high fidelity soundtrack, and more tools exist now to make this plausible. Escape: Maybe I'd be more willing to replay this if it got a bit of a makeover, and I feel like once you've done the others you should just complete the set.

Exactly. The idea that the game isn't going to be released because of a negative vocal minority, when it's months away from completion, makes no sense at all. You may as well be concerned that Ron is going change the protagonist into Leisure Suit Larry, then quit the game industry by sprouting a pair of wings and flying to Mars, never to be seen again. Worse than that though, I find that kind of speculation quite belittling and insulting towards him.

I thought it was Poppa Peeshew

Let's form a Mix N Mojo crew!!

Oh man. While we are saddened by the ugly wave of hateful comments, here and there are beautiful, hopeful shines of love that give me so much joy and hope! While haters rant, others create art. They make things. It's wonderful. 🥰

A Captain Madison is mentioned in the game description on nintendo.com. Seems to be one of the new pirate leaders: 'Hip, young pirate leaders led by Captain Madison have shuffled the old guard from power, Melee Island has taken a turn for the worse, and famed businessman Stan has been imprisoned for ‘marketing-related crimes’.'

Presumably referring to this I would say... reading between the lines, that is... to really be able to have a conversation about this, we'll have to play the game.

Wait, sorry. Turns out I'm interpreting it wrong. This logo is actually trying to remind me that I can dare the opposing team for double the dollars, or take the physical challenge.

A CMI remaster with upscaled backgrounds and better audio would be nice, of course, but it’d be more like a “nice to have” to me. I’d rather have an EMI remaster with better graphics and and point & click. The keyboard controls really are clunky and take away some of the fun (as everything takes so long). And maybe redo the background – never was a fan of those pre-rendered ones. As for a TMI remake/remaster my wish list would be: - new character models for all the ones that were reused - better lighting (especially Ep. 1) - maybe P&C if possible - Soundtrack with live instruments/orchestra In the case of MI1 and MI2 I’d love to see the games remade with Rex Crowle adapting the look of Return. The scrapbook pictures in the ReMI trailer shows, how well that could work. The voice cast could stay, although I’d personally prefer some of the more goofier voices to be recast. While remaking the games it could also be fun, if Ron Gilbert said down to change some puzzles slightly or incorporating new ones, to give the player something new not only in art and sound (although I’d prefer a completely new one after ReMI).

You mean like this? (Made by Jason Lewis)

I would love a remaster of Zac McKracken but I’m also a wimp and would want a mode where I won’t run out of money in the game.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say there is zero chance Ron would even consider that. It would be a complete disrespect to not only himself but to his entire team and all the voice actors. Ron has shown how proud he is of not only the game, but his team as well. Beyond that, releasing the game without any pressured changes would be the ultimate win over these toxic people. The disrespectful and toxic can wallow in their own self-pity while Ron releases the game he wanted to make.

It's great to see fans come out in droves to express their love. That's the thing right? They were always there, but people who like stuff don't feel the need to shout it from the rooftops, and are offen scared off by all the fierce negativity. I've seen some concern from people that the game could be cancelled because of this; I don't think so. Even if Ron was remotely thinking about it (again I don't think so, it's clear he's immensely proud of the work he and his team have done), this isn't simply his decision to make, he has Disney and Lucasfilm to answer to, and there's no way they would can a near-complete game they've sunk money into.

If there's one good thing to be had from all the barrage of nasty stuff we all witnessed in the last few days, is how a great part of the community banded together in defense of a creator's right to fulfill his own creative vision. In a way, all this negative stuff might've ended creating even more goodwill for the game.

I think if we're going to compare artwork then you have do it using the ORIGINAL versions of the games... namely the EGA version of SOMI. The VGA version already started to make moves away from the EGA artwork, which the original team were intimately involved with. Ron famously doesn't like the VGA portraits, for example. So you can't hold those up and say THIS is Monkey Island! It's actually the subsequent team's interpretation. So, if you ask me, anyone who wants to complain about the art style through out the series has to start here. Monkey 1 (1990) Monkey 2 (1991) Curse (1996) Escape (2001) Tales (2009) Return (2022)

My favorite shot has got to be the lookout on Melee. The colors are so gorgeous and the shapes feel so three dimensional while also closely adhering to this game’s style. It looks almost like a Pixar color script or something.

Also, say whatever you like about the art style, but the colors are AMAZING

I love it all but I think my favorite part about it is Elaine. 😍

Howdy, fellow Monkey Island fans! I've been lurking this thread since page one and have thoroughly enjoyed all the discussion and speculation. Thanks for the fun. I just want to say that I am so unbelievably happy that we are getting another Monkey Island game. I've grown up with the series and they're my comfort games. I'm preaching to the choir here, but there's something so incredibly enchanting about every single aspect -- the writing, the voice acting, the music, the locations... I plan to retire to Plunder Island. I'm currently working my way back through the games (for the umpteenth time) and they never get old. There's always something new to discover or appreciate. I love them all. Yes, even Escape! And the fact that we're getting another entry in the series? Helmed by some of the original creators? It's honestly a dream come true. My heart was literally racing when I saw the announcement. I never thought this would happen. I cannot wait to play Return. It's a shining light in a maddening world. It makes me so sad to see that Ron isn't going to post about the game anymore and that he and the team are being personally attacked. What an ugly situation. I don't think anything is perfect, and there will be things I like and dislike about Return (hopefully much more to like!), but there's a way to kindly express your opinions. Or to just... not. Some things you can keep to yourself and/or not direct at the people creating the game. It reminds me of the pathetic 'outrage' following the Sam & Max remaster. Anyway, I'm just another internet rando, but if any of the team happen to read this, know that I appreciate all your hard work, I'm so excited to play Return, and thank you for keeping Monkey Island alive. Please don't let the vitriolic vocal minority get to you (easier said than done, I know). My life is greatly enriched because of the series and you are responsible for hours upon hours of joy. And now back to lurking!

Devolver also does some physical releases through a different limited run-style company. I hope someone does one.

Hello everyone. I cannot not do Monkey Island art while waiting for ReMI, so I made this. Please enjoy. ❤️ Marius

Okay, I keep hearing that Return would just rehash all the old stuff and just pour the old characters over us in hopes that this would trigger our nostalgia. Then I see what's been released and I'm intrigued about all the new characters! And until they get real, author approved ones, let's give them some names. Purveyor of the best name gets love and appreciation and, I don't want to promise too much, but maybe they also get a like. 🥰 Also tell us who's your favorite character and why! And you can speculate a bit about their role in the game until it actually releases. Here's a short list of new characters for you to slap a genius name on: (1) Ghost pirate violinist lady She peaked our interest in the first teaser. Still the best design. Living dreads on the living dead. Also, violin skills! (2) Ghost pirate crate delivery person As seen in countless memes of the ReMI thread. Apparently LeChuck's right hand. Ghostified Largo maybe ... ahhh, naaah. (3) Brr Muda Judge That guy in the screenshot's icy court room, center in the trailer's fish eating contest. He's probs excruciatingly nice. (4) Brr Muda Key King Wears a crown of keys and according to Guybrush's scrap book, eats live fish. (5) LeChuck's Zombie Chef That mouth area really doesn't look particularly healthy. The civilized pirate looks away. (6) Very Important Pirate 1 / Afro-Carribbean beardy dude That animation looks like he's pouring his drink directly into his hat. Also that shirt collar would have brought J. C. Leyendecker to the very end of his skills. (7) Very Important Pirate 2 / Pompous Pirate dude/dudette Square cyan eye shadow, long dark hair, bright golden gloves, slim, a glorious purple dress with puffed sleeves that would make Anne Shirley rabid, and ... is that a pirate melon hat?! (8) Very Important Pirate 3 / Spikey head pirate dude/dudette Finally, a real pirate. A little small, but eyepatch. Possesses a bowl of chicks and is therefore evidently the most likable character in the whole game. (9) Slim Pirate Fencer Elaine faces her in front of the Giant Monkey Head. Red and Dark Cyan, stern look, square collar. (10) First dude on a ship Ship dudes have great sideburns. This one's a small dude with a giant paper ship on his head. Under his jacket, I think he's clothed with a fish net. Don't tell anyone. (11) Second dude on a ship This one's a giant dude with a miniature paper ship on his head. Also, trenchcoat. He's probably a private investigator. Is that an eypatch for both eyes? Also, sideburns. (12) Locksmith of Melee Island Always keeps that family portrait in the background. I also think he knows a bit about fencing! (13) Fisherman dude behind barrel in the Scumm Bar Wild guess maybe, but with that dress, a fish lure on your hat, and that stern look ... it's Buyfrush Keepload, a mighty fisherman. (14) The Squirrel™ As seen in the trailer on a tree. Oh come on. You just KNOW that one has a bigger role to play.

I defaulted to putting it after MI2 so that the “Ron Trilogy” would all be on the same line (that and since ReMI begins in the carnival, I feel justified putting it there regardless of what happens in the rest of the game) and then the “Non-Ron Trilogy” of Curse, Escape and Tales, could be on the same line too. I also realised this is technically the first time Murray has appeared on a poster! Very curious to see what kind of a role he has this time around. Even though you can definitely hear the age in his voice now (compared to CMI especially) it’s fantastic that Denny Delk agreed to come back. I wonder if they’d have even put Murray in the game if Delk had declined, or been unable, to return. He wasn’t Ron’s creation, after all.

Maybe Indy 5 will be Fate of Atlantis! Who knows! (They'd need to update and amend a number of things, of course, but in the movie canon, he hasn't been to Atlantis yet!)

It has always been my dream to get a fully orchestrated Fate of Atlantis soundtrack. I mean ... most of the tracks don't even need a full orchestra and could be done with just a few instruments. But this OST really really deserves so much more attention and appreciation, because it's just awesome. I don't need a FOA remaster, strictly speaking. I'd rather have a five part episodic series reboot: parts 2 to 4 would be the action, puzzle and team parts, they'd yield one stone disc each. You'd play all of the episodes in the order you choose with slight consequences on the storyline. Yeah, I have this all mapped out. The puzzle part has Indy infiltrating the Icelandian black market art thieves that Sophia sold Atlantean artifacts to. At the same time, Sophia is in equally uncharted waters – hunting for info at Princeton University. Indy sent her there. He wouldn't go himself, too afraid to meet his dad. Sophia, of course, will meet Jones Sr., quite unexpectedly.

Yeah I didn't mention this earlier but I'd also love to see the earlier stuff remastered. Talkie versions of Maniac Mansion, Zak and Last Crusade would rule. Also a full talkie of Loom without the dialog cuts of the CD version should happen if Brian Moriarty gets to complete his trilogy. And why not, do The Dig while you're at it.

Sorry, yes that wasn't directed at you. I had in mind comments I've seen on Facebook more than anything.

I really want it to do absolute gangbusters too, just be the absolute triumph for him and the series to finally see it become the financial hit it wasn't in the 90s.

Hi Aaron! I was testing the current beta of DREAMM on COMI&demo and I noticed that I wasn't able to trigger any CTRL combination with any of the keys (e.g. CTRL-C for opening up the exit message, CTRL-T for changing the subtitle/speech mode, CTRL-B for changing the number of iMUSE buffers); is that done by design or is that a bug?

Guybrush and Elaine's son, Herman. Named after HT Marley! Also, man, poppa Guybrush. Wouldn't that be closure! "There were pirates when I was a boy..."

Given that it's my 40th birthday today it seems an apt time to reflect on things I have learned. And one of the things I've learned, I think, is that you can never go back. .. hmm.. but that's not quite right. You can never go back, except by going forward. When, probably almost exactly 30 years ago, someone showed me Monkey Island for the first time, it set my imagination on fire. In the good way. Whatever I thought games were before, this overwrote any of that and it was the start of a real fascination with storytelling in games, it was an immense influence on my style of composing especially melodies and bass parts, and it influenced me in so many other little different ways. So of course when I look back to those days I'm a mess of nostalgia, and part of me wants nothing more than to recreate it, exactly as it was, to experience it over again. But you'll never get that. It's an impossible dream. There's an uncanny valley associated with nostalgia, I feel. You can try to get back to the old house, and you might convince yourself that it's just how you remember it. But you know in your heart that some of the rooms aren't where you remember them, and that picture you thought looked really cool when you were 7 does nothing for you now, and it feels different when there isn't anyone living in it. Even Thimbleweed Park, a game I have mixed feelings about, I thought was at its most interesting when it was being least like a game from 1990. The closest you can get back to recapturing the feeling is perhaps experiencing it through someone else. Watching someone else experiencing something you love for the first time can be its own special joy. So what can you do instead? Well, for me the answer isn't in trying to recreate the same lightning in the same bottle, but to try to do as much as you can to find different lightning in different bottles. And that can only be found with the same spirit of experimentation and risk that the original games were made in. It might not always work, but it's always worth the try.

I played MI 1 VGA and MI2 VGA talkie. Then Thimbleweed Park in Hard mode. Currently stuck with CMI. Don‘t like it very much. Guess will try MI 1 in EGA before ROMI

I wanna see them again, too. So a Mac version would be awesome! Nice project.