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👀 @Dmnkly is in it apparently. And it looks REALLY good to me. Maybe I'll buy Sea of Thieves finally?

Blondebeard's 25 year, long game has finally reached its end. I look forward to the announcements of Psychonauts 3: Razputin's Domain and iMuse Island the album.

"LeChuck has turned the memories of this island into a prison for Guybrush" makes for a nicely flexible slice of unreality. Plausible enough that this is the "real" Guybrush, plucked from wherever in his timeline into a "what if" world of sorts and trapped there. The beard evokes the idea that he's been stuck there a long time. I don't get why they do this. Disney the faceless corporation I can understand not wanting to hire him on, and I imagine NDAs would stop the voice actors and game dev staff from mentioning it unofficially, but why wouldn't Craig Derrick or Mike Chapman who are ostensibly big fans of Ron's work at least keep him in the loop? Such a continual needless bummer with this stuff.

Given it’s a crossover event expansion for an unrelated MMO, I hope it’s more love letter, vibes, etc, and not trying to do a lot new with the series. (Hope it’s more “what if” than trying to stake a claim in continuity.) It’s fun reading interviews and tweets from the team, who are all clearly excited.

There's an interview with Creative Director Mike Chapman, where he goes into more detail. Timeline-wise, it's set after the end of Curse of Monkey Island: So could be an interesting 'what if'. Maybe these aren't the 'real' Melee Island/Monkey Island and instead are versions within the Sea of Thieves. Either way I am hyped and here for this.

In before the Mojo news post!! Woah, another out of the blue announcement! Was literally just thinking moments before that the time to strike with a new Monkey Island may be sooner rather than later (so that we can make the most of the vocal talent while they’re with us, etc.) and it sounds like LucasFilmGames agrees! I’m getting the impression that this is more of a DLC than a full game (particularly since it appears to be free to those who own Sea of Thieves) so I wouldn’t be surprised if it ends up being on the short side, but all the same, any way that means Monkey Island continues is good enough for me! I never played Sea of Thieves, by the way, but this will certainly change that decision. The animation from the trailer isn’t exactly Pixar quality, but seeing these classic locations from MI1 being able to be explored in full 3D is surely going to be wonderful. Sounds like mostly all of the characters’ voice actors from Return specifically are in this too. Makes me wonder how/if it fits into the plot of that game. Just over a month to go! Will keep an eye on this closely! EDIT: Also this means the LimitedRun set is out of date again, GDI.

You need the full game, but this expansion is free. You're only making one purchase. EDIT: Interesting that they are using the relaunch logo instead of the original one used in Return.

Somehow time keeps passing, and it’s been over 25 years since Mixnmojo opened. Jason got a bunch of past and present staff to take a look back over the decades and pick their favorite articles from the site. (I took the most harassing to turn in my homework!) https://mixnmojo.com/features/sitefeatures/25-Years-of-Mojo-Staff-Picks Not sure if anyone else has any Mojo nostalgia, as that is admittedly a weird thing to have, but if you do, drop some memories or trivia or whatever it is in here.

Wow, it's been a great year for Monkey Island and I'm all for this. Only 9 months after Return's release and we already have more Monkey Island content. I love that whenever I think the series is over, it continues in another way. I was really happy with how the main series concluded and the answers that were given, so I'm fine with this just being a love letter for the series and its characters in general. It sounds like they are trying to connect it to the series lore and if they can, that's awesome, but either way, this is a really cool way to continue Monkey Island content.

Wow! I would love to explore the islands in 3D! The only bummer is that it's only playable for a some time and will disappear eventually, at least that's how I think this SoT stuff works?

Yeah, one of the things I do more often than I should, is to imagine what happens between Secret and Revenge and what would have happened after Revenge if there hadn't been the "Curse correction" of Guybrush's character. The Guybrush in Secret was a naive young guy who had a good heart, tried to be a pirate as well as a hero. He wanted to be a pirate and have adventures. Revenge Guybrush was a collossal dick, the more often I play it, and adventure only served him as a source for stories to brag about Guybrush didn't want to BE a pirate anymore, he WAS one. And he'd realized no one gave a damn about it. Guybrush was still the same person from Secret to Revenge. In Secret he'd already screwed people over if he'd think they'd deserve it: the shopkeeper, Bob, the Sheriff, even Elaine (before he met her). What changed was simply the "deserves it" needle, that moved from a quite average position all the way to "almost everybody". Wally did nothing wrong 🧐

I’m assuming this doesn’t fit in at all. This is the sea of thieves continuity and seemingly isn’t set in the traditional world of monkey island. The melee island circus is still in business, stan is still working at stans previously owned vessels, the pirate leaders are still in charge and lechuck is still a zombie. These all seem to suggest it takes place early in the series but also guybrush is govenor and murrays lost his body already. None of it adds up but i don’t think it needs to.

It does really make me question where exactly this fits into the storyline. Granted, Return thankfully made those details less important with the way the stories are framed, but even aside from that, you ever notice that there's genuinely no consistency at all with G/E's relationship between games?! Secret: Guybrush smitten with Elaine. Revenge: Elaine angry at Guybrush. Curse: Guybrush is the only man Elaine ever loved. Escape: G/E are in love like a 1970's sitcom married couple. Tales: Some potential trust issues but G/E are still in love. Return: G/E are in love and as cute with each other as could possibly be. If they're hinting that Guybrush and Elaine are broken up, or worse, that can only place this game after Return. But still, their relationship is a real rollercoaster between games, and it feels like we miss huge chunks of it based on how they interact! Their overly-cutesy interactions with each other in Return almost felt like a overcorrection after they decided to change it from G/E being separated from each other. And yeah, Guybrush's appearance in this checks out when combined with the line about him being locked away in the mansion for a year. It makes me think there's been a tragedy, or the like, in his life to the degree that he wants to distance himself from the rest of the island, despite being Governor, apparently!

A few more details. The first of three “Tall Tales” focusing on MI launches on July 20th, apparently… https://store.steampowered.com/app/1172620/Sea_of_Thieves_2023_Edition/

Based on what little we got it looks like he’s become govenor but lost elaine. He’s held in high regard as a pirate but seems to have lost everything in the process. I don’t mind the design choices if this is supposed to be a disheveled loner guybrush who’s fallen on hard times. Not in keeping with the character but i assume this isn’t canon so it’s a nice “what if” scenario to delve into.

a crossover that makes the most sense, but for whatever reason i never thought I'd see. excited it's happening! wonder what Ron will think.

-I couldn’t quite tell, is that jess harnell back as lechuck? -can you buy this seperate or do you need the full game? -this will be incredible for no other reason than having the ability to walk around a fully 3d melee and monkey island in first person. I know escape had these places in 3d but they were so different from secret it’s difficult to count them. -looks like we carry murray around with us -not a huge fan of the art style but i’ll be damned if i’m going to reopen that can of worms. I’ll just respectfully stfu and wait for it to grow on me like last time.

There is definitely a lot of variance in the alignment. An interesting detail I never noticed until looking at the separate layers just now is that the back piece actually has a lot of redundant face that is covered by the front layer: It’s a shame they didn’t just go all the way but you could probably get a perfect version of each character by using the two, even if the wheels themselves don’t align quite right.

Bard did a better job... kinda. And so on...

One of the first things I did with ChatGPT was to ask it to construct a text adventure version of The Secret of Monkey Island. It got off to a pretty good start: I wandered into the Scumm Bar, since I could "hear the sounds of sword fighting and rowdy pirate songs" coming from there. Much more interesting than the "Governor's mansion in the distance", or the "dense jungle off in the distance", or anything else in the distance really. Then I realised my first mistake: I hadn't specified that I was playing as Guybrush. Still, it's a good opportunity to see if this guy sounds like Dominic Armato, or if he only speaks in text? Well, he seems like a decent enough guy. Time to assert dominance and bend him to my will. Where's the fun in that? I guess I'll just have a chat instead. No points for exposition, ChatGPT. It doesn't even offer me Spiffy the dog to throw out some plot points. Other things that happened in my text adventure: I found a rusty sword in the bins behind the Scumm Bar. Easier than buying it from the storekeeper! The Scumm Bar has an upstairs! And one of the upstairs rooms is full of gold and jewels just waiting to be stolen. Easier than getting a job at the circus! Stan works in the kitchen at the Scumm Bar! I wasn't sure if it was the same guy, but when I encountered him again at the "shopyard" - a typo, but ChatGPT helpfully played along as if a "shopyard" is a thing - the narrator assured me it was. He sold me a ship for a mere 500 gold coins. I'm not sure what the pieces-o'-eight/gold coins exchange rate is, but that sounds like a good deal. All that cooking has dulled Stan's skills as a salesman, it seems. LeChuck lives in a fortress on Monkey Island, and he seems like a nice guy. I joined his crew - then I got bored and stopped playing. Despite neutering the game's antagonist, ChatGPT rigorously enforced the rules of the Monkey Island universe when I asked to teleport to Monkey Island - but with a shocking revelation thrown in casually at the end: It's a blow to find that Monkey Island isn't real (even though it starts by saying "any other location in the real world", as if it is) and I can't teleport in the game, but I'm excited to hear that teleportation is possible in real life! I'm off to try it out, I'll let you know how it goes!!!

Lovely... 😅 And people want to write code using this thing... What could possibly go wrong? 😬

Oh great, now they're locking Monkey Island into Xbox AND Steam, just wonderful. I have to pass with heavy heart. Goodbye, cruel world of Monkey Island. Given the gameplay, I might be better off with a good ol' youtube video anyway. 😔