[Return to Monkey Island]

I have.

[Return to Monkey Island]

5 minutes ago, Laserschwert said:

What do we think of this?



Just marketing messing up?

 

More marketing mess up:

 

"Return to Monkey Island is an unexpected, thrilling return of series creator Ron Gilbert that continues the story of the legendary adventure games The Secret of Monkey Island and Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge".

 

But according to some, it's not the third part of the story that started in MI and continued in MI2.

[Return to Monkey Island]

20 minutes ago, KestrelPi said:

 

So, Lagomorph already addressed the point that this isn't part of a trilogy - and Ron has said as much, but I'd add that even if it was part of a trilogy, then arguably MI2 was already jarring, long ago. What's the similarity between these two jails in the MI1 and MI2 art styles:

 

I would say these are extremely different to each other, and the only reason we associate them as similar is because they have a similar resolution. But one is hand painted, the other is digital. One is noticeably more detailed and has a richer colour palette. One is clearly more interested in straight lines than the other. Which is unsurprising because it's a different background artist and different approach taken to the background. Granted, the sprite design is more similar between them than what's in ReMI, but they're still two different games with very different art styles, and so this is new one.

 

But it's not being pedantic to say this isn't part of an MI trilogy, either. It isn't. Theyve said it isn't, and the faster people accept it isn't the quicker we can get to what the game actually IS.

No, I would never say that there's a jarring or extreme difference between MI and MI2. MI2 looks like a game made a couple of years later [a year], which took advantage of the technology they had at the time. It looks different, but only slightly so. It's above all visually consistent.

 

Curse has an art style that is jarringly different from the first two games. But it's a classic style, not an abstract one, so to me is not as jarring. Same with the Special Editions.

 

I find the style chosen for Return to be the most jarring because it's more abstract and "modern", specially with the first two of which this is meant to be a continuation of. But if that's how Ron wants it to look, he has my full support.

 

And Return is the third part of the story that started in MI and continued in MI2. I do think it's pedantic to argue that point, but I'm not going to feed that discussion.

[Return to Monkey Island]

24 minutes ago, Lagomorph01 said:

There is no trilogy. There are six games, four of which Ron Gilbert worked on to some capacity, and all six have different art styles. Judging from the screenshots and trailers all these games will be referenced in the new game as well, so counting it as a trilogy really doesn't hold up.

If they decide to remake SMI and MI2 in this art style, you'd have six games, of which three will have the same art style, and three will have something completely different.

*sigh*

 

Sure, okay... I'm not going down that rabbit hole. You know what I meant and I think I clarified my original point well enough.

[Return to Monkey Island]

20 minutes ago, Lagomorph01 said:

Could you clarify this? I don't understand that you dislike it as a style for a Monkey Island game, but that you'd love it if the first two games were remade in this art style.

 

Again, I don't dislike this abstract style in and on itself. I like it. I simply dislike that it's jarring for the third part of a trilogy (and even for the MI series in general, I think it's probably the most jarring art style). But if they were to remake the first two games with this art style, it would cease to be jarring and would bring some visual consistency to the trilogy.

[Return to Monkey Island]

33 minutes ago, Lechuck said:

Unfortunately I'm just not a fan of the art style. To me, art as abstract as this is a barrier to immersion, and one of the things I always loved about the first two games was that you could get lost in those worlds. That was what Ron used to want too, with his story of wanting to get off the boat at Disneyland.

 

This is no criticism of Rex. He does what he does very well. But for a game that is celebrating so many of the original team coming back, it feels like a shame that this wasn't extended to the art team as well.

 

I wasn't necessarily after pixel art, and I hear Ron when he says that the games always used the most cutting edge technology that was available, but by returning to this property after so many years and making a direct sequel to MI2, this is by definition a legacy / nostalgia IP and that does come with years of weight to it.

 

But it is what it is, and I will really try to meet the game on its own terms when I get to play it.

 

I agree with this. I don't dislike the art per se, I dislike it as the art style for a Monkey Island game.

 

I respect that this is how Ron wants the game to look, and I wouldn't want the game to be any other way than what he wants, but there's no denying that it's visually jarring. At least to me, more jarring than any of the previous art styles.

If they were to remake the first two games in this art style, I think I might love it. But that's not going to happen (would Ron even be interested in doing that?).

[Return to Monkey Island]

41 minutes ago, Rum Rogers said:

I'd be very careful about taking that for granted 🙂 There's a billion ways you could keep things canon and still not embrace that explanation.

 

That's right. In fact, from what Ron has said on the issue, what we'll be getting from the other games is just certain ideas and aspects acknowledged and adopted. Ideas that Ron likes. Everything else will be ignored if it gets in the way of the story he wants to tell.

[Return to Monkey Island]

I'm also a member of The First One is Better™ club.

[Return to Monkey Island]

3 minutes ago, Udvarnoky said:

Hopefully Lucasfilm is seeing all this reaction and going, "Huh. This whole investing in legacy IP thing -- maybe there's something to it?"

 

Which will probably just lead to Guybrush being an unlockable character in Battlefront III, but I say dream big.

 

#NeverForget

[Return to Monkey Island]

Speaking of the art style, it wouldn't surprise me at all if we got a toggle to switch between modern and pixel art.

[Return to Monkey Island]

5 hours ago, OzzieMonkey said:

So Ron's said that Curse is still canon and they've been careful to make sure nothing is contradicted by this game...

 

Maybe I'm alone in this, but I found that very disappointing. I was hoping that Ron could do his sequel without having to worry about the baggage established in the spin-off games (that's what I call Curse, Escape and Tales), which don't reflect his vision.

[Telltale's Sam & Max games getting remastered]

12 hours ago, Jenni said:

Inclusivity is never a bad thing, for any of those you listed.  There are black and brown voice actors who are not being hired for black and brown characters because white voice actors are hired in their place. There are paraplegic actors who are not being hired because able-bodied actors are being hired in their place.

 

Trevor Noah put the situation quite well over the controversy surrounding the original intention for Scarlett Johansson to play a transgender woman, before she stepped down so an actual transgender woman could play the role. Paraphrasing Mr. Noah, "The issue isn't that [non-minority actors] can't play the part. It's that [they] can play the part as well as any other part they want to play". Minorities don't get that option, especially in the voice realm, since casting directors will often go with a non-minority actor, meaning the opportunities they actually do get are few and far between.  The changes that are happening now are making sure that the playing field is fair, where it absolutely wasn't before, and that's actually taking the to industry to a really good place.

Is it? I think it will take the industry to a very segregational place and that's not a good thing. The whole point of acting, specially voice acting, is that one can pretend to be someone else, fictional or not. And in regards to voice acting, how one look is even less of a factor. I don't know what criteria casting directors have when they choose one actor over another. It might be personal preference, it might be pure discrimination against a certain factor or trait, it might be perception of financial return, it myght be all of these or none of them. But it's dangerous and sets a bad precedent to generalize and run with assumptions for the entire industry in order to try to solve an apparent problem of equality of opportunity with equality of outcome.

In this case though, they admitted that it was purely out of ethniticity, which only feeds the idea that (voice) actors should take roles where they share certain immutable traits.

Personally, I'm not a fan of this decision, but it is what it is. The remaster does look great.

[MI2 ending and the departure of Ron Gilbert from LucasArts]

13 hours ago, Daf said:

Then, some follow-up questions that are a bit more open: do we think the ending to MI2 was setting up a sequel, or was it just a cryptic open ending "for the sake of it"? And coming back to my first question, if Ron and crew did have an MI3 in mind, again, why would Ron leave at that time? Despite MI2 sales not being the best, it's not like management would have stopped them from making a part 3, specially if it was to be a conclusion of sorts. So, has he always had the idea for a trilogy (the famous "MI3a") or is it something he came up with more recently?

 

I do realise that discussing the MI2 ending is well trodden, rather stomped on ground, but nonetheless feel free to theorise away, although I'm personally more interested in exploring other angles of the issue in question.
 

I think Ron did say when musing about a possible MI3a that it would be different from what he planned back then. So there was a plan for a sequel.

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