simonsoup

Okay, I'm ready to pre-order for the horse armour but neither Steam or Nintendo pre-orders are active yet! Glad Return appeared relatively early in the proceedings...was getting pretty sick of watching things get shot in grimy dystopian settings.

I wanted to resist being the 'armchair producer' I was complaining about above, but I agree. I feel that the art & animation choices we've seen so far very deliberately allow for a game with a scale and feel comparable to the first two games. Dave Grossman once said about Monkey 2: "For what was essentially shoebox theater with tiny pixilated puppet people, it was tremendously cinematic." The new screenshots and trailer reassure me that they've kept this in mind, and are achieving it in one of the very few ways possible whilst still moving forward and looking like a modern game.

I foolishly thought that Monkey Island wouldn't attract those kinds of fans but this culture of commentary, ranging from a lack of tact and respect for the creators, to just extreme vitriol and abuse, seems to infect everything. It's depressing. It also irritates me (and it must be even more galling for Ron and the team) how so many seem to consider themselves experts in game dev nowadays, commenting on the budget or whatever in relation to the art style. Twitter and Mojo are both echo chambers of a sort (I know which one I prefer today), but surely the vast majority of people who Ron will want to reach with Return to Monkey Island are frequenting neither? I think this fresh art style will serve him very well in that regard, and I'm sure he won't lose sight of that even with the whining 'fans' clogging up his blog comments. Going to have another click around the new website and watch the trailer again to cheer myself up!

I thought we'd never get another Monkey Island game, let alone one overseen by Ron, let alone one with music composed by the Monkey 2 dream team. Amazing news and it's coming this year. I enjoyed Knights and Bikes and kept daydreaming about Monkey Island in that art style whilst playing it, so Rex Crowle as art director is ideal. (And now I'm daydreaming about customising Guybrush's pirate garb like you get to do with the girls' bikes in Knights and Bikes.) Also thrilled that Dave Grossman is on board, and found this really sweet:

Similarly, it's the book that appeals to me - not that they've shown anything from the inside yet, weirdly! I'd consider that as a separate purchase but can't see it happening.

This one is fantastic too!

Really enjoyed that, especially the glimpses of SCUMM, BILE and FLEM. My highlight probably was Frank editing the dialogue with the pirate leaders.

If the games are on the USB drive, what's in the 5 volumes in the slipcase on the left? I wish it was possible to buy the behind-the-scenes book without the collectables. The Photoshop mangling of the box art on the Certificate of Authenticity doesn't inspire confidence in the book design, but apparently it's got a lot to it.

Got my ticket! I absolutely have to know the story behind that GIF.

This fan documentary premiered yesterday, and features excellent new audio interviews with Ron, Dave and Mark Ferrari. Orson Scott Card and Steve Purcell have also contributed, voiced by actors. It touches on most aspects of the production, including plenty of details that were new to me and some fun anecdotes.

Anyone here got one of these on their wall? Hopefully there will be a reprint someday, as it is just spectacular. I forgot about it and then the edition had run out. If there's ever another game, I hope it takes its cue from these character designs.

That's kind of you – hope we hear something back. This thread on the Telltale forums led me to believe the installers they left available (for now) to people who bought from Telltale are DRM-free. They're not, at least not the Mac versions. It's a shame as I was hoping to play through the whole saga soon (I'm reliably informed Escape can be done under Wine), and I haven't revisited Tales in a long time. Not since I had a laptop with a puny graphics card that almost melted during the prologue.

Ah! This has worked. Thanks, I should have searched more generally for that error - I just assumed it was particular to this era of Telltale stuff. Unfortunately I now find I can't unlock the trial versions (login no longer recognised) but it's otherwise running fine.