Gins

With all the stuff going on among fans since the announcement of Return, especially outside of here, I understand everyone's a bit more on edge, even here. I hope we manage to not let that get to us in the same divisive way as can be seen on e.g. Twitter or Ron's blog. I'm so thankful for everyone here doing their best to course correct and clarify whenever a situation shows signs of escalation, rather than leaning fully into the conflict and going scorched earth. We're all in the same boat after all, even if it looks different for everyone. Monkey Island is a magical boat that can take a crew to multiple places at once, unlike LeShip where everybody has to agree on a single destination. 😁

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I agree, a topic like that or "what defines Monkey Island for you" would be insightful. Will you make it?

To @Lagomorph01 and others who say they cannot suspend their disbelief after playing Return, I want to say I understand. Yet, not all hope is lost. Do you remember the first time you consciously realized that movies, books or even cartoons are not real, likely as a kid? Yet you probably still play games, watch movies and read books. The world of Monkey Island was clearly never real to begin with. They were video games that many people worked on, not the accounts of a historical pirate. The classic "it was all a dream" lazy ending often comes out of thin air because the writers really ran out of time and energy, but in Ron's games (also outside of MI) this layer to reality has always been hinted at from the first game, to the degree that it is even subconsciously in the DNA of the Non-Gilbert games, e.g. with the theme park references in Tales mentioned by @Jake. For Monkey Island this didn't come out of nowhere, it was the inevitable conclusion since 1989. You can still be disappointed of course, e.g. because you simply didn't like the idea or how it played out. But if you truly want to like these games, but are worried that you can't suspend your disbelief anymore, I guarantee you, you will be able to again, the same way as you can still do it for all sorts of other fictional works you already consume. All you need is a shift of perspective. Turn your head like this and squint. And the duck will look like a skull again.

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1. Revenge 2. Secret 3. Curse 4. Return 5. Escape 6. Tales Revenge is without a doubt my favorite. It takes the already brilliant Secret and makes it more of everything in all the right ways, and it just resonates with me. Guybrush's evolution from a nice wannabe to an experienced pirate who becomes full of himself to his own detriment becomes more and more brilliant every time I experience it. It has its flaws for sure, especially with some unfair puzzles and tedious backtracking, but these things are annoying once, the whole rest of the game keeps on giving on every replay, discussion and listen to the soundtrack. Secret in second because it is the original and an eternal classic. It is the giant from whose shoulders Revenge leaped even higher. CMI is so close to tying with Secret. It is in my opinion a perfect point and click. Just that Revenge and Secret hit my personal tastes better, but Curse is a fine entry point to the series. These three will likely always stay this way for me. The other three each have their own issues but like with pizza, even the worst Monkey Island games are still amazing. Return didn't quite reach my hopes and dreams but it is a perfect love letter to the series as a whole and is Ron's official blessing for the fans to accept all Monkey Island games before and after it as canon regardless of the team. EMI suffered most from its controls but was otherwise very Curse-y to me. It jumped the shark in the end by trying to connect everything with everything - Herman, and the Robot - but you know what? Back then I found that awesome. And I liked Monkey Kombat Tales is last on this list, but as said, to be the worst MI game is still no slouch (and as said the bottom three constantly change for me). I didn't care much for the Telltale formular overall, and it was the height of the "casualification" era, which alienated oldschool fans who wanted hard puzzles in favor of expanding the audience and saving the genre. And while many games from that time weren't for me, I believe they achieved that and I'm grateful for it.

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It kind of still hasn't. Those who love to speculate about the MI3a from the 90s or even the version from 10 years ago, can still do so because those games are, as per Ron, lost to time. Return actually only confirms one of the most agreed on fan theories, yet it only contributes mere clues to how it would have played out back then. I'm pretty sure a Ron and Dave helmed MI3 in the 90s wouldn't have had the literal Secret and reliving the glory days as its central themes, or even introduced Boybrush. It would have probably continued more organically from that ending, similar to CMI, have a different central theme and likely different character development, matching Ron and Dave's points in their careers from back then and taken another path to the theme park reveal. With Return, fans now have at least four potential MI futures to speculate about, all of them influencing the others: 90s MI3, 2000s MI3a, Tales season 2 and the inevitable successor to RMI. As a fan, that's awesome.

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Thanks, I read people mention this optional thing, but not seen a screenshot of it!

Yeah, sorry I probably came across a bit strong myself, and felt spoken to, since I just mentioned Terror a post or so above. There are probably a lot of more aggressive opinions at display in other places... 😬 Really so happy that everyone here is so civil about everything 😁

Maybe Elaine is actually the delusional one. While Guybrush is trying to just have fun in a place designed to have fun at, Elaine ist fighting windmills and wants to cure animatronics from scurvy 😂

ReMI detractors? Please don't spin it like that. In my experience the vast majority of discussion about the game is quite positive and constructive, especially on this forum. Even if, for example I, have some critical opinions of some aspects of the game that does not mean that I do not wholeheartedly love the package as a whole. (And if I didn't, I'd hope my opinion would be respected just as much, so long as I speak it respectfully.) Conversly the other games are loved too and got their fair share of valid and constructive criticism by fans (who love them). Would you call people who criticise the Monkey Wrench puzzle of MI2 "MI2 detractors"? Game design is more than a numbers game. You can not simply say Dinky and Terror have the same amount of puzzles and characters and therefore they are equal in all aspects. Exactly what might contribute to them being perceived differently to other islands or between different players is what we are trying to exchange about, by trying to put complex (and in this case quite recent and not fully matured) feelings into words.

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There's more to it than just the amount, e.g. density. The cave of Terror was quite substantial, and I love the puzzle with Flambé's hair and the use of the Xyzzy sign to get out in the end. All other locations on the island seem to only contain 1 item to pick up with not much else to interact with. (Mind you this is from memory, and I should replay it before I can be sure about such things).

LeIsland for next game 😄

I feel now that originally as a kid I loved MI2 despite the ending, because it confused me and I didn't understand it (I just got the Star Wars reference and found it cheap). Later I grew to love its ending after getting the themepark hints and also the themes about Guybrush's character development, as it gave what I already loved another several layers of meaning. RtMI feels like it focuses too much on the Secret of Disappointment and the Story and sidelines these (to me) very important parts of the older games like world building, the sense of adventure. Dispite RMI having like 10 times the dialog lines it felt smaller than SMI, MI2, CMI and EMI. I didn't enjoy _being_ in "the world" as much as with those games, and was focused, like Guybrush, to just get to the end, and get to the secret finally. And maybe all of this is on purpose, and I appreciate it for conveying this feeling so well. Just I would be curious what a more optimistic take on this theme from the 90s would have looked like. Like a fusion of this and Curse.

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The game's not called Monkey Location, tough luck, LeShip!

I have the same problem as many mentioned, that Mêlée simply doesn't excite me anymore, especially as the first location, despite it being the objectively best and most fleshed out location. When it was a surprise in the end of MI2 it was quite exciting and I would have loved to somehow get past the cones and explore the rest of it. Mêlée was also redone before and better in EMI, twice even, with the whole post Charles L. Charles version of it. Every other island felt incomplete, compared to Mêlée, and especially compared to the islands from the other games. Perhaps I'd have liked less islands but all of them as complete and alive as Mêlèe. That said, I was worried I wouldn't like Brrr Muda but it was my favorite, because of how alive it felt. Terror really felt like it was incomplete, although Ron insists it was not. That he was asked about it in the interview speaks for itself though. Return however is definitely larger than the sum of its parts and with the whole theme, I think it fits that most locations were a little bit underwhelming. LeShip though... loved it 😍 But not an island 🙄

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As mentioned in the other thread, I believe the often quite wild voodoo substitutions could be hints too. A child makes up something ridiculous just to advance the imagined story.

^I think this thread is quite related.

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