ThunderPeel2001

It didn't need to be that (true: the player tends to act like a total psychopath, and it can be funny to acknowledge that), it was just another example of how all drama between the characters is quickly resolved. This is where I think Ron (and Dave) are trying to have their cake and eat it. They deliberately try to side step any modern anachronisms in the prelude. The parent's clothes are changed from their MI2 clothes to look less era specific. Everything is deliberately murky and timeless. Is everyone wearing costumes or their real clothes? Is piece of eight a real currency in this alternate universe... or just a playful currency within the theme park? I think Ron wants everyone to have their own ideas of what "reality" is. Also, the big elephant is the room is: WHAT IS A FLOORING INSPECTOR? (Sorry, if this has been discussed earlier in the thread.) And (after you Google it) why is one locking up a theme park? Also, fun fact: Aside from the lookout saying it, Guybrush says he's a flooring inspector in Curse, too. Not really. In MI2 we see the couple acting as parents. In ReMI we see them tell the kids to quit bothering them. One is the fantasy, one is the reality. (Boybrush literally says, "Let's pretend this couple are our parents!" [Boybrush is a weird kid].) We just missed a line where Chuckie says, "Let's pretend my eyes are glowing and I have secret voodoo powers!" A potential issue is that Guybrush has a scrapbook of souvenirs... I haven't looked through all the pages with the mental lens of "is this all fantasy?", but is there anything in that scrapbook that couldn't have been a prop (or theme park bought souvenir)?

All the books in the library (apart from any used in the plot) were written by backers. That one especially so, given the number of typos and poor grammatical choices.

I discovered Cog Island completely through normal play! I was collecting the trivia cards while I considered what to do next, and one came up that was a bit weird: It mentioned an island I know didn't exist, but it also game a map co-ordinate as answer. I decide to try out the map co-ordinate to see if it could exist on the game map... and it could! So I told Guybrush to dive down and lo! An island of cut content, that I wish hadn't been cut! Of course you can't come back up... so you end up dying, which felt weird at the time. But it was fine with the autosave feature. A great easter egg to stumble across!

After rejoining the forum, I realised that I never opened the chest! 🤦‍♂️ I was kind of disappointed in the reveal, and it was really late, and so I didn't really explore the area. I thought that was it. Tonight I went back and considered some of things I've read here, and that the "Secret" was that the entire thing was a theme park (just as Bill Tiller told us), it has made the ending more poignant. Especially Guybrush on the bench, looking back. It might take me a while to process it all. I'm so glad it's getting so well reviewed, though! And (again) I don't know why the graphics looked to awful to me in the screenshots and the trailer, it looks wonderful. I simply cannot imagine the game looking any different now. I think Rex was the perfect choice! (Although I bet he's traumatised from the experience!) Same goes for the voice acting. Dom was perfect. Even Alexandra Boyd, who I have struggled with in other games, was perfectly great. Strangely the biggest issue I have is probably with the dialogue. Sorry to repeat myself, but the whole game was just so damned PLEASANT. Everyone is in such a good mood and so willing to be lovely to everyone. It kind of stripped the game of having any big laugh out loud moments. Which isn't to say the characters weren't memorable or interesting, they all were. But there wasn't any drama. I really thought Elaine following Guybrush's trail of destruction was going to lead to a big confrontation, but it just led to another pleasant conversation. No matter what Guybrush says, Elaine forgives him or shrugs it off. It's not "bad", per se, it's just a not very "Monkey Island" choice. Was this the lack of Tim Schafer in the room? Dave Grossman seems likely an unflappably lovely guy... was this his cheery voice in every character? Obviously Ron and Dave have talked about this game being a reflection of who they are today. Are they both just incredibly mellow 50-somethings? Did they deliberately not attempt to capture the original feel? As I say, it's not "bad". It's quite enjoyable being in this pleasant world. It's just not what Monkey Island has been for the past 30 years. (Shrugs) Anyway... random thoughts!

Thanks for letting me know!

Hmm. I interpreted what you said to mean that it would be closing chapter with little references to the other games in the series, when actually the whole experience (including the scrap book and trivia book) is designed to bring them into one cohesive whole. So, I said false because it doesn't feel like a "final third instalment", it seems to go out of its way to be inclusive of every story -- and any future stories.

It seems more like a reality where the pirate life became the dominant way of living long after it did in our one... Either way, it comes across (to me) like an alternate universe not dissimilar to the one where Guybrush is imagining his adventures. (Hence my "having its cake and eating it, too" comment.) It's all very confusing and contradictory, and probably exactly what Ron wanted!

Dave Grossman's very silly answer to this question:

Got any screenshots?

I never said that? 🤷‍♂️

OzzieMonkey “The game will have more than 4 "Parts".“ TRUE! LowLevel “My serious prediction is that the authors have found a way to make the game feel like a final third installment, in the sense that a person unfamiliar with the franchise could play only "Secret," "Revenge," and "Return" sequentially and feel them as an entire cohesive and organic story.” FALSE KestrelPI Struggled to make ONE prediction… “The carnival/child Guybrush is in SOME sense real, and the 'real' guybrush we're playing now is genuinely grown up.” TRUE! Nicely done. “As is the brother thing, that's also real.” FALSE! “It might not be quite what we imagined, but it's also not going to be 'actually nah that was all just a spell that LeChuck put on you’.” EH? “The opening of the game will address this, but it'll be revisited at the end too.” FALSE! JacquesSparkyTail “My prediction is that no more than 2 of these characters (Captain smirk, meathook, the cannibals, the navigator head, the fettuccini brothers, largo legrande, the voodoo priest, the men of low moral fibre, kate capsize, govenor phatt, the barbary coast crew, kenny, goodsoup, i.Cheese, pegnose pete, van winslow and morgan leflay) will appear. To be just a little more pessimistic i’ll say probably just the cannibals.” TRUE - None of them appeared! fentongames ““The Secret” will be different for every player depending on their specific in-game actions (I.e. which order puzzles were actioned in, which option players took to solve a multi-solution puzzle early on, like Fate of Atlantis, etc.) There will be a hundred or so variations of it in the final game.” FALSE (Edit: Or is it?! Is there more to this that I initially thought?? https://mixnmojo.com/features/sitefeatures/The-Many-Epilogues-of-Return-to-Monkey-Island ) “Okay, I’m only half serious about this, but I am expecting a degree of a joke for the secret’s reveal, or at least something that raises a few more questions.” KIND OF? Guybrush Transmasc “The secret is revealed in the early game, so the narrative can spend time really digging into its ramifications.” FALSE “Also, if I'm allowed a low stakes mini-prediction: There will be a situation where Wally gets one over Guybrush, a role reversal of the dynamic they had in MI2.” Ok... FALSE ThunderPeel2001 “Ron will have added a new clever structure to REMI, the likes of which we’ve not seen before in a MI title.“ TRUE (I think, but I'm biased) THE WINNER KestrelPI for “The carnival/child Guybrush is in SOME sense real, and the 'real' guybrush we're playing now is genuinely grown up.” Thanks for playing!

I think Craig was just hinting that he's onboard for green lighting more Maniac Mansion if Ron and Dave are keen.

Except the game says we are seeing reality: When Chuckie and Boybrush start hassling those random parents, we DON'T see their fantasy responses (as we do in Monkey 2), we see them in reality saying, "Please leave us alone". When Chuckie and Boybrush talk about Scurvydogs, THEY see them as delicious culinary delights, but we WE see them as fly and hair covered monstrosities. The intro makes this point several times: When they make their wishes (who else saved and reloaded to see them all) we see flashes of their imagination, but then we're back to reality again. I mean, that's ultimately the twist: The ending of MI2 was a child's imagination (Chuckie has glowing death eyes, they're brothers, the random couple behave as though they're the real parents), but now we're in reality (they're not brothers, Chuckie isn't evil with voodoo powers, the couple tell the kids to go away). It's just that "reality" is some alternate piratey universe... In other words, the stuffed giraffe was really a pirate 😬 This is so true across the whole of the internet and why I get so annoyed by "news" articles reporting what Twitter users are saying! Internet forums and social media are a subsection of society, not a cross-section.

Well I finally feel ready to discuss ReMI... and there's 18 pages of hot takes to work through 🤪 I'm sure they're filled with interesting and thought-provoking discussion, though! My main takeaways were: My, what a PLEASANT game. Everyone is so damned nice about everything all the time. ("Remember that time I blew up your ship, left your stranded on an island, and you were nearly eaten by cannibals?" "Oh yes, but don't worry about it!") Guybrush is unbelievably nice and non-destructive, too (apart from maybe two moments where I felt they added them afterwards because he'd been so nice) LeChuck has been defanged from his absolutely terrifying MI2 version. OH! And the art style is amazing! That was my first impression. I was like, "Oh shit! I love how this game looks". And I was definitely someone who was unimpressed with the screenshots and trailer. The whole game looks so much better when you're actually PLAYING it. The ending still bends my brain a little. I suppose I want to believe everything really happened... but the game sort of tries to have its cake and eat it, too: The games are retellings of fantasies that have been had... inside a fantasy pirate world. The opening sequence and the park bench are all "reality", but it's a reality where pieces-of-eight are real currency and pirates are real. It also means that the ending he told his son was just randomly weird: "And then I remembered I was in a fairground where I worked as flooring inspector..." Okay, dad! Thanks for the crappy ending to the story. Are you feeling OK? I'm getting a bit worried. It's a bit odd when you think about it... but Ron wouldn't have it any other way.

It seems I'm one of the few people on the planet with the Trivia Overlord achievement (the rarest Steam achievement I own -- pretty crazy). There's an unfortunate bug where starting a new game, and then jumping into a later save, and then back into the new game save. It happened to me twice that all my cards disappeared. So now I have the achievement, but an incomplete Trivia Book (and no idea if anything fancy happens once you get all the cards). I've tried to alert Terrible Toybox, but since I'm the only person complaining about it, it seems nobody is giving it much attention so far

Gentlemen (and any ladies in this forum), the last few months have been a pleasure. Thank you for being excellent company! See you on the other side (of Part One at least) 👋

It's now #3! Edit: I think. It's a bit confusing... there's no #2?

I just mean because a bald man with hooks for hands gets really upset at being called Canonball Head and wishes you to call him... Meathook instead

You know, in hindsight I don't see "Meathook" is that much of a better name than "Canonball Head" 🤔

It's very weird watching a national funeral before playing ReMI 😬 It seems literally timed to end as the game drops... The Queen is dead... long live the (pirate) King?

An important reminder: Ron Gilbert: "The problem with the 'Secret' of Monkey Island... is that it's built up such a mystique, that when I finally reveal it, you're going to go, 'That was dumb' " Chances of having a disappointing next few weeks... moderate to high Your choice, of course, if that's what you wish! 👍 (Actually I was disappointed when I first played Monkey Island 2 -- I just loved the first game SO much. It took me a long while to fully accept it for what it was and enjoy it. Funny how I only just remembered that.)

I would strongly suggest you do your best to lower your expectations! Not because I think the game will be bad, but because nothing can withstand incredibly high expectations. Forget what Falstein said. It could be interpreted so many different ways. (I’m certainly not taking what he said seriously. I have zero doubt that I will not agree with his assessment — or rather I can see what he was getting at, but that I wouldn’t have used those words.) Ron set out to make a straight pirate adventure. Just set your expectations on that. I know if that’s what is delivered, I’ll be happy.

Wally’s voice has always been very wrong to me. I think he should have had a more childish and innocent sounding voice. (Not that the hired actor didn’t do a good job, it just wasn’t the voice I heard in MI2.) I can hear it clearly in my head, but I can’t think of ab example to share 😬

That was a close one 👕 I beat #Mojole #181 and all I got was this stupid t-shirt. 6/6 🖤🖤💚🖤🖤 🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤 🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤 🖤💛🖤🖤💛 💚💚💚💚🖤 💚💚💚💚💚 https://funzone.mixnmojo.com/Mojole/

It’s crazy. In a few hours I’m going to be playing a Ron Gilbert Monkey Island sequel. It’s actually a little bit overwhelming. I can’t quite believe it. How did we get here? Ron has talked for so long about wanting to make his MI3. Some people thought he was deliberately emotionally manipulating fans. That he never had any intention of following through, and yet the Mojo review revealed that he’d been trying to get MI3 off the ground for years. In fact, if TellTale hadn’t scooped him to it with Tales, we may have gotten it back then. Eventually, after so many failed attempts, he wrote the Infamous Blogpost on a particularly grumpy day. Sort of hinting it would never happen, while also clearly wanting it to. Then so many years later the opportunity to do it finally landed in his lap. The thing he’d wanted for years… suddenly real. Uh oh. The pressure. Should he just walk away to avoid disappointing everyone? Nobody would ever know if he did. It’s one thing to want something, it’s entirely another when it becomes real. He called up Dave Grossman and asked for advice. Grossman and Gilbert worked through it and decided it was worth doing. (So it seems that if it wasn’t for Grossman, we may not have ever gotten this. Thank you, Dave!) The two of them set off and started making this thing. This thing we’ve all dreamed of. And now the entire ReMI team are sitting somewhere anxiously wondering how the next 24 hours are going to play out 😅 Good luck, anyone on the ReMI team who reads this! Whatever happens I’m so glad you were brave enough to try! I can’t wait to see what you’ve created. Thanks Ron, Dave, David, Rex, Jenn, Michael, Peter, Clint, Dom, Kris, Devolver and everyone else I’ve missed. This old fan will be always be grateful!