Return to Monkey Island

[Marius]

I drank root beer for this. 💀

[Rum Rogers]

Yeah you're absolutely right, it's an inexplicable choice to me 🤷‍♂️

[Zaxx]

Oh come on no RtMI trailer? Well at least Card Shark continues to look awesome.

[Remi]

I would go as far as to say ReMI's PR campaign has been... somewhat flawed. :~

 

Got a good Marius video out of it, though!

[Kroms]

I was hoping for a trailer, but the stuff they showed won me over! I particularly liked Skate Story's surreal, tranquil feel.

[s-island]

It was a nice break between all the shouting. 👍

[Toymafia88]

 

That was the perfect place to promote it.

 

I'm... so devastated. I know its just a game... but I was so excited and certain it would be there 😫

 

I'm worried we are just going to be waiting until near end of the year for news...

Edited June 9, 2022 by Toymafia88

[ATMcashpoint]

48 minutes ago, Zaxx said:

Oh come on no RtMI trailer? Well at least Card Shark continues to look awesome.

Indeed. I'd never seen it before, but that game looked amazing. I thought when I saw the trailer that it would be the perfect art style for a new version of Sid Meier's Pirates!

Edited June 9, 2022 by ATMcashpoint

[KestrelPi]

I always thought it was gonna be a coin flip.

 

Remember, trailers take time and effort to make, and maybe Ronzo and co just didn't have time to do something in time for this event, or perhaps they already had a plan for a trailer release at a different time Devolver agreed to. Or maybe Devolver just decided this wasn't the event for that trailer. They showed like 5 games and there there are all sorts of reasons that they might not have included ReMI. Most of them were new game announcements and the one is just freshly released.

 

Sometimes it's easy to forget in our bubble that the world doesn't revolve around Monkey Island.

 

The good news is Ron's already said there'll be more to show before they release the game, so I doubt we're going to be kept waiting very much longer.

 

 

 

 

Edited June 10, 2022 by KestrelPi

[demone]

While I was initially disappointed that there was no trailer, in many ways, I wouldn't have it any other way with this type of marketing. I have never really been so excited for a game where the only real updates come from the twitter of the creator, but I also love it because it's not only another Monkey Island game, but the Monkey Island game so many have been waiting for, so it makes perfect sense the marketing wouldn't cater to the typical model.

 

I know there's been a lot of discussion on how this will not be the same game as it would've been 30 years ago, but it's still the game made by Ron that will begin right at that Carnival again. So in that regard, it was always the game I wanted and everything else, especially Ron and Dave having decades more experience as game designers and writers, will make it even better.

 

I sorta love not knowing the release date or almost anything about this game. It helps me live in blissful ignorance that it could release at any time lol. Even though Ron and Dave say they wouldn't do this in an interview, I still wouldn't put it past them to reveal a trailer and then say "oh and it comes out next week."

 

Ron has been pretty blunt and honest in his ambition to not market the hell out of this game, even reposting that rule in his "When I Made Another Monkey Island" Grumpy Gamer blog, as it's a much more personal one for him. Honestly, the fact that he isn't marketing the game in a traditional way a lot I think proves that Disney and Devolver Digital are fully letting Ron do what he always wanted to do. The way it was even so casually teased on Ron's blog is also pretty indicative of that as well. It wasn't the usual way to promote a game, but it was exactly how Ron had dreamed of doing it for years for this game, so I'm happy he is able to do it the way he wants; the guy deserves it.

 

The fans of the series are pretty much hooked at this point. While Ron and Dave both expressed that they still want to appeal to the wider masses, I think the post-release coverage will do just that just as well. I also think that, if Ron doesn't make another Monkey Island after this, he will still be content in finally making the game he wanted to make. I'm also going to play this game with that expectation in mind and I think I'll be happy just knowing we not only had 6 Monkey Island games, all made from various talented and brilliant people and teams, but we finally got the Monkey Island game.

 

What can I say, I think that even after two months, I'm still on a high, and in a little disbelief, knowing we're finally getting this game.

Edited June 10, 2022 by demone

[madmardi]

Well no trailer, but for some reason I'm not that surprised. We'll get news.. eventually! 😏

[Vainamoinen]

What's a trailer? A miserable little pile of spoilers.

 

We don't need no stinkin' ...

 

Yeahhhhhh a trailer would have been nice, and would have shown the appreciation that Devolver hopefully has for the franchise. After the reaction to the first screenshots, however, it kind of dawned on me that the clever marketing would be to not show the Guybrush design at all until the game came out (or do a real live action trailer with Dom as Guybrush. Just sayin'!).

 

I guess if we really need a trailer, we'll have to do one ourselves. If need be, I'd draw some backgrounds! 😌

[Staple Remover]

9 hours ago, Remi said:

I would go as far as to say ReMI's PR campaign has been... somewhat flawed. :~

 

Got a good Marius video out of it, though!

I do agree with this, partially because I’m still recovering from the sting of sitting through “Devolver presents Loud Noises™“ without an MI trailer. I’m hoping we get something tangible soon. 
 

Side note, the “I wonder what happens” series by Marius was the highlight of waiting through the Tales season. 

[Thrik]

Marius’ video was wonderful and a joy. 😁

[Rum Rogers]

Awesome username and profile picture, Staple Remover! My life is complete now.

[OzzieMonkey]

So Ron posted this on his blog:
 

That might explain the lack of a trailer if the voices haven't been mastered yet. I assume this is the process where digital noise is removed and they basically make it sound as clear and crisp as possible before it gets integrated into the game? Anybody know what that means in terms of the potential development timeline?

PS. I wouldn't read into that last bit, Ron's just joking around with us. I think that the Secret will be revealed, but maybe it will be hidden under a really difficult and optional puzzle that most people won't bother with  

Edited June 10, 2022 by OzzieMonkey

[Lagomorph01]

Bit dissapointed, but babyswimming with my son was a hoot and a holler, so I’m not complaining. ☺️
 

@Toymafia88, hope you didn’t miss the wedding for this.

[OzzieMonkey]

3 minutes ago, Lagomorph01 said:

Bit dissapointed, but babyswimming with my son was a hoot and a holler, so I’m not complaining. ☺️
 

@Toymafia88, hope you didn’t miss the wedding for this.

Priest: If there be any man with reason why these two...er...people...should not be united in blissful matrimony, let him speak now or forever hold his peace
@Toymafia88: NOT YET! I have to watch the Return to Monkey Island trailer!

That would've been a rather unfortunate turn of events.

[anothercustard]

but very on brand

 

Edited June 10, 2022 by anothercustard

[Vainamoinen]

5 hours ago, Thrik said:

Marius’ video was wonderful and a joy. 😁

 

I love how Dave Grossman's twitter account now basically is a Marius retweet bot. 😆

[KestrelPi]

3 hours ago, OzzieMonkey said:

So Ron posted this on his blog:
 

That might explain the lack of a trailer if the voices haven't been mastered yet. I assume this is the process where digital noise is removed and they basically make it sound as clear and crisp as possible before it gets integrated into the game? Anybody know what that means in terms of the potential development timeline?

PS. I wouldn't read into that last bit, Ron's just joking around with us. I think that the Secret will be revealed, but maybe it will be hidden under a really difficult and optional puzzle that most people won't bother with  

 

I think this is reasonably unlikely to be the reason. If they'd had a trailer they had ready, they could have fairly easily done a quick mastering of the voices needed for that in advance, and then made the trailer with that. just like how occasionally in the past when I've done music for a game the dev has used unfinished versions of the music which I've quickly mastered for the trailer and then re-done when finished.

 

I think the most exciting thing about that is if all those lines have been sent for mastering then it seems likely that the voice recording is substantially done, now, which means that we're one step closer to a finished game

[OzzieMonkey]

4 minutes ago, KestrelPi said:

 

I think this is reasonably unlikely to be the reason. If they'd had a trailer they had ready, they could have fairly easily done a quick mastering of the voices needed for that in advance, and then made the trailer with that. just like how occasionally in the past when I've done music for a game the dev has used unfinished versions of the music which I've quickly mastered for the trailer and then re-done when finished.

 

I think the most exciting thing about that is if all those lines have been sent for mastering then it seems likely that the voice recording is substantially done, now, which means that we're one step closer to a finished game

One thing I'm curious about is; when voices are implemented into a game, does that not open the door to more bugs that might need to be fixed? Things that come to mind are the wrong voices playing at the wrong time, lines getting cut off, etc. I'm trying to figure out how this all works when they've been fixing bugs, THEN mastering the voice, only to have to fix more bugs when they get put in. Idk, maybe this gap in my knowledge is failing me here. I don't even know how involved mastering voice is or how long it takes. 

[Rum Rogers]

48 minutes ago, OzzieMonkey said:

One thing I'm curious about is; when voices are implemented into a game, does that not open the door to more bugs that might need to be fixed?

It most definitely does. QA will surely have to replay it tons of times once again.

[Toymafia88]

4 hours ago, Lagomorph01 said:

Bit dissapointed, but babyswimming with my son was a hoot and a holler, so I’m not complaining. ☺️
 

@Toymafia88, hope you didn’t miss the wedding for this.

@Lagomorph01Haha I went to wedding but I did have my eyes on the clock...

 

8pm " 3 more hours and we will finally see Guybrush!"

 

We were heading back to the hotel at 11.08pm and i was desperately trying to watch the stream on my mobile in the car. But due to low battery I had to wait.

 

When i got back I was excited to see our long wait rewarded. I couldn't wait to see all of your excited reactions.

 

But... seems like we are all still stuck in the waiting room... 😐

 

So when is the next big event it could get announced at? 

Edited June 10, 2022 by Toymafia88

[KestrelPi]

57 minutes ago, OzzieMonkey said:

One thing I'm curious about is; when voices are implemented into a game, does that not open the door to more bugs that might need to be fixed? Things that come to mind are the wrong voices playing at the wrong time, lines getting cut off, etc. I'm trying to figure out how this all works when they've been fixing bugs, THEN mastering the voice, only to have to fix more bugs when they get put in. Idk, maybe this gap in my knowledge is failing me here. I don't even know how involved mastering voice is or how long it takes. 

 

I guess maybe, but it could be that they are working with scratch dialogue. When I played an early Psychonauts 2 there were still a few lines in the game using scratch, and I guess it's easier to catch bugs with the audio when you're just replacing like with like, and as long as you keep the audio very organised, it shouldn't be much trouble.

 

Also they could have already been using the unmastered voices and testing with those as they came in.

 

As for mastering the voices, I'm not an expert in audio mastering but my impression is that the main goal of this will be to get all the lines recorded with different actors in 3 different locations and times to sound as consistent as possible in terms of tone and volume, and they should be able to do a good deal of that in a fairly automated way, once they know the changes they need to make. I think it's unlikely they'll be making adjustments to each individual line manually at the mastering stage. The other purpose will be to get it into the final audio format to be used in the game, which is really just a file conversion. I assume work would have been done during recording to keep the conditions as consistent as possible so that not very much processing needs to be done.

Edited June 10, 2022 by KestrelPi