Return to Monkey Island

[KestrelPi]

10 minutes ago, demone said:

Guybrush did give Carla a signed contract for a cushy government job lol

Ah! Yet more evidence most of this one happens after all the others.

[KestrelPi]

41 minutes ago, Marius said:

Carla is the governour!

Does feel like a missed opportunity to write "GOV CARL"

[Vainamoinen]

Thought bubbles:
 

• So Dave rolled the D2 crit this time.
• This looks incredible. Just incredible. It's so dimensional, and – something that EMI didn't do – it is a perspective recreation of the original TSoMI Melee harbor. Which is a primary connecting point to childhood nostalgia. This is so well done.
• I was one of the people who was thinking: Really, back to Melee Island? Is that necessary? But seeing that Scumm Bar sign, I now think: How could Ron not go back to Melee Island?!
• The pelicans. By now it's become quite apparent that almost every background we've been shown, even interiors, has one or more animals present. How are we going to make sense of them all? I still say stuff them in my inventory.
• Guybrush's running speed. If this is an accurate reflection of in-game velocity, let's say age hasn't slowed that Threepwood down.
• LeChuck's ship anchoring directly at the Scumm bar. And governor Swordmaster is not up in arms? There's something rotten, and it's not just the usual sea stench!
• Curly green Tiller mist around LeChuck's ship.
• The colors: I could write books about it, but those first four inches, that descent from the lookout, it's incredible. Greens, blues, cyans, magentas, all seemingly thrown together but so awesomely well composed. How did they do that?
• Bit disappointed by the ocean here; there's some movement in the reflections around LeChuck's ship, but apart from that, reflections are static.
• The drinking guy animation in the Scumm Bar window though, much appreciated! I'm certain he could drink all night without becoming visibly inebriated. Maybe I should leave that scene on for eight hours, just to make sure.
• Guybrush seems to be viewable from the front and the side, but there seem to be no betweens. Feels a bit abrupt when he turns (0:01).
• Notably missing ghost violinist lady is dearly missed.
• Nice music, but of course, just ten seconds. The Act I intro had more of a punch for me.
• Oh look! More shadow shapes on LeChuck's ship for us to obsess over! Who is going to be the first to suggest that it's still Guybrush, but rather his twin broth... oh wait that would be Chucky.
• Yes, again I am clicking on things in a video expecting a reaction. That's so dumb, isn't it. But at least I already know where I'm getting a decent length of rope from.

 

 

Edited July 18, 2022 by Vainamoinen

[Remi]

6 minutes ago, Vainamoinen said:

• Oh look! More shadow shapes on LeChuck's ship for us to obsess over! Who is going to be the first to suggest that it's still Guybrush, but rather his twin broth... oh wait that would be Chucky.

 

Seems safe to assume it's ElCarlo.

[Jake]

(I moved the page of bootleg Monkey 1 merch discussion to the poster project thread)

[Vainamoinen]

ALSO

 

 

And I really love the positive energy below that tweet.

Edited July 18, 2022 by Vainamoinen

[tmetic]

Wow, it looks and sounds absolutely amazing. Just perfect. I cannot WAIT.

 

And the reaction elsewhere has been overwhelmingly positive, from what I can see. Happy times!

[KestrelPi]

7 minutes ago, tmetic said:

Wow, it looks and sounds absolutely amazing. Just perfect. I cannot WAIT.

 

And the reaction elsewhere has been overwhelmingly positive, from what I can see. Happy times!

Yeah, I've seen a COUPLE of comments but way more positive ones about how it looks, and I think it's really starting to click with people. I'd love this just not to be controversial when the game comes out because it's such a distraction from NEW MI GAME

[Knight Owl]

42 minutes ago, KestrelPi said:

Yeah, I've seen a COUPLE of comments but way more positive ones about how it looks, and I think it's really starting to click with people. I'd love this just not to be controversial when the game comes out because it's such a distraction from NEW MI GAME

It seems like somehow Twitter has been a more positive forum than Ron's own blog comments. Like even in the worst of it I feel like there were way fewer mean comments on Twitter. Which doesn't make sense to me but whatever 😛

[KestrelPi]

The more I listen to that little snippet of music, the more that I think it might be subtly playing on the Melee Island map theme.

 

listen to the shape of the melody and the rhythm of the steel drums at the start of the clip, and compare:

 

 

[neoncolor8]

37 minutes ago, KestrelPi said:

The more I listen to that little snippet of music, the more that I think it might be subtly playing on the Melee Island map theme.

 

listen to the shape of the melody and the rhythm of the steel drums at the start of the clip, and compare:

 

 

I had the same thought, had the map theme in my head after watching the snippet. I think it's the major/minor interchange that goes on. I forgot the exact term for this, modal interchange?

I even reversed the video to listen to the music backwards but it didn't reveal anything to me. 

[KestrelPi]

34 minutes ago, neoncolor8 said:

I had the same thought, had the map theme in my head after watching the snippet. I think it's the major/minor interchange that goes on. I forgot the exact term for this, modal interchange?

I even reversed the video to listen to the music backwards but it didn't reveal anything to me. 

Maybe so, but I'm not sure it's so deep. I just hear some similar rhythmic and melodic qualities:

 

first two bars, map theme, second two bars, the beginning of the little snippet we hear (approximately; I've not used tuplets or swing rhythms as I think they make it less clear, though to me it sounds like it's perhaps swung or a tuplet feel):

 

both C major, and where the map music goes eventually is melodically very similar to where the snippet is when it comes in, so if I had to guess, what's going on here is that they've taken the map music which in the original game was the the main music to represent the island as a whole, and made some variations of that melodic idea and used that to ground the walking around music, in areas that were previously silent.

 

Very small snippet to say for sure, but that's what I'm hearing here. And it's a lot similar to the MI2 approach where you'd hear a few little motifs around each island which were kind of common to the whole island, and linked the whole thing together.

 

Edited July 18, 2022 by KestrelPi

[demone]

I wonder if LeChuck is in league with the new pirates leaders. Would explain why he is docked at the island and has a nameplate in his cabin. Based off the trailer image, the pirate leaders might also have voodoo artifacts and a level of control over them. 

 

Also, just a side note, but I've noticed that this game really seems to be fairly serious. No real jokes in the trailers and reveals so far, which I really love. Stan's dialogue trees on the website are great and hilarious, so the token humor will obviously still also be there, but I really love the aura this game has. Even in today's reveal; Guybrush running towards something (my guess to visit the voodoo lady based off Ron's tweet); no puns or jokes, just a lot of intrigue. 

 

Combined with what Dominic has said about this game, it sounds like this one is also going to be fairly emotional and deep. Can't wait.

 

Edited July 19, 2022 by demone

[OzzieMonkey]

They absolutely nailed it. Everything about this scene just feels perfect, it illicits just the right mood and I already can't wait to explore Melee Island again. What a tease though! Such a short clip and already I'm dying for next week to get the next little tidbit. There is something playing on my mind though and I wonder if anyone else is feeling this at all.

 

I'm a little concerned that too much of the game will take place in locations we've seen before. Hopefully Melee is just a small portion of the game (mainly Part 1) and there's more to Brr Muda and Terror Island than we've gotten a glimpse of, maybe even another island aswell? It's also a little worrying that we've seen so many returning characters. Maybe this is all just by design for marketing purposes to really focus on pulling our nostalgic heartstrings to not spoil the new stuff, I hope that's the case. I'll admit I was a little disappointed to see that both the Voodoo Lady and Otis are in the exact same location we first met them in the original game. I just hope this isn't The Force Awakens of Monkey Island and really is its own unique story that adds to the world. 

[Glokidd]

I want to know how *deep* this recreation of Mêlée goes.

 

Looking at today's clip and how well it recreates SMI's rendition it could be pretty direct on town layout.

 

Very cool 😀

[Vainamoinen]

I do hope they're done with the Melee Island spoilers now though. On to Monkey, Terror, and Brr Muda.

 

And, well, the half dozen other islands in the game.

[Jake]

I would be happy if nothing else was shown!

[Marius]

Same, I don't want to see anything more. But of course I will study every new tweet thoroughly.

[Vainamoinen]

Well then, on to more speculation instead of discussing all the new things we know. 😎

 

I always wanted Act/Part II to have one giant ocean map and lots of islands to explore. But Guybrush already knows how to get to Monkey Island – what if Monkey Island becomes available rather early on in the overview map, and the finale plays out on yet another island, one we haven't yet heard about?

[BillyCheers]

2 hours ago, Jake said:

I would be happy if nothing else was shown!

I’d also prefer a funny video from the recordings, a hint at new (?) gameplay mechanics or the switch controls, maybe a  spoiler free interview with Ron & Dave. Things that keep the hype up without spoiling too much (even if that maybe is a bit late now 😅).

[DM81]

Guys...this is SO good. If I was been a little skeptical after the trailer about some little details, this clip just blow me out.

I'm thinking that this art stile is like a cup of coffe without sugar: it may taste a little bitter at the beginning and takes time to get used to, but once you are, you start to enjoy the bitter taste and you can't go back to that artificial swetness anymore.

Now...It's like if everything just click.

I'm 100% in.

[KestrelPi]

I seem to be a bit more relaxed about both the spoilers and the potential direction of the game in that...

 

Well, first, I don't think they're spoiling too much, and in fact I think it's less spoilery to show off locations we already have seen in previous games than new ones. Since we already knew the scumm bar and melee island was in the game, it's not really surprising that the docks are also there... and though our eagle eyes might have revealed a couple of more tidbits about carla and the ghost pirates, I'm sure plenty of thought must have gone into what to show and what not to show. There's no doubt in my mind the game is going to be full of surprises when we get to play it.

 

In fact, there's at least one member of this forum that could confirm that  for us

 

Secondly I think that yes, they are absolutely showing us familiar stuff to tug some nostalgia strings, but in the early interviews they were also falling over themselves to say that they wanted this to be a modern monkey island game, not a throwback, so I really don't think that they're just going to do a retread. Remember the stuff Ronzo and Dave said as well, about how they only wanted to do the game if they thought they had a good story to tell?

 

There's a reason they're going back to Melee, and part of it might be that it's probably the most possible nostalgia location to return to but it must also be because it serves the story.

 

In fact, I have a little hunch based on some of these things that one of the things that the game might touch on thematically is a little bit of a meta commentary on nostalgia and the things that are good and bad about that (we also saw this in the recent new version of the Stanley Parable, for example, done much more directly). I mean, look at what we have, an older Guybrush, being controlled by older fans, being developed by older developers, returning to the place of his youth where all the adventures started. What could be a more perfect set up for a commentary about nostalgia than that? So I think there's a bit more to this choice than we currently understand.

 

So nah, I'm not really concerned that it's going to be a retread, and I'm not really worried we're seeing too much. They know what they're doing. Maybe I'll feel differently after 10 weeks of this.

 

[Marius]

Oh I am not scared about spoilers at all, and am sure that the team won't show anything they don't want us to see. All that is public seems well thought out and considerately picked.
I just wish I could explore Mêlée Island for the first time on my own. But that is all a question of self-restraint and I am not criticizing the team (developers and publishers).
#MonkeyIslandMonday is a pretty smart marketing move, and it makes me happy that it excites more and more people every week.

Edited July 19, 2022 by Marius

[Thrik]

I definitely hear what you’re hearing regarding the docks music being pried out of the map music. It’d make sense for that to be a more general theme used across Melee for sure.

[BillyCheers]

2 hours ago, KestrelPi said:

I seem to be a bit more relaxed about both the spoilers and the potential direction of the game in that...

 

Well, first, I don't think they're spoiling too much, and in fact I think it's less spoilery to show off locations we already have seen in previous games than new ones. Since we already knew the scumm bar and melee island was in the game, it's not really surprising that the docks are also there... and though our eagle eyes might have revealed a couple of more tidbits about carla and the ghost pirates, I'm sure plenty of thought must have gone into what to show and what not to show. There's no doubt in my mind the game is going to be full of surprises when we get to play it.

 

In fact, there's at least one member of this forum that could confirm that  for us

 

Secondly I think that yes, they are absolutely showing us familiar stuff to tug some nostalgia strings, but in the early interviews they were also falling over themselves to say that they wanted this to be a modern monkey island game, not a throwback, so I really don't think that they're just going to do a retread. Remember the stuff Ronzo and Dave said as well, about how they only wanted to do the game if they thought they had a good story to tell?

 

There's a reason they're going back to Melee, and part of it might be that it's probably the most possible nostalgia location to return to but it must also be because it serves the story.

 

In fact, I have a little hunch based on some of these things that one of the things that the game might touch on thematically is a little bit of a meta commentary on nostalgia and the things that are good and bad about that (we also saw this in the recent new version of the Stanley Parable, for example, done much more directly). I mean, look at what we have, an older Guybrush, being controlled by older fans, being developed by older developers, returning to the place of his youth where all the adventures started. What could be a more perfect set up for a commentary about nostalgia than that? So I think there's a bit more to this choice than we currently understand.

 

So nah, I'm not really concerned that it's going to be a retread, and I'm not really worried we're seeing too much. They know what they're doing. Maybe I'll feel differently after 10 weeks of this.

 

When I talk about spoilers, I don't just mean content spoilers that relate to the story or puzzles. But especially when it comes to familiar characters and places, it's nice to find them in the game. Questions like "Where will the Voodoo Lady be this time?", "Will we see Stan again?", "Will the Scummbar be open?", "Can we visit the monkey head again?" etc. are basically already answered.

 

Of course, there will certainly be lots and lots of new things to discover. But I think we've already seen an incredible amount. As I said before, I would have liked to know the title of the first part (as important or unimportant as it is) in the game.
I would also find it a great pity, for example, if they posted the intro on the Monkey Island Mondays now. I would like to experience something like that in the game for the first time - and not on Twitter.

 

As I said: I'm happy about everything we see, but I would also be happy to discover the rest now.🤗