Return to Monkey Island 🚨GAME-WIDE🚨 Spoiler Chat

[leecrawford19]

11 minutes ago, Dmnkly said:

Had Ron and Dave made this game in 1992, I'm sure it would have been very different.

 

But unless I'm mistaken, I believe the notion that Ron HAD ideas for MI3 back in 1992 assumes facts not in evidence. I mean, I'm sure his mind wasn't a total blank. But has he ever said that there was any vision for MI3 back in the day? Again, I might be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure that never existed.

 

It seems that for those who feel dissatisfied with the ending, there is a theme of feeling like they just wanted closure. But may I suggest the possibility that you're just overthinking it? I mean, there is a lot of ambiguity around the specifics, but I'm not sure how much more clear RtMI can be about the core revelation. The Secret of Monkey Island is that these stories are fantasies inspired by an amusement park. And in the fellas' defense, they've basically been telling us this for 30 years — in ways both subtle and less subtle — right from the first two lines of the first game.

 

What constitutes "reality," so to speak, is much more unexplained and nebulous. Do Boybrush and Elaine exist? Where are the lines between Guybrush's fantasy and reality? What's the back story? How do all of these pieces fit on the timeline? My hunch is that these are intentionally very undefined because — to put it bluntly — who cares? It's interesting to ponder, but at least as far as this chapter is concerned, as they say quite explicitly, that's not the part that really matters.

 

I'm not sure if the disappointment some people experience stems from feelings of ambiguity beyond the secret, or that RtMI's big reveal is hammering home confirmation that the secret is a fairly obvious thing that's been staring us in the face for 30 years. (Or from something else, I don't mean to put words in anybody's mouth.) But FWIW, I really don't think there's a lot of wiggle room around what the core of the revelation is.

 

Like I said way upthread, I get the impression that people's comfort with this ending largely comes down to whether you're comfortable with a lot of peripheral ambiguity, or if you really want everything spelled out to the letter. This definitely isn't the latter. But just because an ending is ambiguous, that doesn't mean it can't bring closure. My opinion is that yes, the game obviously and quite intentionally leaves all kinds of loose ends hanging. But when it comes to the primary themes of the story, the heart of the matter, the capital T Truth at its core, it really wraps things up quite nicely while still giving us a bunch of other stuff to play around with.

what he said. 

[RobDangerous]

13 minutes ago, Dmnkly said:

But unless I'm mistaken, I believe the notion that Ron HAD ideas for MI3 back in 1992 assumes facts not in evidence. I mean, I'm sure his mind wasn't a total blank. But has he ever said that there was any vision for MI3 back in the day? Again, I might be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure that never existed.

Quoting https://web.archive.org/web/20051122075149/http://idlethumbs.net/display.php?id=59 once more:

Quote

I think the thing is, when I planned those games out — and this is nothing new — but, when we did the first one the whole story just got too big, which is when I broke it up into three different parts. I know what that third one is, right? So it's not that I kind of sit there and think about "oh, what would the third one be?" I kind of know how that story's supposed to end, so I don't really think about it too much.

He also always insisted that nobody really figured out what the secret is even though "it's just fantasies in a theme park" has always been the most widely seen theory. In the end I'm not disappointed - I long suspected there's nothing more to it and after Thimbleweed Park I was quite sure about it. But the game just ending as expected is also not very exciting.

[Mighty Bashar]

34 minutes ago, Dmnkly said:

Had Ron and Dave made this game in 1992, I'm sure it would have been very different.

 

But unless I'm mistaken, I believe the notion that Ron HAD ideas for MI3 back in 1992 assumes facts not in evidence. I mean, I'm sure his mind wasn't a total blank. But has he ever said that there was any vision for MI3 back in the day? Again, I might be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure that never existed.

 

It seems that for those who feel dissatisfied with the ending, there is a theme of feeling like they just wanted closure. But may I suggest the possibility that you're just overthinking it? I mean, there is a lot of ambiguity around the specifics, but I'm not sure how much more clear RtMI can be about the core revelation. The Secret of Monkey Island is that these stories are fantasies inspired by an amusement park. And in the fellas' defense, they've basically been telling us this for 30 years — in ways both subtle and less subtle — right from the first two lines of the first game.

 

What constitutes "reality," so to speak, is much more unexplained and nebulous. Do Boybrush and Elaine exist? Where are the lines between Guybrush's fantasy and reality? What's the back story? How do all of these pieces fit on the timeline? My hunch is that these are intentionally very undefined because — to put it bluntly — who cares? It's interesting to ponder, but at least as far as this chapter is concerned, as they say quite explicitly, that's not the part that really matters.

 

I'm not sure if the disappointment some people experience stems from feelings of ambiguity beyond the secret, or that RtMI's big reveal is hammering home confirmation that the secret is a fairly obvious thing that's been staring us in the face the whole time. (Or from something else, I don't mean to put words in anybody's mouth.) But FWIW, I really don't think there's a lot of wiggle room around what the core of the revelation is.

 

Like I said way upthread, I get the impression that people's comfort with this ending largely comes down to whether you're comfortable with a lot of peripheral ambiguity, or if you really want everything spelled out to the letter. This definitely isn't the latter. But just because an ending is ambiguous, that doesn't mean it can't bring closure. My opinion is that yes, the game obviously and quite intentionally leaves all kinds of loose ends hanging. But when it comes to the primary themes of the story, the heart of the matter, the capital T Truth at its core, it really wraps things up quite nicely while still giving us a bunch of other stuff to play around with.

 

And speaking for myself, that's what I want from a Monkey Island game. I don't want everything spelled out. I don't want a neat package where everything is carefully explained. To me, that hazy, ambiguous half real, half fantasy isn't the thing Monkey Island is trying to work through to get to a destination. That IS the destination.

 

I'm quite sure I remember in an interview few year ago, Ron Gilbert talked about how he had the idea in his mind if he gets the chance, how he would pickup the story where MI 2 stopped. And he said he thought about putting the secret of monkey island™ in his well in case of death, but joked that perhaps someone will have the idea of "Hey... I know how to get the secret of Monkey Island". I tried to find that interview just now, but couldn't. However I'm positive I read it. Perhaps I'm getting some details wrong, but there was that one part about putting the secret in his well.

 

Having said that, that was years ago, and as he said, things have changed, he have changed, his ideas have changed. And I fully admire how they tied the story through the opening, making it as kids were replaying his heroic days, and keeping enough ambiguity to make a lot of options possible, and paying respect to the games that came after it. That shows high level of maturity and character from Ron and Dave. 

 

I'm quite happy with the ending, even if it still leaves questions. I guess like you said, some fans wanted full definite closure. It's hard to say if I would have enjoyed clear detailed ending more, since I don't know how it would have been. I can say I was full of joy with rush of emotions going through me as I finished it. 

 

Guess that makes Guybrush just an A level LARP player? Funny thing is, one day before finishing RtMI, I was thinking of printing myself a custom t-shirt that said "I know the Secret of Monkey Island". So in a way, I kinda had it right? 😂

 

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this. 

[BillyCheers]

30 minutes ago, RobDangerous said:

He also always insisted that nobody really figured out what the secret is even though "it's just fantasies in a theme park" has always been the most widely seen theory. In the end I'm not disappointed - I long suspected there's nothing more to it and after Thimbleweed Park I was quite sure about it.

You’re forgetting the t-shirt! ☝️☝️

[demone]

I think Ron knew how he wanted the game to begin and end and the secret. But the specifics, the journey, of the game were not laid out yet. He had ideas of LeChuck being a demon and going to hell (which is technically still in the the final product) but other games of their series had already done that. 

 

From that interview, my take is Ron knew the focus for each game, but the specifics of each were something only really covered during production with the team. It seems the first game was initially a combination of all the different ideas from what would've been a trilogy, but to better streamline the story, they segmented certain plot threads.

 

Monkey Island is all about the puzzles and dialogue and those inform the story. So, it would be a bit pressing for Ron to have that laid before even starting working on the game. 

Edited September 23, 2022 by demone

[Dmnkly]

Hey, P.S., I don't mean to say that anybody would be wrong for wanting something less ambiguous. My MO would be to encourage you to judge it for what it is, not for what you wish it were. But at the end of the day, you like what you like.

[miraculous.0]

Wow, so I just finished the game and absolutely loved it! The writing and jokes were top notch, the puzzles were really well designed and didn't delve into moon logic, and the art style in motion looks fantastic. The thing that really stuck with me though, was that ending!

 

Now, we all knew the end was gonna be divisive, one way or another. The biggest question looming over the world of MI has always been "is any of this real?" and I think they did a good job of leaving it ambiguous enough that it's still open to interpretation. I've noticed though, that a lot of people who want the world to be real have been relatively...unimpressed with the ending. They wanted the answers to all the questions to be laid bare and definitively answered, a big final confrontation with LeChuck, and a Secret that would live up to the years and years of hype. After ruminating on the ending for a while and seeing what other people thought, I decided to start a playthrough of the writers cut. I ended up checking the to do list and saw the item of "Find the Secret and relive the glory days" and it finally hit me. I'd seen this before...roughly 5 years ago...

 

Return to Monkey Island is Ron Gilbert's Twin Peaks - The Return! IT'S EVEN RIGHT THERE IN THE NAME!!!!! Almost everything is exactly like what happened when TP S3 came out. A series that has been in stasis for years, with so many questions left unanswered and the original creator coming back to fulfill their vision how they see fit, fanbase reaction be damned. Their both about chasing that feeling of reliving the glory days and answers that could never truly satisfy everyone and that you should enjoy the journey, rather then trying to get to some all encompassing Secret that could never truly live up to the expectations. You're supposed to treasure and relish in all this new time we get with these characters and this world that we all love!

 

There was never gonna be an ending that could live up to the expectations of so many years of pondering and I really think this is the best and most tasteful way they could've approached it. All in all, it was really cool seeing my favorite game series tale so much inspiration and lessons learned from one of my favorite TV shows ever!

[Sadbrush]

49 minutes ago, Dmnkly said:

Had Ron and Dave made this game in 1992, I'm sure it would have been very different.

 

But unless I'm mistaken, I believe the notion that Ron HAD ideas for MI3 back in 1992 assumes facts not in evidence. I mean, I'm sure his mind wasn't a total blank. But has he ever said that there was any vision for MI3 back in the day? Again, I might be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure that never existed.

 

It seems that for those who feel dissatisfied with the ending, there is a theme of feeling like they just wanted closure. But may I suggest the possibility that you're just overthinking it? I mean, there is a lot of ambiguity around the specifics, but I'm not sure how much more clear RtMI can be about the core revelation. The Secret of Monkey Island is that these stories are fantasies inspired by an amusement park. And in the fellas' defense, they've basically been telling us this for 30 years — in ways both subtle and less subtle — right from the first two lines of the first game.

 

What constitutes "reality," so to speak, is much more unexplained and nebulous. Do Boybrush and Elaine exist? Where are the lines between Guybrush's fantasy and reality? What's the back story? How do all of these pieces fit on the timeline? My hunch is that these are intentionally very undefined because — to put it bluntly — who cares? It's interesting to ponder, but at least as far as this chapter is concerned, as they say quite explicitly, that's not the part that really matters.

 

I'm not sure if the disappointment some people experience stems from feelings of ambiguity beyond the secret, or that RtMI's big reveal is hammering home confirmation that the secret is a fairly obvious thing that's been staring us in the face the whole time. (Or from something else, I don't mean to put words in anybody's mouth.) But FWIW, I really don't think there's a lot of wiggle room around what the core of the revelation is.

 

Like I said way upthread, I get the impression that people's comfort with this ending largely comes down to whether you're comfortable with a lot of peripheral ambiguity, or if you really want everything spelled out to the letter. This definitely isn't the latter. But just because an ending is ambiguous, that doesn't mean it can't bring closure. My opinion is that yes, the game obviously and quite intentionally leaves all kinds of loose ends hanging. But when it comes to the primary themes of the story, the heart of the matter, the capital T Truth at its core, it really wraps things up quite nicely while still giving us a bunch of other stuff to play around with.

 

And speaking for myself, that's what I want from a Monkey Island game. I don't want everything spelled out. I don't want a neat package where everything is carefully explained. To me, that hazy, ambiguous half real, half fantasy isn't the thing Monkey Island is trying to work through to get to a destination. That IS the destination.

 

Oh, hi Dom. Big fan of your voice work.

 

I appreciate your reply and breaking down your interpretation for me. I find myself flip-flopping between my feelings of the game. I really loved the humor and puzzles and everything leading up to those final 5 minutes of the story. At the end, I feel like we were given a lot of information at once and not enough time to process it. For me, I was still waiting for the other shoe to drop. Then it just ended and I had to reassess everything up to that point. I've considered a lot of points of view in this thread, which I can respect, but personally I find myself reaching. I wasn't looking for a big climactic fight between Guybrush and LeChuck. I just wanted that sense of closure that puts a big red bow on the entire series. The kind of revelation that allows me to replay the first two games and get something completely different out of it. I know that was a lot to expect from a computer game, but somehow I convinced myself that Ron was hiding an ace up his sleeve all this years. But instead it managed to rehash most of the things we already knew, just given a new context (and perspective, through Boybrush's eyes). 

 

My favorite TV show is Lost, so I'm no stranger to ambiguity or not getting all my questions answered. It's a series I still defend because it managed to feel satisfying without revealing every single mystery. It's that old adage that if you "wow" them at the end, you can forgive any of the flaws that came before. I realize a lot of it is about the "journey, not the destination," but I think they have equal standing. When I think of my nostalgia-filled memories of the first two games, it mostly comes down to the endings and how I felt about the whole experience. That beautiful graphic of Guybrush and Elaine watching LeChuck explode into fireworks. Or that carnival setting that comes out of left field and ends with a giant question mark. Only time will tell if I view this game and its ending in the same light. I've had a couple of days to sit on it and there are things I really like about it (the fact that there are so many variations and interpretations you can derive from it). I definitely don't take for granted how much of a gift it is that Ron and Dave got to make the game they wanted after all this time. Monkey Island will always be one of my favorite series regardless, but the fact that I still have so many reservations about the ending (and have devoted so many words to it) leaves me feeling less than satisfied. I'm certainly glad other people are getting more enjoyment out of it, but I can't help how I feel.

[deevan]

I apologize in advance for my English as it is not my native language.

 

The ending of RtMI has left me extremely sad. It was perfect and worked for me on so many levels. I was devastated turning off the lights. I believe this is the end of Monkey Island series or how we knew it. It was so symbolic. Yes, you could escape back and keep pretending of having adventures while also receiving “I don’t believe” achievement. The achievement in itself is quite telling.

 

I played MI in my early teens. Back when I really struggled to understand many of the dialogs. My vocabulary improved immensely through the first two games. MI2 will forever remain the greatest game of all times for me. I cried watching the trailer of RtMI. Cried again during the prologue. Cried while turning the lights off, and still feeling incredibly sad. For me it all came to a simple understanding. Your adventures in this world are done. Go back and keep replaying them but now the lights are out. The final story is now told. For many the meta ending doesn’t work, but honestly with such lofty expectations after 30 years, no ending would have worked for everyone.

 

Is RtMI a perfect game? Honestly no. There were a number of issues. Humor was definitely lacking compared to earlier games. The closure with Elaine with respect to the cutscenes where she learns about Guybrush’s selfish behavior was not satisfying. But it did wonders in tying up the series. The prologue and the ending were a masterclass in storytelling. The final shot of Guybrush sitting alone will remain with me for a long time. It is so beautiful and devastating at the same time. Unbelievable!

[Dmnkly]

6 minutes ago, Sadbrush said:

...but I can't help how I feel.

Nor should you feel compelled to apologize for it. (Not saying you are.)

 

For me, I don't want to pretend I know what's going to stick with me so close to the moment, but I think it's a good bet the fireworks and the carnival for me is going to be that long, slow pull on Guybrush, contentedly sitting alone on a quiet park bench.

[Colorfinger]

2 hours ago, Dmnkly said:

And speaking for myself, that's what I want from a Monkey Island game. I don't want everything spelled out. I don't want a neat package where everything is carefully explained. To me, that hazy, ambiguous half real, half fantasy isn't the thing Monkey Island is trying to work through to get to a destination. That IS the destination.

 

Sounds like something a flooring inspector would say...

 

... just kidding, I completely agree with you.

 

RtMI is a mature reflection on life, not a rollicking pirate adventure. It's the culmination of years of thought about what Monkey Island and adventure gaming has meant to the original authors, and how their lives have been changed by it. My opinion is that this game (and Monkey 1 and Monkey 2) are entirely allegorical. It is not a literal pirate adventure, and taking it as such will inevitably lead to disappointment.

 

I suspect where a lot of disappointment comes from is that Monkey 3, 4, and Tales were in fact rollicking pirate adventures with comedic fourth wall breaks. I think the reason this happened is because after Monkey 2 it wasn't perfectly clear whether the author's intent for fourth wall breaks was for comedy (think Spaceballs) or for allegory (think Twin Peaks).

 

CoMI, Escape, and Tales all played it pretty safe, and while containing similar "out of place" things (Star Buccaneers for example), they missed the central point, because they had never received the full story. They just did their best, and so you ended up with a more Spaceballsy type fourth wall break. I would bet that Ron was extremely frustrated by that at the time. I would also bet that this is why he didn't want to accept them as "canon" until very recently, when he was able to find a framework to make them fit within his original intent.

 

RtMI (and especially the ending) cements for me that the series is intended to be allegorical.

Edited September 23, 2022 by Colorfinger

[tmetic]

37 minutes ago, Sadbrush said:

My favorite TV show is Lost, so I'm no stranger to ambiguity or not getting all my questions answered. It's a series I still defend because it managed to feel satisfying without revealing every single mystery. It's that old adage that if you "wow" them at the end, you can forgive any of the flaws that came before. 

 

I hated the ending to Lost. In fact, the entire 6th series. Even now, thinking about it is a complete bummer. I feel for you if you're experiencing similar disappointment with ReMI.

 

ReMI's ending was about as close to perfect as it's possible to get, for me. Heartfelt, touching, sort of creepy and weird, with a dash of humour in the mix. I was sobbing. It's a shame it didn't work for you - but at least you got to enjoy Lost!

[MurraySchull]

Going back a couple of pages (this thread is moving quickly!) regarding the fan-service nature of ReMI. This was a feeling that I had about Tales in a lot of ways, but for different reasons. Tales repeated a lot of catchphrases, lines and puzzles from previous games, to a point that really towed the line between "homage" and "ripoff". Return brings back a good amount of characters and locations from, particularly, the first game, but Ron and Dave made it a point not to re-use jokes or dialogue from previous games too often, and many of ReMI's puzzles also felt more fresh to me compared to Tales. So I would argue that as a game, Return is the more fresh, original game to play by comparison, and even the returning locations and characters have evolved.

 

Also, don't think this has been linked here yet, but Dominic appeared in Cressup's stream the other day (she's playing the game on Twitch this week) and gave his thoughts on a few moments in the game, particularly the opening (also noting that the Forgiveness Frog puzzle wasn't in the rough cut that he played originally, amongst other things):

Dominic Armato (aka Guybrush) joining for a chat! - Twitch

 

Anybody know what the 9MB Steam update was yesterday? Maybe they quietly patched a bug!

[Colorfinger]

1 hour ago, RobDangerous said:

He also always insisted that nobody really figured out what the secret is even though "it's just fantasies in a theme park" has always been the most widely seen theory. 

 

To be fair, the secret isn't "it's fantasies in a theme park." It's either the t-shirt (if you take it completely literally), or the secret is actually an allegory about searching for something that you may never (or perhaps should never) find.

 

Or to put it differently, the real secret is the friends we made along the way. 

 

2 minutes ago, fentongames said:

Anybody know what the 9MB Steam update was yesterday? Maybe they quietly patched a bug!

 

Maybe that patched in a different Secret, wouldn't that be a twist?

Edited September 23, 2022 by Colorfinger

[Jake]

9 minutes ago, fentongames said:

Anybody know what the 9MB Steam update was yesterday? Maybe they quietly patched a bug!

They’re posting patch notes on Steam. This is the second patch it seems (1.2 also had patch notes) https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2060130/view/3310732036320199259

[MurraySchull]

The "Previously On" feature is working for me now. Upon loading a save game, we cut first to Guybrush and his son on the bench, and Boybrush can ask for a re-cap of the story so far. A clever feature!

 

4 minutes ago, Jake said:

They’re posting patch notes on Steam. This is the second patch it seems (1.2 also had patch notes) https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2060130/view/3310732036320199259

 

Cheers! Overall, it seemed to be a really polished game. Seems like they went over every detail and possible interaction with a fine tooth-comb. The only real glitch that I found, so to speak, was that the music wasn't looping properly in the underwater section on Monkey Island (where we first see the squid). Wonder if that's been patched.

 

 

ALSO... did you all read the note at the end of the scrapbook after completing the game? 🥲

Edited September 23, 2022 by fentongames

[Jake2JakesRevenge]

28 minutes ago, Colorfinger said:

My opinion is that this game (and Monkey 1 and Monkey 2) are entirely allegorical. It is not a literal pirate adventure, and taking it as such will inevitably lead to disappointment.

 

RtMI (and especially the ending) cements for me that the series is intended to be allegorical.

This is more or less explicitly confirmed by Ron and Dave in the addendum to the scrapbook.

 

The Chum quest in particular seems to get at the heart of the secret: people want to feel what you felt at some exciting point in your life, through the use of grandiosity and colorful fluff. Monkey Island was the creators' fluffed up story of their lives and how they look back on their adventures as explorers of uncharted territory 

 

 

Edited September 23, 2022 by Jake2JakesRevenge

[Sadbrush]

12 minutes ago, tmetic said:

 

I hated the ending to Lost. In fact, the entire 6th series. Even now, thinking about it is a complete bummer. I feel for you if you're experiencing similar disappointment with ReMI.

 

ReMI's ending was about as close to perfect as it's possible to get, for me. Heartfelt, touching, sort of creepy and weird, with a dash of humour in the mix. I was sobbing. It's a shame it didn't work for you - but at least you got to enjoy Lost!

 

I really wanted it to work for me. I sat through the credits that first time just thinking about that final moment and what it meant. Again, I think it's the sudden shift of tone and the fact that it ended so suddenly that caught me by surprise. We needed a bit more dialogue and time to process what we had just seen before reaching the end of that sequence. Especially considering this seems intended as the final entry in the series. Some of these characters deserved better.

 

But yeah, Monkey Island and Lost are pretty similar in that they've got that J.J. Abrams "mystery box" analogy behind them. I noticed someone else in the thread compared it to the third season of Twin Peaks, which also seems apt (a series that I found challenging, but ultimately fulfilling). I mentioned this earlier, but my dissatisfaction with the ending likely also stems from the fact that I haven't reached that point of contentment in my life that Guybrush finds himself in. If I were sharing this game with my spouse or my kid, I'd wager my overall experience would be entirely different. 

 

27 minutes ago, Colorfinger said:

they missed the central point, because they had never received the full story.

 

I don't wish to belabor this, but this is kind of how I feel after playing RtMI. 😉

[Colorfinger]

7 minutes ago, Sadbrush said:

...my dissatisfaction with the ending likely also stems from the fact that I haven't reached that point of contentment in my life that Guybrush finds himself in. If I were sharing this game with my spouse or my kid, I'd wager my overall experience would be entirely different. 

 

I wonder if that's a big part of it as well: you take from it what you bring to it. I am at that point in my life where I have a wife and two kids, and ready to reflect on the things that have gone before, so the game speaks to me directly. If I was playing it twenty years ago, I doubt I would have enjoyed it as much, or at least not in the same way. It wouldn't have felt so deep to me then - it might have even seemed like a shallow, confusing, cop out. In fact I did at the time adore Curse of Monkey Island and didn't understand how people could say it wasn't as good as LeChuck's Revenge.

 

Quote

 I don't wish to belabor this, but this is kind of how I feel after playing RtMI. 😉

 

I'm not sure quite you mean when you say "this is kind of how I feel after playing RtMI". Do you mean that you feel like Ron/Dave missed the point of the series?

Edited September 23, 2022 by Colorfinger
split those quotes up

[Sadbrush]

1 minute ago, Colorfinger said:

I'm not sure quite you mean when you say "this is kind of how I feel after playing RtMI". Do you mean that you feel like Ron/Dave missed the point of the series?

 

No, I missed the point of the series because they never bothered explaining it. I was just being glib. 😛

[BaronGrackle]

1 hour ago, Colorfinger said:

I suspect where a lot of disappointment comes from is that Monkey 3, 4, and Tales were in fact rollicking pirate adventures with comedic fourth wall breaks. I think the reason this happened is because after Monkey 2 it wasn't perfectly clear whether the author's intent for fourth wall breaks was for comedy (think Spaceballs) or for allegory (think Twin Peaks).

I suspect MI1 was also a rollicking pirate adventure, or at least 50% rollicking pirate adventure.

 

When MI1 tells us LeChuck sailed to find the Secret of Monkey Island, and before him Herman and his Captain had sailed to find that same Secret twenty years ago, was it really talking about a mature reflection on life?

[Colorfinger]

4 minutes ago, BaronGrackle said:

I suspect MI1 was also a rollicking pirate adventure, or at least 50% rollicking pirate adventure.

 

When MI1 tells us LeChuck sailed to find the Secret of Monkey Island, and before him Herman and his Captain had sailed to find that same Secret twenty years ago, was it really talking about a mature reflection on life?

 

Oh definitely, I'm not meaning to suggest that it's entirely some grand master plan or that there is no way to enjoy the games at face value, I more mean that there has always been an undercurrent that the fourth wall breakage was intentionally allegorical, not just played for comedy's sake as a nod to a contemporary audience.

[BaronGrackle]

37 minutes ago, Colorfinger said:

 

Oh definitely, I'm not meaning to suggest that it's entirely some grand master plan or that there is no way to enjoy the games at face value, I more mean that there has always been an undercurrent that the fourth wall breakage was intentionally allegorical, not just played for comedy's sake as a nod to a contemporary audience.

Fair point. But to give credit to 3-5, I'm reminded of this old mojo article from Jason: https://mixnmojo.com/features/sitefeatures/Still-Lost-in-a-Theme-Park

 

As an example? Curse itself begins like the Disneyland ride, with a slow banjo playing in a bayou, followed by our main character sailing his literal ride cart up to a ship besieging a fort town.

 

Quote

I remain unconvinced that he could or should, but Ron has already stated that if he ever were to make “Monkey Island 3a,” he would split the canon and simply continue the series where he left it off, but I wonder if he would necessarily have to. I mean really, what’s changed? It seems to me that the subsequent sequels have been keeping the bench warm, faithfully keeping that barrier between fantasy and reality blurred. That portal remains open, and that carnival remains a daydream’s interruption away.

Edited September 23, 2022 by BaronGrackle

[Dmnkly]

All of this, incidentally, is really getting me thinking about The Adventures of Baron Munchausen. Some rather interesting parallels there. A collection of adventures that blur the lines between fantasy and reality, feature outlandish exaggeration and improvisation, and while vaguely tethered to reality, seem to exist out of place and time, almost as though our protagonist were more of a symbolic archetype than an actual person.

Edited September 23, 2022 by Dmnkly

[Staple Remover]

I just want to buy my Secret T-Shirt, and maybe some other merchandise too.