Return to Monkey Island 🚨GAME-WIDE🚨 Spoiler Chat

[Jake]

Ah damn they’re even outsourcing the inscrutable shitposts to bots now!? Mojos days are truly numbered. 

[Hube]

4 hours ago, Knight Owl said:

Nah I know what happens in curse haha

 

 

I have a question for everyone: if you were in charge of making the next game, how would you frame it? Does it take place after the park bench at the end of RtMI and follow up on Elaine’s little cliffhanger? Is it a totally self contained story? Do you keep the framing device of guybrush telling the story to his son, or someone else?

However the story would wind up, I would definitely appreciate it if they peeled back another layer off the theme park ending and went deeper into the metaphysical weirdness of the series. A new lingering thread of mystery feels pretty important to establish.

[Romão]

On 9/30/2022 at 12:55 PM, ThunderPeel2001 said:

 

Read the whole thing. Lovely summation... It also matches what I wrote in the "head canon" thread yesterday 

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you so much. What I wrote was greatly informed by other reflections and post such as yours

On 10/1/2022 at 11:26 AM, Carlius said:

Very nicely put before @Romão! I fully agree, what Ron and Dave did, actually opens up Monkey Island to have a future.
Also 😊 congratulations on your little ManuelBrush 

 

Thank  And although he was named after both his grandparents, I will always tell him the future it was also an homage to Manny Calavera

[Sadbrush]

7 hours ago, Knight Owl said:

I have a question for everyone: if you were in charge of making the next game, how would you frame it? Does it take place after the park bench at the end of RtMI and follow up on Elaine’s little cliffhanger? Is it a totally self contained story? Do you keep the framing device of guybrush telling the story to his son, or someone else?

 

The more I think about it, the more unsatisfying another entry would feel at this point, especially coming from a different team. It would be the jump from MI2 to Curse all over again, ignoring all the mythology and setting it firmly in the fantasy of the pirate world. But that world has come crumbling down at the end of this and it's hard not to constantly be aware of that now. Maybe the best strategy would be to make a Boybrush-centric game (perhaps the search for his dad after he went missing from his latest adventure?), even though I hate those passing-of-the-torch stories. Also, I wouldn't want Boybrush to be an exact carbon copy of his dad; maybe he has other fantasies and aspirations. I don't know, I just don't want the next MI game to be a hard reboot that ignores all the previous entries or anything like that. But then again, it feels too soon to consider all of this because I'm still too close to the ending.

[Garystu]

8 hours ago, Knight Owl said:

Nah I know what happens in curse haha

 

 

I have a question for everyone: if you were in charge of making the next game, how would you frame it? Does it take place after the park bench at the end of RtMI and follow up on Elaine’s little cliffhanger? Is it a totally self contained story? Do you keep the framing device of guybrush telling the story to his son, or someone else?

 

guybrush tells the story directly to me (like this)

 

Edited October 3, 2022 by Garystu

[BaronGrackle]

4 hours ago, Hube said:

However the story would wind up, I would definitely appreciate it if they peeled back another layer off the theme park ending and went deeper into the metaphysical weirdness of the series. A new lingering thread of mystery feels pretty important to establish.

Just leave me with my Mutiny on Monkey Island designer document, so I can read it over and over again as I tell myself that somewhere in Ron Gilbert's brain, the secret of Monkey Island was a hellgate beneath a crack in the earth, described in detail.

[LowLevel]

11 hours ago, Knight Owl said:

I have a question for everyone: if you were in charge of making the next game, how would you frame it?

 

Good question. Well, it depends: is the goal to create a game enjoyed by as many people as possible or to create something that I would personally enjoy?

Personally, I would like the next game to go more down the rabbit hole. I'm not sure if I would use the same "old Guybrush tells a story" device, but I would like to see the darker and more surreal themes explored more, perhaps hinting at themes from MI2 that were never explained and using (again) the "unfinished business" motivation to return to some of the islands shown in MI2. Perhaps an even older Guybrush might be the best character to use as the protagonist and his son might work as a second playable character, framing everything on the father-son rite of passage.

On the other hand, if the goal is to create something more easily appreciated by people, I would drop any meta features, abandon any attempt to discuss older topics never explained, and simply take advantage of the framing device established in RtMI. Guybrush would tell another story to his son, this time extremely straightforward: "Guybrush gets into trouble and eventually defeats LeChuck". I would also show Guybrush telling a story to Boybrush only at the beginning and the ending of the game.

 

I believe that after MI2, Ron Gilbert left a hot potato in the hands of other authors who wanted to create a sequel. This hot potato was handled by ignoring whatever Ron had in mind, leading to successful games and stories. RtMI is a little different, because I think it helps to frame any future game in the MI universe without ignoring what Ron did and without creating canon problems: let's pretend it is simply another story told by Guybrush to his son. This is what I would do if the goal is to simplify things and reach as many people as possible.

[Jake]

18 minutes ago, LowLevel said:

This hot potato was handled by ignoring whatever Ron had in mind,

Counterpoint: I’d argue that they didn’t ignore it, but that all the sequels are consciously attempting to deal with the aftermath of 2 in their own ways, with the knowledge that if they ever had attempted to say anything definitive, fans would have rioted and punished them for trying. Those teams were all in a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation. I don’t think they all liked the ending of 2, but every sequel was made in response to it in some way. For example, the original design document to Curse:

 

Mediocre but real example: I dreamed of a moment in Tales where Guybrush hits his head or takes a huge punch from LeChuck and wakes up in a first aid tent, is bandaged up by a nurse, walks outside and is back in the story, and to never mention it again. Not the most genius idea of all time, but I know I’m not the only one who worked on these games and was drawn to the idea of crashing head-on into the dual-layer blurry reality we get a glimpse of at the end of 2, but knowing a head-on crash like that would be rejected by everyone everywhere for different reasons. Instead some games tried to fold it into the reality of the game, some games did their own version of surreal piracy, some tried to acknowledge it but only around the edges. 

 

(Anyway I know this isn’t really what you meant. You know they didn’t literally ignore it, you meant they didn’t try to imagine exactly what he wanted and try to do that. I think that would have been far worse than them instead reacting however they most naturally wanted to and making that game. Someone imagining what Ron would have done and just sort of futzing around would have probably created something far less memorable than the games we got!)

[Sadbrush]

3 hours ago, BaronGrackle said:

Just leave me with my Mutiny on Monkey Island designer document, so I can read it over and over again as I tell myself that somewhere in Ron Gilbert's brain, the secret of Monkey Island was a hellgate beneath a crack in the earth, described in detail.

 

I had no idea that this was even a thing, but that's amazing.

 

 

Edited October 3, 2022 by Sadbrush

[Knight Owl]

ughhh I literally can’t sleep because I can’t stop thinking about the ending, and trying to think of an interpretation that works with everything we’ve seen. 

 

 

I just really hope that, since all interpretations are valid, that Ron Gilbert won’t shy away from telling us his interpretation. Stuff like, why he keeps returning to the idea of theme parks. How the carnival opening evolved in his mind over the years, what he was originally planning on doing that after MI2. I feel pretty confident that the amusement park was his original idea for the secret, because of the plaque, but I’d like to hear him expand on like, what that meant exactly at the time, how that might have played out. Like I’m totally cool with the idea that there’s no definitive answers to any of the questions, but I hope in interviews Ron will tell us all his thoughts and opinions honestly, without holding back just to be mysterious like he would have before this game came out. 

Anyways, here’s where I’m at with the story right now. Sorry if it’s super incoherent, it’s like 2am right now haha.

 

I like the idea that Guybrush wanted to tell a story about how all his adventures were really just him at a carnival. (Why, I’m not sure, but I’m sure you could speculate about that. Maybe something from his childhood?) But because of what we know from all the other games, the story guybrush wanted to tell just didn’t really make sense anymore. Boybrush literally lives in a piratey world where Elaine is his mom, so of course to him that story wouldn’t make any sense! In other words, Ron Gilbert had a story he wanted to tell, but all the other games contradicted it, and so this game is the story that emerges from those contradictions. This is represented in the game at the end, when we see a literal contradiction with how guybrush acts when looking at all the cardboard cutouts (like he knew the whole time that it was all fake) vs how he acts when talking to Elaine (confused about what’s going on.) I think Elaine is telling him, “this weird obsession with the original secret of monkey island, this weird carnival thing, just doesn’t work anymore. Let’s put it to rest.” And so you turning off all the lights is like Ron Gilbert symbolically putting the whole carnival plotline to rest, and embracing whatever direction the story wants to go next. To be clear, I think that guybrush’s adventures were mostly all real, with some embellishments here and there. I think that because I see no reason for the park bench stuff to not be considered “real.”  To me, it’s the carnival stuff that’s the fantasy, hence why we see the “Big Whoop Amusement Park” turn into a quaint little town at the beginning of the game. As for what really happened when Guybrush went through the door? I think whatever you tell boybrush happened is what really happened, as we see with all the epilogues.

 

On the topic of contradictions: At the beginning of the game, guyrbush tells boybrush that you can’t just mess around with the ending, and that that’s not how storytelling works. At the end of the game, boybrush reminds guybrush that he said that, To which he replies, “I did?” I think This is Ron Gilbert sort of poking fun at himself, and how he used to be so particular with what his third MI would be, and how he’s loosened up. And it (lovingly) pokes fun at the fanbase, for obsessing so much about every word he’s said. The beginning of the game is “If I made another monkey island,” and the end of the game is “when I made another monkey island.”
 

I’m reminded of the initial reveal trailer.

 

Murray: Ron Gilbert told me he’d never make another monkey island unless~
 

Ron Gilbert: I did?

 

 

 

Ok that’s enough for now. I probably missed a whole bunch of stuff. Not gonna proofread this, just had to get it out there.

 

TLDR: Game good, I need sleep. Aaaaaaaaaaaaa

Edited October 3, 2022 by Knight Owl

[LowLevel]

5 hours ago, Jake said:

all the sequels are consciously attempting to deal with the aftermath of 2 in their own ways, with the knowledge that if they ever had attempted to say anything definitive, fans would have rioted and punished them for trying.

 

I can understand the "fear" of saying something definitive, but I don't think "something definitive" was the only option available to the authors of other games. Telling something meaningful (not definitive) about the more surreal tones and perspectives that fascinated me the most was also an option. These themes were not only related to the ending of MI2:

• The whole story possibly being the product of the imagination of someone;
• When in time the stories take place: "Pirate Lingo! It's how everybody talked back then. Come on Guybrush, play along.";
• Guybrush's parents role.

I do not doubt that in creating "Curse," for example, the authors thought a lot about these themes. However, in the end the final product is a story that does not address them. Everything happens in-universe: what Guybrush experienced as a kid was the result of the voodoo magic of a demonic pirate. I think that avoiding the topics mentioned above was a smart decision and that keeping everything self-contained in the pirate universe contributed to the success of the game.

 

And that's why I would also avoid them in a possible sequel, if the main goal is to increase the chance that people will like the story. Many artists would disagree with that "if" because, understandably, they need to feel free when creating something. That's why I gave two answers: what I think was a "commercially sound" solution and what I would like for myself.

[Jake]

I think you might be projecting if you’re implying the Curse team effectively censored themselves for mass appeal, when it’s probably just that they didn’t like that stuff and didn’t want it in their game. I think the team did see themselves as artists and did feel free to create what they wanted, and it’s just very different from what you wanted. I think that team just didn’t like those surreal and mysterious themes that came to a head at the end of 2, so they chose to interpret that moment as “I hope LeChuck didn’t cast a spell on him or something” being the literal plot truth, and based their game on it.

 

Even though I like Curse a lot, it’s never been the Monkey Island 3 that I wanted, because it ignores the things you’ve been talking about (which I also love about the series), but I’m sure it’s the game they wanted to make, with the only real compromises coming from budget and scope restrictions, not creative or thematic. Personally I didn’t ever care if I got “Rons original vision” in future monkey Island games, but always wanted them to live in that exciting space where uncertainty exists, where the world feels like it’s almost projected on paper and you can see that unreality and feel like you could poke a hole through it or fall through at a moments notice, if you dig too deep. I don’t think that stuff remotely appealed to the leads on Curse, though. In that case they were the ones who were irritated at the thought of the potential head on car crash with those themes, and drove the car as far away from it as possible as the motivation for their game.  You’re probably right that it was a big contributor to its success - not necessarily because those themes are unpalatable, I think, but because their absence from the plot made Curse a soft reboot in a way, a great entry point in the series for a new era of players. 
 

Sorry my thoughts on this are kind of jumbled. It’s not something I’ve thought about enough. 

[ThunderPeel2001]

5 hours ago, Knight Owl said:

ughhh I literally can’t sleep because I can’t stop thinking about the ending, and trying to think of an interpretation that works with everything we’ve seen. 

 

I think that would be putting more thought into than Ron and Dave did... there's far too many contradictory elements for it all to make sense. For example, in every game there's a fourth-wall breaking reference to you playing a video game. 

 

So is Guybrush a real person in modern day who loves reliving his childhood fantasies as a pirate in an amusement park? Or is he playing a video game? Or is he self-aware that he's IN a video game?

 

You simply have to ignore elements in order to make sense of it all... and if you start doing that, you may as well ignore any elements you don't like and just make your own head canon

 

(Personally I'm still enamoured with the idea that Guybrush breaking open Big Whoop at the end of MI2 is what caused all of this. And as its powers slowly permeated reality, the weirder things got...)

 

Edited October 3, 2022 by ThunderPeel2001

[Jake]

13 minutes ago, ThunderPeel2001 said:

I think that would be putting more thought into than Ron and Dave did...

🤔🙄 They clearly put a ton of thought into it. Again, it’s just not the thing you want, which is fine. 

[LowLevel]

2 hours ago, Jake said:

I think you might be projecting if you’re implying the Curse team effectively censored themselves for mass appeal, when it’s probably just that they didn’t like that stuff and didn’t want it in their game.

 

Oh no, I am not speculating on "why" the authors did anything. I just pointed out that those topics were not addressed in the game and that their decision resulted in a game that, in my opinion, is welcoming even to those who have not played the previous two games. I never considered "Curse" a "soft reboot," as you called it, but it is a nice way to put it.

[Knight Owl]

1 hour ago, ThunderPeel2001 said:

 

I think that would be putting more thought into than Ron and Dave did... there's far too many contradictory elements for it all to make sense. For example, in every game there's a fourth-wall breaking reference to you playing a video game. 

 

So is Guybrush a real person in modern day who loves reliving his childhood fantasies as a pirate in an amusement park? Or is he playing a video game? Or is he self-aware that he's IN a video game?

 

You simply have to ignore elements in order to make sense of it all... and if you start doing that, you may as well ignore any elements you don't like and just make your own head canon

 

(Personally I'm still enamoured with the idea that Guybrush breaking open Big Whoop at the end of MI2 is what caused all of this. And as its powers slowly permeated reality, the weirder things got...)

 

Well, even if they didn’t have the same ideas that I had, I can still come up with  my interpretation for everything, right? That’s the whole thesis of the game!

[LuigiHann]

I thought Curse's approach was fun. Not only did they follow through with the tease at the end of MI2 (whether we like it or not, whether Ron liked it or not, MI2 ended with the implication that Guybrush was under the effects of LeChuck's curse), but they had LeChuck's theme park ride recount bits of the backstory and both games' events, and even had LeChuck explicitly answer endless questions to tie everything together. I feel like it was as tightly-woven as any sequel to anything could be. 

 

And they didn't drop the anachronisms, we've still got vending machines and fried chicken restaurants and tri-county areas, just slightly more integrated into the piratey setting than in previous games... and that could be chalked up as much to art style and screen resolution as anything, since they're forced to fill in gaps that would previously be left to the imagination. And I think it's nice that that setting laid the groundwork for the ambiguous timeframe of RtMI's frame story.

 

There's always going to be a difference in output between a newcomer attempting to paint within the lines established by an original creator, versus the original creator returning and getting to go as far from the expected template as they want, because the true "essence" of the series exists in their own mind. 

 

9 hours ago, Jake said:

Instead some games tried to fold it into the reality of the game, some games did their own version of surreal piracy, some tried to acknowledge it but only around the edges. 

 

One detail I really loved in Tales was that the distant walls of the giant tunnels of the underworld were styled with the same rivets and textures as the endgame tunnels of MI2. Just the right kind of ambiguous hint that works whether MI2's ending was really unearthly or if Tales is just taking place in real-life Guybrush's subconscious, and had super-interesting implications either way. Always kept an eye out for that kind of nod, didn't catch many others. 

[Jake]

40 minutes ago, LuigiHann said:

Always kept an eye out for that kind of nod, didn't catch many others. 

There are a few others in the Crossroads (I can’t remember all of them). There’s the Grog machine sitting there of course, though that’s almost a Monkey Island meme at this point. The boat that takes you to the different crossroads island is initially boarded via a queue system that is meant to evoke the way guests are loaded onto ride vehicles in a theme park (and it has a tiny puttering gas motor and seems to run on a track when it starts and stops). The music is a deliberate callback to the underground tunnels. When LeChuck is killed and the screen goes to white, there is some ambience from a theme park bleeding in under the voodoo sounds. Does any of that mean anything??? I couldn’t tell you because it never felt to me like there was any sort of direct symbolic correlation between these images and any one meaning in a high school literary analysis sense, but it “felt right” to us so we did a bit of it. We had talked about going more full bore and having the grave Guybrush dug himself out of be made of cardboard and astroturf and that sort of thing - waking up in a more explicitly artificial world - but in the end decided to keep it more grounded and less explicit. 

[Gins]

13 minutes ago, Jake said:

There are a few others in the Crossroads. There’s the Grog machine sitting there of course, though that’s almost a Monkey Island meme at this point. The boat that takes you to the different crossroads island is initially boarded via a queue system that is meant to evoke the way guests are loaded onto ride vehicles in a theme park (and it has a tiny puttering gas motor and seems to run on a track when it starts and stops). The music is a deliberate callback to the underground tunnels. When LeChuck is killed and the screen goes to white, there is some ambience from a theme park bleeding in under the voodoo sounds. Does any of that mean anything??? I couldn’t tell you because it never felt to me like there was any sort of direct symbolic correlation between these images and any one meaning in a high school literary analysis sense, but it “felt right” to us so we did a bit of it. We had talked about going more full bore and having the grave Guybrush dug himself out of be made of cardboard and astroturf and that sort of thing - waking up in a more explicitly artificial world - but in the end decided to keep it more grounded and less explicit. 

I really have to spin up Tales again, it's the only one I've never replayed, and I feel like after getting so many of your perspectives on it, that would be worth it

[LuigiHann]

23 minutes ago, Jake said:

but it “felt right” to us so we did a bit of it

 

Love those examples, makes me want to replay it again as well. And to say it "felt right" is quite correct. 

 

I think Escape is ironically both the one that leaned the hardest into the modernish touristy theme-park aesthetic and also the one that landed the furthest from "feeling right" in terms of Monkey-Island-ness, so I do think the softer touch of Curse and Tales was the way to go. 

 

Though I do, again, feel like Escape also laid enough groundwork for the in-universe theme park to square with the ending of RtMI without too many compromises or leaps of logic. The world all still fits together whether you choose to take it literally or not. 

Edited October 3, 2022 by LuigiHann

[Jake]

To be totally clear I love that Return did dive all the way into the multi-layered nature of especially the first two games. I also like that they did it with their own unique tone. Monkey Island 2 had this creeping dark underbelly to it, and everyone was kind of a dick, and it was great. Thimbleweed Park actually really had that mood going on, and I appreciated it the.  I liked that Return did it’s own thing, though, and scratched and picked away at the surface of those layers, but did it inside a shaggy dog hangout story about a bunch of old people. 

[BaronGrackle]

If I could change a single major part about Curse? I would remove the parts of LeChuck's monologue that detail the amusement park specifics of the Carnival of the Damned (dynamo monkelectrics, family friendly, etc.). Along with the earlier cutscene specifically showing the roller coaster.

 

Then, when Guybrush is strapped at the beginning of Part 5 and eventually asks, "Why a carnival?", LeChuck would take a minute to understand what he meant. But then he would laugh and explain that Big Whoop is an unmistakable rush of evil that overtakes you, etc. etc.

"Are ye seeing a carnival right now, Threepwood? That be a product of your own mind, harr harr!"

Or, keep LeChuck's awareness of the carnival, but say it was tailored that way because it was in Guybrush's mind, and LeChuck went into it fullswing because he hates Guybrush that much.

Edited October 3, 2022 by BaronGrackle

[ThunderPeel2001]

3 hours ago, Jake said:

🤔🙄 They clearly put a ton of thought into it. Again, it’s just not the thing you want, which is fine. 

 

I didn't mean to imply they hadn't put a lot of effort into ReMI, it's just clear that their efforts and intentions were in a different place to what was being discussed here.

 

For example, there's no attempt to explain Guybrush's dream (or why a random couple from years into the future should appear in it -- the same age), or to draw a line between what was foreshadowing of an amusement park (eg. Grog machine), and what was just a silly joke, (eg. lines like "What's this doing in a pirate game?", "This isn't Monkey 1", "Never pay more than $20 for a video game"). Or why Herman is Elaine's grandfather.

 

They openly said they had a casual attitude towards canon and tying things together.

 

If you, as a fan, you are being kept awake at night because you're trying to make it all fit together, your best bet is to acknowledge that Ron and Dave didn't put much thought into that particular aspect of ReMI, and let it go (or make your own explanation).

 

It's not an insult to Ron or Dave to say this, it's just not where their focus was.

 

2 hours ago, Knight Owl said:

Well, even if they didn’t have the same ideas that I had, I can still come up with  my interpretation for everything, right? That’s the whole thesis of the game!

 

That's literally what I said, yes.

Edited October 3, 2022 by ThunderPeel2001

[Knight Owl]

13 minutes ago, ThunderPeel2001 said:

 

I didn't mean to imply they hadn't put a lot of effort into ReMI, it's just clear that their efforts and intentions were in a different place to what was being discussed here.

 

For example, there's no attempt to explain Guybrush's dream (or why a random couple from years into the future should appear in it -- the same age), or to draw a line between what was foreshadowing of an amusement park (eg. Grog machine), and what was just a silly joke, (eg. lines like "What's this doing in a pirate game?", "This isn't Monkey 1", "Never pay more than $20 for a video game"). Or why Herman is Elaine's grandfather.

 

They openly said they had a casual attitude towards canon and tying things together.

 

If you, as a fan, you are being kept awake at night because you're trying to make it all fit together, your best bet is to acknowledge that Ron and Dave didn't put much thought into that particular aspect of ReMI, and let it go (or make your own explanation).

 

It's not an insult to Ron or Dave to say this, it's just not where their focus was.

 

 

That's literally what I said, yes.

Fair enough

[ThunderPeel2001]

9 hours ago, Knight Owl said:

I hope in interviews Ron will tell us all his thoughts and opinions honestly, without holding back just to be mysterious like he would have before this game came out.

 

Just to add, that I would hope this, too! He's always been very forthright and honest (IMHO), so I imagine he will, once everyone has had a chance to digest ReMI.

Edited October 3, 2022 by ThunderPeel2001