“I want to be a pirate,” declare gimcrack game journalists about Mixnmojo art

[Udvarnoky]

As you may know, the header art for our “Secret History” feature on The Curse of Monkey Island was done by the great @Paco (V), known intergalactically for his unfinished comic adaptation of the first game:

Paco’s work was so on-point that it sometimes gets confused for official promotional imagery for Curse, and it has therefore turned up, without attribution, in all sorts of low-effort articles, such as:

Curse of Monkey Island is the Only Pirate Game You Should Take Note of This Month (Gamespew, 03/29/18)

Escape from Monkey Island hits GOG, gets bundle discount (AltChar, 06/19/18)

Monkey Island Creator Debunks Myth About Guybrush's Name (TheGamer, 04/28/22)

*Curse of Monkey Island designer reveals reasons for series' art style switch (Eurogamer, 05/05/22)

Why Return To Monkey Island’s Art Style Is So Divisive (Screenrant, 07/06/22)

All Monkey Island Games, Ranked (TheGamer, 12/28/22)

**Steven Spielberg Almost Made This Video Game Movie Adaptation (Collider, 08/19/23)

The Curse of Monkey Island System Requirements (Systemreqs)

Where will Paco’s work turn up uncredited next? Let us know so we can grow the wall of shame. Sure, this is the definition of throwing stones from a glass house, but you gotta pass the time somehow.

*credit added after some shaming from @Kroms

**“Image via Lucasfilm Limited,” apparently

[Remi]

And who could forget... ?

 

[Remi]

The plot thickens...

 

Apple, the purveyor of good taste, has spiffed up its Sam & Max TV+ site in a familiar fashion. (Original Secret History art.)

 

 

Meanwhile, the Grim Secret History article is making the rounds…

 

• mygaming
• Press Start

More to come.

[Udvarnoky]

Amazing. Keep them coming.

 

Let the record show that the Hit the Road piece is also a Paco Vink original, while the Grim artwork is by Colin Panetta. This is a reminder that we need to go back and clearly credit the artists behind these headers. They definitely got attribution at the time, but I think it was done inconsistently (in some cases they may be mentioned only in the original news post, long orphaned from the feature), and some of the features' finer details may not have survived the transition from Gabez's highly bespoke HTML to the BBCode era.

[Scummbuddy]

I mentioned recently in the "Sea of Thieves - Legends of Monkey Island" thread you can see Paco's Tri-Island Map appear in the game.

https://forums.mixnmojo.com/topic/200674-the-legend-of-monkey-island-sea-of-thieves/?do=findComment&comment=2803208

[Junaid]

Met up with Paco earlier this week (we're about to start production on a new short film at the moment) and we were just talking about this haha. 

There's also some wonderful versions of the Guybrush at the top if you google Monkey Island tattoos...