Tuesday 5 April 2022

Return to Monkey Island



Lucasfilm Games has so much nostalgia for generations of video gamers (myself included).

Rescue on Fractalus!, Ballblazer, Koronis Rift and The Eidolon are amongst my all-time favourite video games from the 8-bit era on Commodore 64 and Sinclair ZX Spectrum. And I vividly remember playing Labyrinth: The Computer Game whilst listening to David Bowie and Trevor Jones' soundtrack on cassette (remember those?).

When Lucasfilm Games was rebranded as LucasArts in 1990, it cemented its reputation for point-and-click adventure games and arguably created one of its finest ever examples in the wake of the success of Maniac Mansion in 1987.

The Secret of Monkey Island is one of gaming’s greatest franchises and greatest games full stop. You play as Guybrush Threepwood (an homage to Star Wars' C-3PO), who’s on the quest to become a mighty pirate. Funny, atmospheric and heavily based on Disney’s own Pirates of the Caribbean ride.

Now, Return to Monkey Island has been announced for release in 2022. The long-awaited sequel is by Ron Gilbert's Terrible Toybox in collaboration with Devolver Digital and Lucasfilm Games.



I first discovered the point-and-click genre playing LucasArts' Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis on a friend's Amiga A500 in the early nineties - Indy remains lost in a frozen tundra. Years later, I belatedly played Maniac Mansion, Day of the Tentacle, The Secret of Monkey Island, Full Throttle and The Dig on an iMac G4.

Are you excited about Return to Monkey Island? What are your favourite LucasArts games? Let me know in the comments below.

2 comments:

  1. The original Monkey Island was one of my all time favourite games. Loved loved loved it.

    Replayed a while back on one of the earlier generation iPads; so super excited to see what this new chapter has to offer

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You've reminded me, I've got classic LucasArts games sitting on my iPad Pro...

      Delete

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