8 ms·

If I Made Another Monkey Island...

309 points by skardan 13y ago

PavlovsCat 13y ago
What business model is this? Give gamers blue balls and then wait until they inevitably ram down your door with money trucks?
- smoyer 13y ago
  Sounds like a good plan to me! I'd just like to add that the first rule of Monkey Island 3a is that you don't talk about Monkey Island 3a. Shhhhhhhhh!
- cskau 13y ago
  You plant the seed for the violent revolt of rampaging gamers that will ultimately see Disney surrender the Monkey Island IP to restore global peace. Then you make a game.
  - fusiongyro 13y ago
    Disney's takeaway from a "violent revolt of rampaging gamers" will be that this IP is tremendously valuable, which is probably the opposite impression you should be cultivating if you want to buy it from them at a low enough price to make third-party development itself practical.
  - okamiueru 13y ago
    If he wanted to put the effort and time to make this game, why would it have to use the Monkey Island IP? I think that any new game with same quality, the humor and mechanics, but in a different setting (or heck, just a different name!) would still be loved.
    - rrreese 13y ago
      Using existing IP is a lot safer, and will generate more sales, even if otherwise the games are the same. There are a lot of people who played Monkey island in their youth and are nostalgic for it, but who don't follow the latest game news and wouldn't auto buy a game without the IP. Yes it could be successful, but that the Monkey Island name it would be more so. See for example the success of every new Civ game compared to the success of other strategy games.
- sgt 13y ago
  Let's just hope Disney goes along with this!
- Svip 13y ago
  He has built an engine that is powered by gamers' frustration over things they can never have.
tseabrooks 13y ago
FFS, I was secretly hoping for a tiny kickstarter link at the bottom.
- libria 13y ago
  Myself as well. On the other hand, I'd wait to see how the Two Guys from Andromeda [1] fare before having hopes of something like this. They appear to have missed their February delivery. [1] http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spaceventure/two-guys-spaceventure-by-the-creators-of-space-que http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spaceventure/two-guys-sp...
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
soneca 13y ago
I supported Double Fine Adventure on Kickstarter and lot of the last points of the OP refer to how Tim Schafer is managing it. But, in this case, if Ron Gilbert is making a proof of concept with this post, a MVP to check if Monkey Island 3a can be crowdfunded - or even if it is just a critique of Double Fine Adventure campaign, I am on Tim Schafer's side here. Crowdfunding is not about "give me the money and trust me". The crowd is not a substitute for publisher's money or even a maecenas. He wants to win the lotto and create a game, not receive the support of the crowd (and all that come from it). I love the documentary updates, the forums, to understand what happens behind the scenes. This is not about keeping the hype up, this is about sharing the world of creating games with the people that supported it.
- mtrimpe 13y ago
  I didn't read that much of a value judgement into it. It seems more like he's just managing expectations by explaining that he wouldn't do it that way.
  - soneca 13y ago
    I tried to read it again, but I see a lot of value judgement into it. One possibility is that it maybe not a judgement of how Tim is managing it, but a critique to the Kickstarter model as a whole. Either way, I don't agree with him. If a Monkey Island is going to be created in this manner I wouldn´t support it as a crowdfunding project. But I would certainly buy the game after it is released! And pay good cash too! I don't think Ron is doing something bad by stating those things, I just think he doesn't get crowdfunding the same way I do.
- criley 13y ago
  I disagree. I love that model of crowdfunding and I think he hit the nail on the head: the stretch goals, crowd feedback, demos, etc are a hallmark of a blockbuster Kickstarter. But, as he admitted, he's not interested in breaking records. He's interested in making his game the way he wants. That's totally legit and I totally support someone making that claim. It's up to each and everyone of us to assess that claim and decide if we trust him in that endeavour. I strongly resist the idea that Kickstarted games MUST follow one model or they are wrong or bad. Not every creative mind works well with the chaos and bile that spews from the crowd.
ComputerGuru 13y ago
Is SCUMM really better than Lua?
- criley 13y ago
  I think the question you meant to ask was: "Is SCUMM really better than Lua for the rapid/(agile?) development of 2d adventure games?" And according to one experienced source (OP): The answer is a resounding "yes"!
- probably_wrong 13y ago
  From what I've read about SCUMM, it was designed to be very similar to writing a regular script for, say, a TV show. The famous "hamster in the microwave" sequence was conceived, planned and implemented in one afternoon, and it even included some form of multitasking. Just by reading a piece of code such as this one (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SLVyjUCOIo&t=0m10s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SLVyjUCOIo&t=0m10s) you get a sense of what is going on, and that makes trying ideas really simple. You probably wouldn't use SCUMM for anything except an adventure game, but in that particular case I think it would be much better than a general-purpose language as LUA.
  - rmc 13y ago
    From what I've read about SCUMM, it was designed to be very similar to writing a regular script for, say, a TV show. There's a programming language for writing textual interactive fiction games, Inform 7 ( http://inform7.com/ http://inform7.com/ ), which reads as a natural language. For example, here's part of the "programme" of a game (copied from http://www.hpiweb.com/newmedia/i7/cbrk/source.html http://www.hpiweb.com/newmedia/i7/cbrk/source.html ) The Forest is a room. "This forest is cold and damp. Sunset is drawing very near and shelter must be found soon. The only apparent direction to go is north." A room called Before the Castle of the Big Red Key is north of the Forest. "The castle looms before you. Its massive front door has a lock that seems to glow a fiery red. You must continue north past that door. The only other exit is to the south." The big_red_key is here. The description is "It's a big red key." The printed name is "big red key". Understand "big", "red", and "key" as the big_red_key. It unlocks the massive front doorway. The massive front doorway is north of Before the Castle of the Big Red Key and south of the Castle Vestibule. The doorway is a door. It would be interesting to have a graphical equivalent.
nollidge 13y ago
I hope no one minds if I hijack to ask: What are some really good MODERN adventure games, along the lines of MI or the Space Quests? Besides the Two Guys' Kickstarter campaign, I mean...
- corysama 13y ago
  http://www.gamingenthusiast.net/top-ten-best-pc-adventure-games/ http://www.gamingenthusiast.net/top-ten-best-pc-adventure-ga...
- willismichael 13y ago
  Seconded - I've found and played some of the King's Quest remakes by ADG and Infamous Adventures, then started wondering if there are more recent games along these lines.
  - e1ven 13y ago
    Lots! Check out http://www.adventuregamers.com/ http://www.adventuregamers.com/ - They have reviews frequently. If you're in a hurry, try their top 100 list, at http://www.adventuregamers.com/articles/view/18643 http://www.adventuregamers.com/articles/view/18643
- Fargren 13y ago
  Most of the games by Wadjet Eye are great. I specially recommend Gemini Rue. Also, almost anything by Ben Chandler[2], but that's usually short form. My favorite is Eternally Us[3]( I know, yucks at the name, but it's a beautiful game). And Donna[4] is one of the best games I played las year, so there is that. [1]http://www.wadjeteyegames.com/ http://www.wadjeteyegames.com/ [2]http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/author/Ben304+%26+Calin+Leafshade/ http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/author/Ben30... [3]http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1303/ http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1303/ [4]http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1523/ http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1523/
- HeXetic 13y ago
  I consider "L.A. Noire" the modern equivalent of an adventure game. Much of your time is spent walking around crime scenes picking up everything that isn't nailed down. The rest of the time consists of solving the game's "puzzles", which are all in the form of conversations, and sometimes involve using objects (evidence) to solve, while otherwise requiring careful observation. The combat and chase sequences are actually very incidental, with the foot chases in particular having extremely simplified controls (just hold "up" to climb a whole set of fire escape ladders and stairs) and if you screw them up enough then the game will simply let you skip them. Unlike old adventure games, there are multiple ways to solve each case, and there are no instances of "Moon Logic Puzzles".
morganwilde 13y ago
This is absolutely brilliant! One on one with the community, speaking from the heart to people that understand you, no marketing BS, just the good old truth. I enjoyed Monkey Island for that same reason. By this point, I think it is pretty obvious Ron is just trying to gauge the readiness of the crowd, which obviously is there and happy to pay up. The one thing that scares me - he'll probably have start buy shelling out a ton of money to buy the IP and that may turn out to be a showstopper...
runjake 13y ago
For the people going on and on about Kickstarter and crowd funding, note point #11: "The only way I would or could make another Monkey Island is if I owned the IP" This seems more like a post to get the masses exited and perhaps help him get a license for or ownership of the Monkey Island franchise. I hope he's successful, I was a big fan of the first two games (never got to play the 3rd). I'd certainly buy whatever he produced if it inspired the same awe of the prior games. I do like the idea of starting fresh with a new story, ala The Legend of Gorilla Mountain, or something silly like that. After all, it was the wit of the writers and the artists that really sold the game.
- dublinben 13y ago
  Isn't it actually relatively possible now for him to secure the IP rights from Disney? With LucasArts disbanded, they've made it clear they intend to license the IP to other developers.
aidenn0 13y ago
Reading the linked rules of adventure gaming, it is true that you can have arbitrarily hard puzzles without breaking any of them. [spoiler for a two puzzles in Monkey Island 2 below] The example for me is in MI2; there comes a point at which you are suspended over a boiling cauldron with a candle that is burning through the rope holding you up. If you are really clever, you will remember that earlier you got a drink that would thicken your spit (and you can't have not picked it up, since you needed it to solve a puzzle to get to this point). However, you can't spit at the candle, but you can spit at a shield on the wall, causing a ricochet to extinguish the candle. I was stuck on this for months, finally got bored and played through the game again. The moment I got to the first time you need to spit I just slapped my self in the head.
gavanwoolery 13y ago
I have no less respect for Ron than I did back in the 90s, but I think that sometimes the veterans lose sight of what made their old games great (and this of course, is just my opinion). He wants keep the retro aesthetic, which is good, but then wants to include things like DOF and glows...which can technically be done with a palette, but I don't think this is what he is getting at, and could potentially destroy the rigid palettization that makes pixel art what it is. He wants to use speech instead of text, which is one of the things that I think ruined Monkey Island 3. There are many ways to improve on the old formula while keeping the superficial aspects that fuel our nostalgia - it seems like most remakes these days jump on the very generic looking engines like Unity (yes you can tweak Unity to look any way, but if you use the default shaders, cameras, etc it will look like any other game).
- lloeki 13y ago
  > He wants to use speech instead of text While the no-talkie and partial talkie DotT are great, full-talkie DotT is absolutely awesome. > He wants keep the retro aesthetic, which is good, but then wants to include things like DOF and glows...which can technically be done with a palette, but I don't think this is what he is getting at, and could potentially destroy the rigid palettization that makes pixel art what it is I'm not sure pixel art and retro looks is the solution. There was something unique yet common to all those great games that made them memorable enough that we long for them even today. As an example, while I don't quite like the whacky universe and style that evolved since Rayman 2, Rayman Origins engine and graphics were stunning, and captures part of that essence. Sadly the gameplay is largely forgettable, almost a rhythm-based party game — I long for something like the first Rayman gameplay — but the graphics part is a step in the right direction. I feel like Orioto [0-3](browse his tumblr blog for more) tries to captures this essence, and I long for games looking like his work. Given the incredible horsepower we have at hand as of yet, I just can't believe it's not possible. [0]: http://www.redbubble.com/people/orioto/works/8245345-through-the-night http://www.redbubble.com/people/orioto/works/8245345-through... [1]: http://www.redbubble.com/people/orioto/works/8290902-city-borders?p=photographic-print http://www.redbubble.com/people/orioto/works/8290902-city-bo... [2]: http://orioto.tumblr.com/post/15721511369/1200p-1080p-print http://orioto.tumblr.com/post/15721511369/1200p-1080p-print [3]: http://orioto.tumblr.com/post/15627728854/1200p-1080p-print http://orioto.tumblr.com/post/15627728854/1200p-1080p-print
austinstorm 13y ago
Living up to his name, and yet I still want him to TAKE MY MONEY NOW
erdogan 13y ago
I love Monkey Island series and other Lucas Arts Adventure games, spent way too many hours playing them. However, I am a bit disappointed in this article because it feels a bit concierge-mvp to nostalgia (feeling the grounds before a full-on Kickstarter campaign), unfortunately without any interesting build upon what those great games offered. Well, consider this as my feedback to the mvp. Grim Fandango was a breakthrough, including its no-interface approach and clever use of camera angles to script the player. I have never seen a game script coming alive so strongly, it was like playing a movie. But Monkey Island re-pixelated? Although I played it on my iPad and switch back and forth between old-new renderings, I would expect these wonderful minds to be more inventive than nostalgic when producing something new.
Aloisius 13y ago
I may be an odd ball here, but I cheated at Monkey Island 1 and 2. I don't like to be frustrated with a puzzle that relies on either randomly choosing inventory items or seeing some pixels that look like almost every other set of pixels on the screen and trying to pick them up. For me, what made Monkey Island great was that it was a pretty quirky comedy. I wanted to see what Guybrush would say next. Further, it shocks me at how bad the graphics are at some of these games after looking at them again after decades. It occurs to me that what I remember it looking like is a heck of a lot better than what it actually looked like. So I'd rather the game not look like the pixely original. I'd rather have it look like I remember.
- Contero 13y ago
  I think Machinarium is a good example of how you can preserve the fun frustration of adventure games without pushing people to cheat. They would allow you to play a mini-game in order to reveal some extra hints which would push you in the right direction enough to figure out the rest on your own. In Monkey Island I would sometimes get annoyed and google for what to do out of angry frustration. It was easy for me to throw my hands up and say "I don't give a shit any more, time to move on!" Lots of times the solutions made zero sense to me. In Machinarium I still got a sense of frustration and puzzlement, but I would try to forego the hints out of pride for as long as I could which made for a much more enjoyable experience.
  - ricardobeat 13y ago
    You mean Altavista?
  - lobster_johnson 13y ago
    I really liked the puzzle difficulty with Machinarium. I think I had to use the hints system once for one of the particularly difficult puzzles. Great game.
  - m_mueller 13y ago
    Machinarium's gameplay could (and should) be pretty much copy pasted onto lots of adventure games, both remakes and new ones. It's just perfect. I hope Amanita goes back to that franchise, there's still a lot that could be explored there.
ganeshtoday 13y ago
Ron, please shut up and take my money!
rocky1138 13y ago
What was wrong with Tales of Monkey Island? I thought it was good!
taeric 13y ago
Point Eleven is awesome!! Eleven - The only way I would or could make another Monkey Island is if I owned the IP. I've spent too much of my life creating and making things other people own. Not only would I allow you to make Monkey Island fan games, but I would encourage it. Label them as such, respect the world and the characters and don't claim they are canon. Of course, once the lawyers get ahold of that last sentence it will be seven pages long. edit: Thanks!
- MartinCron 13y ago
  Grr, how do I do block quotes? Because, this is terrible. Apologies to everyone seeing it I usually just do block quotes as italics by surrounding them in asterisks. As I did above.
aresant 13y ago
"True, I wouldn't raise huge sums of money or break any records . . ." Haha. Come on. I'd wager that MI 3 would far and away be the #1 all time Kickstarter fund raise, starting with my money: "After its release on Steam, the Special Edition remake topped the sales charts for the week ending July 18. On July 20th, the Xbox 360 version had already sold over 38,000 copies" (1) I bought the SE on iPad the day it was released, and still haven't played it - that is how strong the nostalgia is with me . . . (1)http://www.miwiki.net/The_Secret_of_Monkey_Island:_Special_Edition http://www.miwiki.net/The_Secret_of_Monkey_Island:_Special_E...
egypturnash 13y ago
Honestly after "The Cave" and "Deathspank" I'm not sure Gilbert is on my HERE TAKE MY MONEY list any more. And him saying "MI3 will be RETRO looking!" isn't making me interested; the Monkey Island games were GORGEOUS for the time, but I don't want to go wallowing in nostalgia for something made now.
- lobster_johnson 13y ago
  Indeed, The Cave had good visuals, but extremely boring gameplay. I understand what he was going for, but it just didn't work. Way too much running back and forth to place your characters in a certain place, and all the running took way too much time. Deathspank was mildly amusing, but got tired very fast. It was visually flimsy and felt underdeveloped overall; it wasn't a good RPG, but it wasn't a good action game either, and it was a terrible adventure game. Admittedly neither of those games are classical point and click games. It may well be that he's just much better at designing point and clicks than at the other game genres.
- vacri 13y ago
  Yes, I've been burned by enough one- or two-hit wonders to not just assume the next item will be good. World of Goo was another example; they then made Little Inferno, which while continuing their trend of uniquely beautiful art, was unbelievably monotonous and shallow to play, a stark contrast to the game that made their name. XCOM was another example - XCOM remake! Take my money! How bad can it be? Well, they could strip out the strategy part of the game altogether, giving it zero replayability.
DigitalSea 13y ago
People have so much respect for the Monkey Island series from yesteryear and for Ron as well. Lets face it, if there was a Kickstarter for a retro-styled Monkey Island game built by Ron and a few of his friends, it would shatter Kickstarter records faster than Usain Bolt. Just tell me where to send the money and I'll send it all, so many would love another Monkey Island game, lets get the IP back into the hands of Ron and let him work the magic. "True, I wouldn't raise huge sums of money or break any records . . ." We all know that isn't true. A remake would seriously break any sales record of any game no doubt.

309 points by skardan 13y ago

What business model is this? Give gamers blue balls and then wait until they inevitably ram down your door with money trucks?

smoyer 13y ago
Sounds like a good plan to me! I'd just like to add that the first rule of Monkey Island 3a is that you don't talk about Monkey Island 3a. Shhhhhhhhh!
cskau 13y ago
You plant the seed for the violent revolt of rampaging gamers that will ultimately see Disney surrender the Monkey Island IP to restore global peace. Then you make a game.
- fusiongyro 13y ago
  Disney's takeaway from a "violent revolt of rampaging gamers" will be that this IP is tremendously valuable, which is probably the opposite impression you should be cultivating if you want to buy it from them at a low enough price to make third-party development itself practical.
- okamiueru 13y ago
  If he wanted to put the effort and time to make this game, why would it have to use the Monkey Island IP? I think that any new game with same quality, the humor and mechanics, but in a different setting (or heck, just a different name!) would still be loved.
  - rrreese 13y ago
    Using existing IP is a lot safer, and will generate more sales, even if otherwise the games are the same. There are a lot of people who played Monkey island in their youth and are nostalgic for it, but who don't follow the latest game news and wouldn't auto buy a game without the IP. Yes it could be successful, but that the Monkey Island name it would be more so. See for example the success of every new Civ game compared to the success of other strategy games.
sgt 13y ago
Let's just hope Disney goes along with this!
Svip 13y ago
He has built an engine that is powered by gamers' frustration over things they can never have.

tseabrooks 13y ago

FFS, I was secretly hoping for a tiny kickstarter link at the bottom.

libria 13y ago
Myself as well. On the other hand, I'd wait to see how the Two Guys from Andromeda [1] fare before having hopes of something like this. They appear to have missed their February delivery. [1] http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spaceventure/two-guys-spaceventure-by-the-creators-of-space-que http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spaceventure/two-guys-sp...

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

soneca 13y ago

I supported Double Fine Adventure on Kickstarter and lot of the last points of the OP refer to how Tim Schafer is managing it. But, in this case, if Ron Gilbert is making a proof of concept with this post, a MVP to check if Monkey Island 3a can be crowdfunded - or even if it is just a critique of Double Fine Adventure campaign, I am on Tim Schafer's side here. Crowdfunding is not about "give me the money and trust me". The crowd is not a substitute for publisher's money or even a maecenas. He wants to win the lotto and create a game, not receive the support of the crowd (and all that come from it). I love the documentary updates, the forums, to understand what happens behind the scenes. This is not about keeping the hype up, this is about sharing the world of creating games with the people that supported it.

mtrimpe 13y ago
I didn't read that much of a value judgement into it. It seems more like he's just managing expectations by explaining that he wouldn't do it that way.
- soneca 13y ago
  I tried to read it again, but I see a lot of value judgement into it. One possibility is that it maybe not a judgement of how Tim is managing it, but a critique to the Kickstarter model as a whole. Either way, I don't agree with him. If a Monkey Island is going to be created in this manner I wouldn´t support it as a crowdfunding project. But I would certainly buy the game after it is released! And pay good cash too! I don't think Ron is doing something bad by stating those things, I just think he doesn't get crowdfunding the same way I do.
criley 13y ago
I disagree. I love that model of crowdfunding and I think he hit the nail on the head: the stretch goals, crowd feedback, demos, etc are a hallmark of a blockbuster Kickstarter. But, as he admitted, he's not interested in breaking records. He's interested in making his game the way he wants. That's totally legit and I totally support someone making that claim. It's up to each and everyone of us to assess that claim and decide if we trust him in that endeavour. I strongly resist the idea that Kickstarted games MUST follow one model or they are wrong or bad. Not every creative mind works well with the chaos and bile that spews from the crowd.

ComputerGuru 13y ago

Is SCUMM really better than Lua?

criley 13y ago
I think the question you meant to ask was: "Is SCUMM really better than Lua for the rapid/(agile?) development of 2d adventure games?" And according to one experienced source (OP): The answer is a resounding "yes"!
probably_wrong 13y ago
From what I've read about SCUMM, it was designed to be very similar to writing a regular script for, say, a TV show. The famous "hamster in the microwave" sequence was conceived, planned and implemented in one afternoon, and it even included some form of multitasking. Just by reading a piece of code such as this one (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SLVyjUCOIo&t=0m10s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SLVyjUCOIo&t=0m10s) you get a sense of what is going on, and that makes trying ideas really simple. You probably wouldn't use SCUMM for anything except an adventure game, but in that particular case I think it would be much better than a general-purpose language as LUA.
- rmc 13y ago
  From what I've read about SCUMM, it was designed to be very similar to writing a regular script for, say, a TV show. There's a programming language for writing textual interactive fiction games, Inform 7 ( http://inform7.com/ http://inform7.com/ ), which reads as a natural language. For example, here's part of the "programme" of a game (copied from http://www.hpiweb.com/newmedia/i7/cbrk/source.html http://www.hpiweb.com/newmedia/i7/cbrk/source.html ) The Forest is a room. "This forest is cold and damp. Sunset is drawing very near and shelter must be found soon. The only apparent direction to go is north." A room called Before the Castle of the Big Red Key is north of the Forest. "The castle looms before you. Its massive front door has a lock that seems to glow a fiery red. You must continue north past that door. The only other exit is to the south." The big_red_key is here. The description is "It's a big red key." The printed name is "big red key". Understand "big", "red", and "key" as the big_red_key. It unlocks the massive front doorway. The massive front doorway is north of Before the Castle of the Big Red Key and south of the Castle Vestibule. The doorway is a door. It would be interesting to have a graphical equivalent.

nollidge 13y ago

I hope no one minds if I hijack to ask: What are some really good MODERN adventure games, along the lines of MI or the Space Quests? Besides the Two Guys' Kickstarter campaign, I mean...

corysama 13y ago
http://www.gamingenthusiast.net/top-ten-best-pc-adventure-games/ http://www.gamingenthusiast.net/top-ten-best-pc-adventure-ga...
willismichael 13y ago
Seconded - I've found and played some of the King's Quest remakes by ADG and Infamous Adventures, then started wondering if there are more recent games along these lines.
- e1ven 13y ago
  Lots! Check out http://www.adventuregamers.com/ http://www.adventuregamers.com/ - They have reviews frequently. If you're in a hurry, try their top 100 list, at http://www.adventuregamers.com/articles/view/18643 http://www.adventuregamers.com/articles/view/18643
Fargren 13y ago
Most of the games by Wadjet Eye are great. I specially recommend Gemini Rue. Also, almost anything by Ben Chandler[2], but that's usually short form. My favorite is Eternally Us[3]( I know, yucks at the name, but it's a beautiful game). And Donna[4] is one of the best games I played las year, so there is that. [1]http://www.wadjeteyegames.com/ http://www.wadjeteyegames.com/ [2]http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/author/Ben304+%26+Calin+Leafshade/ http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/author/Ben30... [3]http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1303/ http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1303/ [4]http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1523/ http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1523/
HeXetic 13y ago
I consider "L.A. Noire" the modern equivalent of an adventure game. Much of your time is spent walking around crime scenes picking up everything that isn't nailed down. The rest of the time consists of solving the game's "puzzles", which are all in the form of conversations, and sometimes involve using objects (evidence) to solve, while otherwise requiring careful observation. The combat and chase sequences are actually very incidental, with the foot chases in particular having extremely simplified controls (just hold "up" to climb a whole set of fire escape ladders and stairs) and if you screw them up enough then the game will simply let you skip them. Unlike old adventure games, there are multiple ways to solve each case, and there are no instances of "Moon Logic Puzzles".

morganwilde 13y ago

This is absolutely brilliant! One on one with the community, speaking from the heart to people that understand you, no marketing BS, just the good old truth. I enjoyed Monkey Island for that same reason. By this point, I think it is pretty obvious Ron is just trying to gauge the readiness of the crowd, which obviously is there and happy to pay up. The one thing that scares me - he'll probably have start buy shelling out a ton of money to buy the IP and that may turn out to be a showstopper...

runjake 13y ago

For the people going on and on about Kickstarter and crowd funding, note point #11: "The only way I would or could make another Monkey Island is if I owned the IP" This seems more like a post to get the masses exited and perhaps help him get a license for or ownership of the Monkey Island franchise. I hope he's successful, I was a big fan of the first two games (never got to play the 3rd). I'd certainly buy whatever he produced if it inspired the same awe of the prior games. I do like the idea of starting fresh with a new story, ala The Legend of Gorilla Mountain, or something silly like that. After all, it was the wit of the writers and the artists that really sold the game.

dublinben 13y ago
Isn't it actually relatively possible now for him to secure the IP rights from Disney? With LucasArts disbanded, they've made it clear they intend to license the IP to other developers.

aidenn0 13y ago

Reading the linked rules of adventure gaming, it is true that you can have arbitrarily hard puzzles without breaking any of them. [spoiler for a two puzzles in Monkey Island 2 below] The example for me is in MI2; there comes a point at which you are suspended over a boiling cauldron with a candle that is burning through the rope holding you up. If you are really clever, you will remember that earlier you got a drink that would thicken your spit (and you can't have not picked it up, since you needed it to solve a puzzle to get to this point). However, you can't spit at the candle, but you can spit at a shield on the wall, causing a ricochet to extinguish the candle. I was stuck on this for months, finally got bored and played through the game again. The moment I got to the first time you need to spit I just slapped my self in the head.

gavanwoolery 13y ago

I have no less respect for Ron than I did back in the 90s, but I think that sometimes the veterans lose sight of what made their old games great (and this of course, is just my opinion). He wants keep the retro aesthetic, which is good, but then wants to include things like DOF and glows...which can technically be done with a palette, but I don't think this is what he is getting at, and could potentially destroy the rigid palettization that makes pixel art what it is. He wants to use speech instead of text, which is one of the things that I think ruined Monkey Island 3. There are many ways to improve on the old formula while keeping the superficial aspects that fuel our nostalgia - it seems like most remakes these days jump on the very generic looking engines like Unity (yes you can tweak Unity to look any way, but if you use the default shaders, cameras, etc it will look like any other game).

lloeki 13y ago
> He wants to use speech instead of text While the no-talkie and partial talkie DotT are great, full-talkie DotT is absolutely awesome. > He wants keep the retro aesthetic, which is good, but then wants to include things like DOF and glows...which can technically be done with a palette, but I don't think this is what he is getting at, and could potentially destroy the rigid palettization that makes pixel art what it is I'm not sure pixel art and retro looks is the solution. There was something unique yet common to all those great games that made them memorable enough that we long for them even today. As an example, while I don't quite like the whacky universe and style that evolved since Rayman 2, Rayman Origins engine and graphics were stunning, and captures part of that essence. Sadly the gameplay is largely forgettable, almost a rhythm-based party game — I long for something like the first Rayman gameplay — but the graphics part is a step in the right direction. I feel like Orioto [0-3](browse his tumblr blog for more) tries to captures this essence, and I long for games looking like his work. Given the incredible horsepower we have at hand as of yet, I just can't believe it's not possible. [0]: http://www.redbubble.com/people/orioto/works/8245345-through-the-night http://www.redbubble.com/people/orioto/works/8245345-through... [1]: http://www.redbubble.com/people/orioto/works/8290902-city-borders?p=photographic-print http://www.redbubble.com/people/orioto/works/8290902-city-bo... [2]: http://orioto.tumblr.com/post/15721511369/1200p-1080p-print http://orioto.tumblr.com/post/15721511369/1200p-1080p-print [3]: http://orioto.tumblr.com/post/15627728854/1200p-1080p-print http://orioto.tumblr.com/post/15627728854/1200p-1080p-print

austinstorm 13y ago

Living up to his name, and yet I still want him to TAKE MY MONEY NOW

erdogan 13y ago

I love Monkey Island series and other Lucas Arts Adventure games, spent way too many hours playing them. However, I am a bit disappointed in this article because it feels a bit concierge-mvp to nostalgia (feeling the grounds before a full-on Kickstarter campaign), unfortunately without any interesting build upon what those great games offered. Well, consider this as my feedback to the mvp. Grim Fandango was a breakthrough, including its no-interface approach and clever use of camera angles to script the player. I have never seen a game script coming alive so strongly, it was like playing a movie. But Monkey Island re-pixelated? Although I played it on my iPad and switch back and forth between old-new renderings, I would expect these wonderful minds to be more inventive than nostalgic when producing something new.

Aloisius 13y ago

I may be an odd ball here, but I cheated at Monkey Island 1 and 2. I don't like to be frustrated with a puzzle that relies on either randomly choosing inventory items or seeing some pixels that look like almost every other set of pixels on the screen and trying to pick them up. For me, what made Monkey Island great was that it was a pretty quirky comedy. I wanted to see what Guybrush would say next. Further, it shocks me at how bad the graphics are at some of these games after looking at them again after decades. It occurs to me that what I remember it looking like is a heck of a lot better than what it actually looked like. So I'd rather the game not look like the pixely original. I'd rather have it look like I remember.

Contero 13y ago
I think Machinarium is a good example of how you can preserve the fun frustration of adventure games without pushing people to cheat. They would allow you to play a mini-game in order to reveal some extra hints which would push you in the right direction enough to figure out the rest on your own. In Monkey Island I would sometimes get annoyed and google for what to do out of angry frustration. It was easy for me to throw my hands up and say "I don't give a shit any more, time to move on!" Lots of times the solutions made zero sense to me. In Machinarium I still got a sense of frustration and puzzlement, but I would try to forego the hints out of pride for as long as I could which made for a much more enjoyable experience.
- ricardobeat 13y ago
  You mean Altavista?
- lobster_johnson 13y ago
  I really liked the puzzle difficulty with Machinarium. I think I had to use the hints system once for one of the particularly difficult puzzles. Great game.
- m_mueller 13y ago
  Machinarium's gameplay could (and should) be pretty much copy pasted onto lots of adventure games, both remakes and new ones. It's just perfect. I hope Amanita goes back to that franchise, there's still a lot that could be explored there.

ganeshtoday 13y ago

Ron, please shut up and take my money!

rocky1138 13y ago

What was wrong with Tales of Monkey Island? I thought it was good!

taeric 13y ago

Point Eleven is awesome!! Eleven - The only way I would or could make another Monkey Island is if I owned the IP. I've spent too much of my life creating and making things other people own. Not only would I allow you to make Monkey Island fan games, but I would encourage it. Label them as such, respect the world and the characters and don't claim they are canon. Of course, once the lawyers get ahold of that last sentence it will be seven pages long. edit: Thanks!

MartinCron 13y ago
Grr, how do I do block quotes? Because, this is terrible. Apologies to everyone seeing it I usually just do block quotes as italics by surrounding them in asterisks. As I did above.

aresant 13y ago

"True, I wouldn't raise huge sums of money or break any records . . ." Haha. Come on. I'd wager that MI 3 would far and away be the #1 all time Kickstarter fund raise, starting with my money: "After its release on Steam, the Special Edition remake topped the sales charts for the week ending July 18. On July 20th, the Xbox 360 version had already sold over 38,000 copies" (1) I bought the SE on iPad the day it was released, and still haven't played it - that is how strong the nostalgia is with me . . . (1)http://www.miwiki.net/The_Secret_of_Monkey_Island:_Special_Edition http://www.miwiki.net/The_Secret_of_Monkey_Island:_Special_E...

egypturnash 13y ago

Honestly after "The Cave" and "Deathspank" I'm not sure Gilbert is on my HERE TAKE MY MONEY list any more. And him saying "MI3 will be RETRO looking!" isn't making me interested; the Monkey Island games were GORGEOUS for the time, but I don't want to go wallowing in nostalgia for something made now.

lobster_johnson 13y ago
Indeed, The Cave had good visuals, but extremely boring gameplay. I understand what he was going for, but it just didn't work. Way too much running back and forth to place your characters in a certain place, and all the running took way too much time. Deathspank was mildly amusing, but got tired very fast. It was visually flimsy and felt underdeveloped overall; it wasn't a good RPG, but it wasn't a good action game either, and it was a terrible adventure game. Admittedly neither of those games are classical point and click games. It may well be that he's just much better at designing point and clicks than at the other game genres.
vacri 13y ago
Yes, I've been burned by enough one- or two-hit wonders to not just assume the next item will be good. World of Goo was another example; they then made Little Inferno, which while continuing their trend of uniquely beautiful art, was unbelievably monotonous and shallow to play, a stark contrast to the game that made their name. XCOM was another example - XCOM remake! Take my money! How bad can it be? Well, they could strip out the strategy part of the game altogether, giving it zero replayability.

DigitalSea 13y ago

People have so much respect for the Monkey Island series from yesteryear and for Ron as well. Lets face it, if there was a Kickstarter for a retro-styled Monkey Island game built by Ron and a few of his friends, it would shatter Kickstarter records faster than Usain Bolt. Just tell me where to send the money and I'll send it all, so many would love another Monkey Island game, lets get the IP back into the hands of Ron and let him work the magic. "True, I wouldn't raise huge sums of money or break any records . . ." We all know that isn't true. A remake would seriously break any sales record of any game no doubt.