Platform: PC
Developer: LucasFilm Games
Publisher: LucasFilm Games
Release Date: Oct 1990 (16 color), Dec 1990 (256 color)
Genre: Point and Click
Nerd Rating: 9.5/10
Reviewed by: InfiniteKnife
Look out behind you, a three-headed monkey!!!!!!
If you’ve ever heard someone say that phrase and you wondered where it came from, look no further than The Secret of Monkey Island, a wonderful point and click adventure by LucasFilm Games and the team of Dan Gilbert, Tim Schafer, and Dave Grossman. We’ll get into the details of the game itself, but The Secret of Monkey Island was pretty significant to the point and click genre in a few different ways. It wasn’t the first one (actually the 5th by LucasFilm), but was among the first to focus more in exploration and made player death nearly impossible, a stark contrast to other Point and Click games like the King’s Quest series. It was also among the first to implement a dialog tree when conversing with NPCs throughout the game. The latter went on to be used extensively in point and click games thereafter.
Our adventure begins on Mêlée Island™ where wannabe pirate Guybrush Threepwood meets the town lookout and is immediately ridiculed for his aspiration. He’s instructed to visit the pirate leaders at the Scumm Bar, who inform him that in order to become a pirate, he must face the three trials, which are finding the lost treasure of Mêlée Island™, defeating the Sword Master, and stealing the Idol of Many Hands from the governor’s mansion. During the trials, Guybrush meets several interesting characters including a voodoo woman, a snarky shopkeeper, and the governor herself. He and the governor become smitten with each other from the start, but she is quickly kidnapped by the ghost pirate LeChuck and is taken to Monkey Island. Guybrush puts together a crew, procures a ship, and sails off after her.
I remember the excitement of going in here the very first time.
In typical point and click fashion, you guide Guybrush through the world by selecting from 12 different commands such as “Talk to” and “Pick up” in order to solve puzzles that allow progression through the game. Conversations can go a number of different ways due to different dialog trees based on responses to different characters. Some can be a bit tricky to get through, but the dialog was very well-written and many of the lines are hilarious. The sword fighting was even designed around these trees. In order to win a sword fight, you need to insult your opponent and select the correct response to their insults to you. You learn the correct responses through using them on different pirates and them using the correct response on you.
But I’ve got a little TIP for you, get the POINT?
One of the most frustrating, but also funniest dialog tree puzzles in The Secret of Monkey Island is haggling with Stan the used ship salesman over purchasing a ship for the journey to Monkey Island. Frustration set in for me because it seems to take forever to get him to agree to your price, but looking back, the way it’s done is quite funny. I won’t spoil it, but the whole interaction involves basically saying “forget this” and straight up leaving the area, but not before old Stan hits you with his shady salesman spiel.
His arms are constantly flailing when he speaks.
Many of the puzzles lead to funny moments. One example is poisoning meat to feed to the governor’s dogs only to be met with a big pop up that says “Important Notice! These dogs are not dead, they are only sleeping. No animals were harmed in the production of this game.” I really appreciate light-hearted, self-aware humor like that in games, and Monkey Island is full of it. It’s really worth it to try to talk to as many characters as possible to see what kind of funny conversations you can have.
Don’t worry, PETA!
Overall, the difficulty in The Secret of Monkey Island isn’t crazy, but you definitely need to use your head to solve some of the puzzles. Admittedly, it took me FOREVER to figure out how to find the Sword Master. Like, I’m talking years. This was before the days when you could just look up a solution to a puzzle online, so I was stuck sitting there not knowing how much of the game was left, or if I would ever see the end. After finally figuring it out, I didn’t have much trouble with the rest of the adventure, but felt pretty silly for taking so long to solve one early game puzzle.
Visually, The Secret of Monkey Island is great. I played the 256 color version and the backgrounds were vibrant and well detailed. In the early part of the game, you’re running around at night, so there are a lot of cooler colors, but you get a fair amount of bright daytime play when you actually reach Monkey Island itself. Character models were designed well and with enough variety that you aren’t looking at the same pirate everywhere you turn. That said, when you’re learning all the sword fighting insults and have to fight a bunch of pirates, several elements were mixed and matched between them so you will definitely see the same face with a different outfit or different hair.
The bright colors of Monkey Island are a welcome change from the never ending night on Mêlée.
There isn’t a ton of music in The Secret of Monkey Island, but what is there is sure memorable. I vividly remember the opening theme song, as well as a handful of others. Music only plays during cutscenes and a few areas like the circus tent and ghost pirate ship. The other sound effects weren’t anything special. Many were used in many other games made around the 80s and 90s when sound capability was limited on floppy disk games. The sound effects in these old games always bring back waves of nostalgia for me and were never a negative aspect of a game.
Another thing worth mentioning about The Secret of Monkey Island is its anti-piracy measure built in. Upon starting the game, you’re prompted to answer a history quiz and are given a picture of a pirate. You then have to bust out your handy Dial-a-Pirate wheel that came in the box, line up the photo, and you’ll see the number it’s looking for. Some might have found this step annoying, but I always enjoyed it and found it ironic that a game about pirates would have a security measure to avoid illegal copying.
Some of the head combos are pretty funny looking.
The Secret of Monkey Island is one of my all time favorite Point and Click games and it really holds up well after over 25 years. It had enough of a cult following that an HD remake was released in 2009, offering the same game experience with better graphics and full voice acting. I jumped on this immediately and was very impressed with how it turned out. There is even an option to swap the graphics between the new and old school graphics at any time.
New one looks awesome!
Whether you have an old computer with the pirate wheel, or want to try this one out on newer consoles, I can’t recommend it enough. The Secret of Monkey Island is absolutely worth playing and if you’re anything like me, you may just find yourself dusting it off for a revisit every now and then.
Enjoy!
Written by InfiniteKnife
Widget not in any sidebars
My personal favorite games are those in the Survival Horror and Sports (baseball) genres, but I can find at least a game or 2 in just about any category that I love to play.
I grew up on Nintendo consoles (NES and SNES) and have been an Xbox guy since the first one was released in the early 2000s. It’s hard to stay away from the classics as the 16-bit era is probably still my favorite overall.
