I grew up with Guybrush Threepwood. No exaggeration there. While other kids obsessed over names like Sonic and Mario, I went wild over Sam and Max, over Bernard, Manny, and LeChuck. The name LucasArts didn’t just bring up the prerequisite pictures of Star Wars and Indiana Jones in my mind, it brought up the entire genre of the adventure game.

Anyone could defeat Bowser with enough determination, but adventure games made me think. I had to actually stop and consider every situation and every tool, something anathema to the neck-breaking pace of games like Sonic the Hedgehog. These games were so enamoring because they were actually interactive — not just in the “I press a button and you do something” sense, but in that one would have to think and engage with the puzzles in order to progress. I had to interact with the game as much as it interacted with me.

Of course, it helped that the games were so damn entertaining. In an era before the PlayStation and the subsequent RPG explosion, adventure games were one of the few sources of genuinely decent writing around. Hell, most of them are more than a decade old and they still demonstrate a writing quality better than the majority of modern fare.

If you would have taken me aside two months ago and told me that a new Monkey Island game would not only be announced, but even released by now, I would have called you a dirty liar. Sam & Max only made it out because Steve Purcell owned the characters, and I had long ago given up on LucasArts regaining any interest in their adventure properties. The announcement that Telltale would be making an episodic Tales of Monkey Island was the biggest announcement of E3 in my mind. I loved Sam & Max as a kid, but Guybrush’s many brushes with death have lingered in my mind for years. Anybody that reads this site knows that I am a fan of Telltale, but I haven’t been as hyped for one of their games as I was for Launch of the Screaming Narwhal. Of course, that hype comes with some pretty major expectations. Strong Bad and Wallace & Gromit have been good, but Monkey Island deserves greatness.

Launch of the Screaming Narwhal opens up right in the thick of the action. Antagonist and voodoo pirate LeChuck has boarded Elane’s ship and is casting some sort of deadly spell. Guybrush has to find a way onto the pilfered ship as well as a bottle of fizzy root beer so that he can finish enchanting his sword. Of course, things go horribly wrong and Guybrush ends up marooned on a cursed island with the spirit of LeChuck in possession of his hand. Your only lead on escaping is a reporter’s mysterious source and this reporter won’t let you in on the identity until you give him some news to report. Sounds weird, but it’s a pretty average morning for Guybrush Threepwood.

While I have enjoyed the Wallace & Gromit and Strong Bad games, neither really represented my sense of humor. I got my share of chuckles, but they didn’t have that certain snark that left me in tears while playing the new Sam & Max (or the old one). It wouldn’t have made sense in those series, but Monkey Island and Sam & Max come from the same thematic roots (ignoring the obvious pirate tilt). What I’m getting at here is that Launch of the Screaming Narwhal is amazingly hilarious. It isn’t funny in the “ARGH, I’m a pirate.” Shtick sense. Instead, it is funny in a sarcastic and clever way that allows the writers to not only tell pirate jokes but to poke fun at the internet culture that spawned these jokes at the same time. Yep, there is a ninja reference (in the form of a nerd playing with action figures). There are all of these little pop culture references that, amazingly, don’t seem out of place in the colonial age (including the best YouTube joke ever).

The gameplay follows the adventure template to the last letter. You wander around, click on the environment to examine things or talk to people, and pick up items that might come in handy later. There aren’t any huge surprises here, nor did I want any. The inventory system has been slightly beefed up. Not only can you equip an item, but you can now examine or combine items in the same panel. My only control complaint comes from the movement. The keyboard-based movement has been inherited from Wallace & Gromit, and it remains just as clunky. Telltale has also implemented mouse controls, but they only approximate the same movement style. Basically, you click and drag the mouse in the direction that you want to move. You get used to it quickly, but it never works quite as well as the old-fashioned “click and walk there” that has been an adventure staple for years. The arrow-key movement made sense in W&G as that particular series was intended for the pointer-less Xbox 360. Monkey Island is being released on the PC and the Wii, so I’m a little surprised that they didn’t stick with the controls used in Strong Bad.

As I’ve already stated, I love adventure games because they make me think. As great as the writing can be, the puzzles are just as important of a component. Tales falls squarely in the middle in this regard; I wasn’t disappointed, but nothing really pushed my brainpower. What I do like is that the puzzles tie in nicely with a few of the jokes. I also like how most of the puzzles are actually logical, you can’t just stumble through them or click on every pixel of the screen until something happens. Of course, there are a couple of things that you’ll miss if you don’t find that one little part of the environment that holds the key, so there is a bit of the ol’ pixel-hunt. I appreciate that the developers took the effort to try a couple of new things out, like a Zelda-esque forest maze. Surprisingly, this maze was actually one of the more satisfying puzzles in the game (here’s a hint – you don’t start in the same section of the forest that you are given the map in).

The switch from 2D to 3D graphics in Tales of Monkey Island is going to be a point of controversy. Many fans cried fowl when the first Telltale-helmed Sam & Max episode was shown to be a 3D game, and the same will undoubtedly happen here. I was even a little put off by the first screenshots of Narwhal, but I honestly didn’t mind by the time that I finished the episode. Yes, it looks nothing like the old games. No surprise there. Yes, Guybrush’s design has changed a bit. Trust me, you’ll get over the goatee. I’d have preferred a 2D game, but it isn’t a killing point.

[Update: I seem to have forgotten all about Escape From Monkey Island, which may be for the best.]

Actually, the game that Launch of the Screaming Narwhal reminds me of the most both graphically and aurally is the GameCube Zelda game, Wind Waker. I suppose that makes sense, both games share a bevy of common influences. Both are set in tropical environments, are brightly colored, and look like a pirate-filled cartoon. Even the character designs are vaguely similar. Tales looks pretty nice in motion, and is definitely Telltale’s most beautiful game yet. The music, unsurprisingly, follows a Caribbean theme and is almost annoyingly catchy. Voice acting was clearly a high priority; the Curse of Monkey Island cast members have all returned and their performance is top-notch.

I’ve been ranting about this game for more than a thousand words now. It seems kind of excessive for a game that is about a quarter of the length of your average video game, but this was kind of an important release for me. I came in with huge expectations, and I wasn’t let down. Tales of Monkey Island is pretty much exactly what I expected a Telltale-developed Monkey Island game to be. This is Guybrush Threepwood, he just had a new dimension added. The heart of the series is present, and despite a couple of niggling flaws, I’m excited for what the coming months will bring.

Positives: Hilarious jokes, catchy music, great voice acting
Negatives: Puzzles are hit or miss, slightly awkward controls

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