Monkey Music Magic

Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge is a great adventure game, in fact one of the finest point and clickers I have ever experienced. But what really blew me away wasn't the beautiful pixel art or the fantastic pirate setting and humour - it was the music which really got to me. Land, McConnell and Bajakian made such an infectious soundtrack that is constantly intertwining and bewitching my ears. Normally it is only JRPGs that have music which get me excited, maybe because the compositions are more considered. Although I did go through a period of soundtracking my outdoor runs to the Gradius V OST.

Monkey Island 2 felt like an inventive sequel with the spitting contests and voodoo dolling. Although I preferred Ghost LeChuck to Zombie LeChuck as he seemed a somewhat less threatening opponent this time round. Maybe it was the fact - one that Guybrush often recounts - that we'd already defeated LeChuck in the first game. The island hopping was a nice feature, but for a pirate game I did feel a little let down by the lack of time you actually spend on a ship.

The ending was an interesting twist - one that I will not spoil here - but considering the lukewarm reputation of the next games in the series I don't feel in any rush to find out what happens next. I can see why the first two Monkey Island games have such a positive reputation, and considering all their faults they still hold up really well in the modern gaming age.

The Secret of Point & Clicking?

I always wanted to play the Secret of Monkey Island but being a console-owner meant I all I could do was look enviously over at Amiga and ST owners. My hopes were raised by the port to the Sega Mega CD, but it never got released in Europe (maybe that was a blessing in disguise considering the poor reputation of that version).

Anyway after some persuasion from my girlfriend I recently decided to give the re-mastered version from 2009 a spin. Thankfully you can change the graphics back to the 1990 originals, the pixel art still looks fantastic and superior to the soulless slick new visuals where characters seem to float over the backgrounds.

I can see why the game has such a following; it has a great sense of humour and a fun cast of characters. I particularly liked having to tail the storekeeper to find the sword master or (later in the game) the appearance of the three-headed monkey.

In general point and click games hold up really well in the modern era aside from one thing... the internet. I completed Monkey Island in a couple of days and whilst I'd love to claim I have the deductive powers of Colombo the brutal truth is whilst I tried to work out all the puzzles, a few had me completely stuck and so I caved and sought the internet's easy answers.

This got me to thinking - how the hell did I complete Broken Sword back in the day on the PlayStation? Did I just sit there for days on end exhausting every single point and click option? In fact I remember way back playing Sherlock Holmes on the Mega CD. When I got stuck there I went methodically and patiently through the entire phone directory line by line...

There's something to be said for the elated feeling you get when you solve something that had stumped you for weeks (if not months), but in reality the temptation of having the answers ready at your fingertips is all too tempting.

Even if you try to resist.

And I did try to resist.

A little.