The Secret of Monkey Island

""You fight like a dairy farmer." "How appropriate. You fight like a cow.""

Genuinely funny games are few and far between in video games. Several games that try to be funny just fall flat on their face with no hilarity whatsoever, but there are a few games that are actually worthy of the player's laughs. One such game is The Secret of Monkey Island. TSOMI is the first game in the famed 'Monkey Island' series and it is downright hilarious at times. It is a game that even makes the ending credits fun to read! How often can you say that about a game?

The Secret of Monkey Island places you in the role of a wanna-be pirate absurdly named Guybrush Threepword. While in the town of Melee, Guybrush enters the popular Scumm Bar where many pirates hang out and drink grog. In there, Guybrush meets three 'important looking pirates' with hopes of becoming a pirate just like them. They tell our hero that he can become a pirate by completing the three trials, which involve fighting, stealing, and a long quest. Naturally Mr. Threepwood says yes, so he begins his journey to piratehood. Many hilarious obstacles appear during the trials, many of which will actually cause you to laugh out loud.

The game uses a simple 'point and click' format during play. There are a list of commands on the bottom of the screen that can be used in the game, such as 'walk to' and 'pick up'. To complete those commands, one would have to click on the approriate object on the game screen. The bottom portion of the screen also is home to Guybrush's inventory, which gets rather large as the game advances. Left clicking on an object in the game usually walks Guybrush to that location, but if one of the commands is clicked beforehand then he will do whatever command was chosen to that particular object. If the player is too lazy to click the command then the object, one could always just right click on it to have the computer automatically pick a suitable command. Needless to say, the interface is actually very simple to learn and understand and it will probably pose no problems to the user.

The game itself is nowhere near as simple as its interface. The game revolves around solving puzzles, some of which can get very difficult. One example of a puzzle in the game is to clean a giant monkey head's ear with a large ear swab. Sure it sounds easy right now, but first you have to figure out how to get the ear swab. Then you have to go through a series of other tasks after which you must actually find the giant monkey head's location. A use of a walkthrough is no doubt very helpful in this game.

The Secret of Monkey Island's best feature is obviously its humor. There are several hilarious moments found throughout the game, one of which is the game's highly unorthodox fighting system. You see, instead of the regular fist to fist type combat found in other games, TSOMI uses verbal brawls via insult sword fighting. The goal of these said battles is to be wittier than your adversary. One opponent may use an insult such as ''I once owned a dog that was smarter than you.'' The proper way to 'beat' this insult is to comeback with ''He must have taught everything you know.'' Absolutely classic. Sadly, the only times that these fights take place is in the last part of the 'master the sword' trial. Still, the insult sword fighting is an experience to behold.

TSOMI was released in 1990. As a result, the visuals look rather old nowadays (obviously). Things can get horrifically pixellated, especially on the map overviews where the characters are incredibly tiny. When the pixellation is not a problem, though, the game doesn't look half bad considering its age. The backgrounds are done quite well, with a nice usage of many different colors. Sometimes it can be a bit hard to see objects on the hidden in the backgrounds, but a simple move of the mouse cursor should be able to find the object in search of. The character designs are also great, with Mr. Guybrush Threepwood himself being no exception (I love saying that name). Notwithstanding, the numerous cases of heavy pixellation still hold back the visuals from greatness.

Sound in the game is almost a rarity - most of the game will be played in complete silence. The areas that do feature sound are merely average at best. In all fairness, the audio shows more age than the visuals. The music tracks found in the game consist of a string of bleeps and bloops, but they do fit the Caribbean pirate theme. The sound effects are just bleeps and bloops themselves. Some of the sound effects seem awfully similar to ones I have heard in other games. Maybe it's just my ears playing tricks again..

Overall, The Secret of Monkey Island is a fun-filled experience that almost anyone can enjoy. With its seemingly non-stop humor and clever puzzles, I don't see how anyone can not play this game. I don't know where this game can be found anymore - I got my copy in a special edition of PC Gamer that featured a look back at classic computer games. If you do see TSOMI somewhere, give it a try. I guarantee that you will laugh at least once while playing (if not, then there is something wrong with you!). Besides, there are always walkthroughs if you get stuck...

Best Feature: Humor.
Worst Feature: Can get very difficult.

Final Analysis:
Graphics 5/10 - pixellation bad, backgrounds and character design good
Sound 4/10 - sparse and too bleepy bloopy
Gameplay 8/10 - hilarious, can get difficult
Control 7/10 - nice use of the 'point and click' format
Replay Value 5/10 - worth playing once or twice just for the dialogue, won't be played more than that
Challenge 8/10 - some very difficult puzzles
Overall 8/10

I only wish this review could be as funny as The Secret of Monkey Island.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/16/01, Updated 11/16/01