Adventure games are bad. I’ve played a few of the classics now – Monkey Island, Grim Fandango and I feel like they really haven’t aged well. They should be interactive movies. Fun writing, quirky jokes, games totally defined by their tone, humour, and imagery. The interactivity is where they fall apart for me. The solutions to the puzzles are just so obscure! A modern game like Resident Evil 7 has item puzzles as a core mechanic, much like old adventure games. But unlike RE7s old school counterparts the puzzles do a far better job of presenting logical solutions using contextual clues and the environment hints. In Monkey Island you need random objects at random times for random objectives. It feels like a real crapshoot figuring out what to do, a crapshoot that often ends in frustration.
But do old-school adventure games still have a place? As it turns out they do. As I played through the Monkey Island Remaster, I used the tip system extensively. The first time you ask for a hint, it gives you a vague piece of guidance. The second time you ask for a hint, it just tells you what type of item to find. And the third time the game just tells you what and where the item is. With this system in place I was able to figure things out quickly and the moment I got frustrated I could just get the solutions and continue progressing. With this system Monkey Island really did become a beautifully illustrated comedic picture book. From one scene and joke to the next with no challenge at all, and more importantly no frustration at all. And paired with a cold glass of beer was exactly what I needed in this weird isolated time. I’m not sure that old adventure games have a place as gameplay experiences in 2020, but I think as just brainless romps filled with puns they still can be enjoyable experiences.
And damn, the Monkey Island soundtrack just slaps so hard – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fj5pIpjS14&t=225s&ab_channel=Stan%27sPreviouslyOwnedSoundtracks
What do y'all think?
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