The Secret of Monkey Island™: Special Edition

Somehow I have managed to never come across MI as a child, which allowed me to experience this gem for the first time. I used the Monkey Island Ultimate Talkie Edition Builder to extract the original game out of this "Special Edition", but with the addition to voiceovers from the CD-ROM edition. The writing and character design in the game is phenomenal - the game is very humorous and doesn't take itself too seriously. The characters are very lively and likeable. This is where the "Special Edition" falls short. The "remastered" characters and animations are simply awful, and that's to compared to the 1990's DOS version! Somehow the original clumps of pixels are animated better, and are much more expressive. The original verb-action menu system was a bit cumbersome, but all of the possible actions and inventory items were always visible on the screen. In the SE version, the actions are hidden behind a bizarre system of shortcuts and toggles. This works well for simple actions like opening doors etc, but fails when having to combine items, for example. I did not approach this game as a nostalgic fan, but even as a newcomer, I have to say the best version of the game is obtained by extracting the OG game, and playing it via either ScummVM or DosBox.

I didn’t find the ‘upgraded’ look and feel to be an improvement, but the original game version can be accessed with F10 keystroke during play. Phew!

Love monkey island and love the voice acting ... hate the new visuals, didn't realize the voice acting and the new visuals were a package deal and if you switch to the old style the voice acting goes away too. Still happy to have the original available but am basically playing it as if the special edition part didn't exist.

Having first played this game now, I can honestly say everyone telling you it is the best game of all time is right, it's not only the pink glasses of nostalgia. The story is good, the jokes are hilarious, the characters are legendary, the visuals are amazing, the puzzles are fun... if you're playing in Classic mode, that is. The updated music, graphics and the added voices suck all of the fun and charm out of the characters and locations, I recommend against them 100%. Thank Stan the option to play the original, unaltered classic is included.

5 stars for Monkey Island. +2 for the speech. Sync is great! -1 for the new haircut and the silly expression in Guybrushs face -1 for the new inventory -1 for atmosphere in the remake. It feels a bit unfinished and empty. Original is just better. -1 for not being able to play old graphics and new audio and speech makes 3/5 Oh, nice to know: It's possible to extract the speech and audio files and repack it for ScummVM (MI1_Ultimate_Talkie_Edition_Builder). Original graphics with new audio and speech = 4+ stars! If you play the remake: very VERY pretty please do yourself a favour and use the hair patch. Just google it.