Monkey Island 4 Demo

Escape from Monkey Island

One of the most anticipated games this fall, especially for long-time adventure aficionados, is Escape from Monkey Island – make sure to read our feature interview with the project leaders.   Nevertheless, last weekend LucasArts released the playable demo for the game.  It doesn’t disappoint.  For fans who thought the move to a 3D engine would somehow destroy the Monkey Island look and feel, think again: everything looks stunning in the demo, which takes place on Melee Island.  While the Governor’s mansion certainly has changed from the days of the first Monkey Island, the same Caribbean-tinged music plays in the background and the witty one-liners are in ample supply.

Players of the demo are sent on a short mission to stop a henchman from destroying the governor’s mansion while Eliane goes to town hall to get herself undeclared as being dead. (It’s a long story; the demo fully explains).   The major change for this Monkey Island game is the introduction of a keyboard-only interface as was used in Grim Fandango.  While the game does support joysticks and gamepads, I’d imagine the majority of players will use the keyboard.   There’s no question this interface takes it time to get used too, especially in a Monkey Island game.   True, navigating Guybrush a la Alone in the Dark allows you to feel more a part of the character, but after running into objects and having trouble navigating up stairs in the demo, I’ve come to realize that the mouse interface sure is missed this time around.  Still, the new interface means that Monkey 4 is in the perfect position to become a console title down the road.

Still, the interface concerns are only a minor gripe for what is otherwise a great demo. Of particular note is LucasArts’ decision to release three different versions of the demo, ranging in size from 34 to 120 megabytes.  It’s nice to see a company that actually thinks about those users who would like to experience the demo but can’t spend the time to download 120 megs.  Let this be a lesson to all those developers who ship out huge demos and don’t even think about stripping out the cinematic and voice files for online users.