Return to Monkey Island

What can I say... it's a Monkey Island game! Tall tales, and hilarious puzzles to solve.

Graphics are remastered into today's glory. But one can resort to the original graphics and interface with a toggle of the keyboard.

If you like puzzle and a great story, then I recommend this game highly.

I have played every Monkey Island and have been a fan since back in the DOS days on windows 93. I was 13. I played the original Monkey Island along with Kings Quest, Quest for glory, stuff like that. I was thrown off by the animation of this new game at first, but it grew on me since the story was so good. I really enjoyed the game and will be playing it again. I want to pick different responses from Guybrush in talk sequences.

I struggled to finish "Return to Monkey Island". I struggled not because I got stuck or because it was too hard or so, but because the more I played the less I knew it was left to play a Monkey Island adventure. I didn't want it to finish, so the first time I just slowed down and then stop it before finishing it. After more almost 2 years (of course I had it pre-ordered) I decided it was time to just enjoy it. It was a pleasure, an honour to be delighted with such a fine work. It warmed my heart, it made me laugh, it made me cry, but most of all it made me happy. It is such a great work, that, in my opinion, succeeds in the hardest thing: it does not leave any sour taste!...instead it leaves a fine, different although familiar taste. It feels a proper ending that respects the nostalgia without leaving any of it. Thanks Ron, thank you all for this final bite of something so delicious I will always wish for more.

So this game was OK. It was actually very OK. So OK that it's average.
Where to start? I want to recommend people pick up the game because I'm a huge fan of the series and I'd like to see a new Monkey Island adventure more often than every decade. However, candor compels me to admit that this is definitely the weakest addition to the series thus far.
The gameplay is quite nice if you're into point and click adventure games. The puzzles are satisfying complex and the 'Hint Book' that the game provides you with ensures that you'll never be stuck. There are also two different levels of puzzle difficulty which is nice for old school fans. All of this is done well.
The game's problems are mostly thematic as it doesn't really feel like the Monkey Island that we've come to know and love. The game is almost aggressively disconnected from the 3rd, fourth, and fifth games in the series aside from random references. The plot hooks in game five are completely ignored. I know that Ron Gilbard didn't direct those games and may have mixed feelings about them but the fandom has lived with the franchise for decades and the canon aren't things that should be discarded so easily.
In this game, Guybrush feels like a comedic sociopath for most of the game and the way that he sabotages himself for the sake of a joke gets old fast. Guybrush has always been doing "questionable" things during the games but for the most part, the more cruel actions were always aimed at people who arguably deserved it. In this game, he seems utterly indifferent to the consequences of his actions as long as he gets what he wants. LeChuck feels less like a real threat and more like a sitcom archnemesis. Even five made him more of a threat and you spend most of the game working with him!
The new characters introduced in the game also fall flat. Elaine is probably the worst character affected as her personality feels like it was hacked down with a weedwhacker. The fiesty Elaine and brilliant planner of prior games is gone in favor of a paper-thin "female main character" for Guybrush to play off. You could rename Elaine as a brand new character without really changing much of the way the pair interact.
The humor itself is much weaker than in prior additions. Instead of mocking the zany situations the characters find themselves in, the game seems motivated to constantly make fun of itself which becomes wearing after a while. The art style has similarly devolved IMHO. It's much more pseudorealistic than in the other games and it feels like it's trying to half-heartedly copy ren-and-stimpy in places. The humor is much more biting than it used to be.
The ending was a huge let down but I'll get into that further along.
In summary, it's an OK game. I hope that we'll see more media in this franchise and that next time they'll return to their roots.

Spoilers Start Here
The ending was a serious WTF moment. I actually sat through the entire credits because I was certain that this couldn't be the way the game was ending and it must be a fake out. Unfortunately, it was real.
They seem to be trying to double down on the mindscrew ending of Monkey Island 2 but in this case they add so many confusing layers to it that I have no idea what the creators are trying to say.
The whole final act of the game feels deeply disappointing and almost unfinished. A lot of plot elements just don't seem to have any sort of resolution and it feels like the game is doing it deliberately either to mock its audience or to make some sort of artistic statement that isn't very well conveyed.


Long story short, I want to see more Monkey Island games but something in this design went seriously wrong. I like all of the other five to varying degrees but this one was not one I expect to replay.

The game is fun and definitely triggers nostalgia for the series. That being said, I'd rate it as one of the weaker entries.
The story is okay-ish but somehow disappointing (including a typical Ron Gilbert ending), the riddles surprisingly easy. The humor is good but not as great as in the earlier entries. Voice acting, gameplay and music are top notch as always. While the new art style is beautiful and well crafted, it definitely needs some getting used to. The only thing I really didn't enjoy at all, are the spawn rates for the trivia cards you can find across the game, which result in tedious grinding.
The Monkey Island series is like pizza, even a bad one is still pretty good. So I'd recommend this one to fans of the series, but you should lower your expectations. If you're new to the series, go play the original ones instead.

It's a shame they chose such a terrible art style. The game was magical in the 90s with the highly detailed pixel art presenting pretty much the best possible realism at the time. They've ditched that to present a Cartoon Network reject style of art.
The game itself is good, follows the same storytelling tropes and puzzles. Just the art is horrible and whoever directed the art style should be exiled from game development.

I grew up on the Monkey Island and other LucasArts adventure games of the 80's and 90's. They're very special to me. Return to Monkey Island is a look back on Guybrush Threepwood's life and is clearly a labour of love. The graphical style fits in perfectly with the spirit of the series (shoutout to Stan's jacket) and is beautiful to behold. The puzzles are varied and sufficiently challenging. The included hint book, which sits in your inventory throughout the game, gives you conversation-style hints for the active puzzles, increasing from vague to specific the further you go into the conversation. This is brilliant because it doesn't give you the answer right away, but truly gives you clues so that it still feels like you solved the puzzle yourself. This is a brilliant design.

All in all, if you even remotely like point-and-click adventure games, get this one. If, like me, these games have special nostalgia value for you then you'll already have bought this :)