Escape from Monkey Island (2000)

I went in hoping that this was better than its reputation. I remember liking it when I played it 20 years ago but it's pretty telling that I remembered the big box art more than the game itself. Yeah, it's a legitimately bad game. Just an all-around disaster. The 3D engine used here just doesn't work like it should. The instant Guybrush bumps into an object, he turns direction and suddenly you're on the wrong side of the screen. It's like if the original Alone in the Dark was on fast-forward. The puzzles are weird and mostly unfun. Worst of all, it's just not all that funny.

The most damning thing I can say is that it reminds me more of season 10+ episodes of The Simpsons where it has characters you recognize but they don't act right. Guybrush doesn't feel like Guybrush to me. The jokes don't fit the rest of the series. It comes across as too mean. There's some sort of satire about capitalism or gentrification or something, it's kind of unclear, but that doesn't seem to fit with the usual Monkey Island stuff. A couple jokes are okay here and there, though I did especially like when one of the reformed pirates pretends he's okay as a model citizen and starts shaking with joy when he remembers the blood of his enemies on his ship deck.

The pacing is all sorts of wrong. There are some excruciating sequences like the pirate reform school or the infamous Monkey Kombat. You can see what they're trying to do with Monkey Kombat, a kind of update to the original insult sword fighting from the first game, but the randomness makes it tedious as you have to figure out what's what through trial-and-error. There's that stupid rock throwing minigame too. It's simply not fun.

That's Escape in a nutshell. It's simply not fun. It's worth a look as a curiosity but it's probably not worth playing all the way through, even with a walkthrough. It's just frustrating.

Escape from Monkey Island, the fourth installment in the series, was the last adventure game LucasArts ever released. After 3 gorgeously made 2d point and click adventures this game was made in a 3d engine, the same one Grim Fandango uses if you're familiar with that. It looks and plays very similarly to Grim Fandango in fact, and I don't think that 3d did the series any favors.

I get that video games had to evolve, but early 3d from the 2000's just looks and plays so terribly when compared to how far these games had come making amazing 2d environments. Once 3d hit the scene, "pixel hunting" for items involves walking to every nook and cranny in the room seeing if a prompt appears. Holding forward to walk places is incredibly frustrating because often Guybrush just gets caught on some invisible barrier and you need to turn around and try again.

Here are some other complaints about this entry...

• WHAT DID THEY DO TO STAN???
• The trademark witty combat was traded in for tediously learning an arbitrary set of fighting game moves in a Mortal Kombat parody.
• It's Monkey Island humor but doesn't seem as top notch.

What the game does well

• Amazing soundtrack
• Fun, interesting new locations mixed with visiting old ones
• Some great puzzles
• Heavy puzzle areas rewarded by extended cutscenes

I would recommend this game to anyone interested in completing the Monkey Island saga for completion. It's not terrible honestly, but the legacy of the first three games makes this one's sins more painful to bear. If you're into the Monkey Island series and you want to continue with Guybrush's story, then I think you'll be glad you got through it, but be prepared to endure some early 3d growing pains.