Ron Gilbert has just announced a sequel to his long-dormant Monkey Island series, so while longtime fans are downloading boats or whatever it is that the pirates of today do to celebrate cool stuff, we’ll take the time to explain why people who aren’t fans (yet) should begin feeling the hype as well. Even though it might sound just like it, the Monkey Island series isn’t a low-budget video game spinoff of Planet Of The Apes, but rather a series of original games responsible for inspiring the good film in the Pirates Of The Caribbean series.
The story of wannabe pirate Guybrush Threepwood is but one of many hits by Lucasarts. That’s one of the greatest video game companies of all time, one that younger gamers might think we’ve just made up because Disney shut it down after it swallowed George Lucas whole and spat out everything not related to Star Wars. The Monkey Island games provided a fun alternative to the games from competitor Sierra not just because they were way less punishing, but also because they brought some damn good comedy writing to video games.
Disney, Ron Gilbert
Details are still scarce on the upcoming Return To Monkey Island, but we already know some really cool things, like how it has been secretly in active development for two whole years, and how they’re using the 2d hand-drawn visuals that we all love: