The Curse of Monkey Island
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| The Curse of Monkey Island
Original Curse of Monkey Island box art
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|---|---|
| Developer(s) | LucasArts |
| Designer(s) | Jonathan Ackley & Larry Ahern |
| Engine | SCUMM |
| Release date(s) | 1997 |
| Platform(s) | PC |
| Media | CD-ROM |
| System requirements | According to Monkey Island Bounty Pack
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| Input | Mouse and Keyboard |
| Preceded by | Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge |
| Followed by | Escape from Monkey Island |
The Curse of Monkey Island is the third game in the Monkey Island series of adventure games. It was released on PC CD-ROM in 1997 and it is the twelfth and final adventure game by LucasArts to use the SCUMM game engine. As the game was made after Ron Gilbert's departure from LucasArts the project was headed by an entirely new crew lead by Jonathan Ackley and Larry Ahern (the graphic designers of Tim Schafer's Full Throttle).
The game took on several new aspects not seen previously in the series, such as a CD quality soundtrack (still composed by Michael Land), a full voice-cast and the highest quality graphics seen in any SCUMM-based game with a graphic outlook imitating Disney Feature Length Animations. The game also had a revamped gameplay system which still used the mouse, but instead of a control-bar used a more convenient verb-coin (this element was borrowed from Full Throttle).
As before the game is divided into parts over two CDs.
CD1:
- Part 1: The Demise of the Zombie Pirate LeChuck - Guybrush drifts to the shore of Plunder Island and is captured by LeChuck. Guybrush must escape his ship and help Elaine defend her island-fortress.
- Part 2: The Curse gets Worse - Elaine is turned into a gold statue by the engagement ring Guybrush discovers on board the ship. Guybrush must collect a map, a ship and a crew to find a cure for the curse.
CD2:
- Part 3: Three Sheets to the Wind - Guybrush has to recover the map to Blood Island stolen by Captain Rottingham. This section is comprised largely of ship-to-ship combat and Insult Swordfighting.
- Part 4: The Thief, The Barkeep, his Aunt and her Lover - Once on Blood Island Guybrush has to continue the search for the uncursed diamond ring without the help of his crewmates.
- Part 5: The Kiss of the Spider Monkey - Guybrush and Elaine are captured by LeChuck. After a lengthy discussion which explains a number of things about the games' history Guybrush is turned into a kid and has to cure himself in order to stop LeChuck marrying Elaine.
- Part 6: Guybrush Kicks Butt... Again - On the Rollercoaster of Death Guybrush must defeat LeChuck once again.
Contents |
Excerpt from memoirs
Excerpted from "The Memoirs of Guybrush Threepwood: The Monkey Island Years"
"I've sailed the seas from Trinidad to Tortuga and I've never seen anything like it! The engagement ring I gave Elaine has a terrible pirate curse on it. LeChuck is behind it, I'm sure. I should have known that nothing good could come out of that evil zombie's treasures. And if that's not bad enough, the clairvoyant I met in the mangrove swamp told me that if I am to break the curse and save Elaine, I will have to die!"
Plot synopsis
After escaping from the Carnival of the Damned, Guybrush Threepwood drifts off to Plunder Island and smack into the middle of a battle between LeChuck and Elaine. He is captured by LeChuck who plans to blow down the walls of Elaine's island fortress with the power of the Voodoo Cannonball
Part 1
Guybrush is united with Wally B. Feed, now going under the title of Bloodnose the Pirate. Guybrush, however, causes him to crack by insisting he isn't a true pirate and uses his cannon to sink LeChuck's longboats. Using the cutlass that got stuck on Murray's skeleton arm Guybrush cuts the restrain rope on Wally's cannon and fires, causing the ship to shake and LeChuck to drop the cannonball which promptly explodes destroying him and much of the ship with it. It also causes the ship to capsize.
Guybrush then finds himself in the ships treasure hold where he discovers a whopping big diamond ring. He uses it to gut the class of a nearvy porthole which floods the ship and allows him to escape. On the shore he is reunited with Elaine and propeses to her with the diamond ring. Wally also appears shortly after having been thrown clear (apparently he wasn't wearing his seatbelt). He immediately reveals that the diamon ring looks like the one in the treasure hold: "...you know the one with that ghastly, disfiguring Voodoo Curse on it."
As Guybrush and Elaine simultaneously realise the truth Elaine is about to punch Guybrush in the face when she is turned in to a solid gold statue.
Part 2
Reunited with the Voodoo Lady Guybrush learns that he must replace the cursed ring with a pure one of greater or equal value and that such a ring is only found on Blood Island. Unfortunately during their reunion Elaine is captured by the pirates of Danjer Cove. Guybrush learns that in order to get to Blood Island he will need a map, a ship and a crew, but is also warned thta he will die on Blood Island.
Guybrush finds a map to Blood Island on the back of the agent Palido Domingo, which he is able to peal off with the use of Coconut Oil.
For crew Guybrush enlists the help of the barber pirates of the Barbery Coast; Haggis McMutton, Edward van Helgen and Cutthroat Bill; proving his worth to each of them in various ways.
Guybrush also confronts the pirates of Danjer Cove, discovering that they are a group of apes under the command of the demented Mr. Fossey who alledgely is under the command of Captain LeChimp which Fossey, in his delution, merely believes to be the captain. Guybrush is able to trick him through ventriliquism to quit piracy and discovers that Elaine has been burried on the stage of the theatre on the island. Guybrush inadvertidly ends up saboutaging the juggling act of Slappy Cromwell in order to stop the show and dig Elaine out.
Guybrush and crew then ship off on the Danjer Cove pirates' ship, the Sea Cucumber.
At the same time two unfortunate pirates are looting the spoils of the battle and unfortnately pick up LeChuck's boots, still hot and steaming from his evil presense. After they are dumped in to the ships hold, the catch fire and LeChuck is resurrected in a flaming demon form, turning the two pirates into skeletons and sailing back to Monkey Island.
Part 3
Upon their departure they're ship is boarded by Captain Rottingham who challenges Guybrush to a swordfight and wins due to Guybrush being unfamiliar with the maritime rules of Insult Swordfighting (all insults must rhyme). He takes his map, explaining his intensions to make the diamond his personal paper-weight, but only after he is done pirating the shores around Plunder. Guybrush remarks the uselessness of his crews after which they engage in song (see A pirate I was meant to be). Guybrush is luckily able to flop their rhyming after which he begins the hunt for the map.
Challenging several pirate captains in sea combat and swordfighting Guybrush is able to eventually beat Rotingham and get his map back.
Part 4
Ending up in a furious storm Guybrush's ship crashes on Blood Island, his crew has a peaceful mutiny, decide to patch up the ship and leave for home, leaving Guybrush on his own to lift the curse. In a nearby resort he is introduced to Griswold Goodsoup, whose great-aunt Minnie Goodsoup's diamond ring turns out to be the one that Guybrush needs. However, the ring was split into two parts when Minnie's fiance sold the diamond to the smugglers of Skull Island. Guybrush inadvertidly ends up feigning his own death in order to get into the Goodsoup family crypt, to get the wedding-band that Minnie took to the grave with her, also fulfilling the Voodoo Lady's prediction.
In the crypt Guybrush learns that Minnie's fiance was non other than LeChuck. Uniting her with Charles DeGoulash (the guest who never left) the two of them find each other, go into the light and leave the wedding band behind.
In order to get the ring Guybrush ends up fixing the ligthouse of Blood Island and calls forth the ghostly ferryman, The Lost Welshman. On Skull Island he runs into the smuggler king, King Andre and challenges him to a game of poker. Using a five tarot deathcards he recieved from Madam Xima Guybrush beats the pirates but is about to be murdered. Just then the bungling replacement, LaFoot, opens the door to the lair, causing the candles to go out and giving Guybrush the chance to escape.
Guybrush also ends up waking the dormant volcano of the island in order to melt some cheese with tar like qualities. He barters this for a bottle of hand-lotion to get the cursed ring off Elaine's finger and replaces it with Minnie's ring. Elaine punches Guybrush, then asks where have they ended up on. After ensuring that everything is just fine, they are seized by LeChuck's skeletal horde.
Part 5
Guybrush winds up at the Carnival of the Damned on Monkey Island. From LeChuck he hears many a horrible tales and eventually stops listening. This irritates LeChuck enough to turn him into a child and leave him to his fate in the cable-cart which is lined with explosives. Guybrush, however, discovers that the door is unlocked and escapes. Guybrush then uses Griswold's hangover remedy to turn himself back to normal and to pursuit LeChuck on the Rollercoaster of Death.
Part 6
On the Rollercoaster of Death Guybrush is being chased by LeChuck and is able to use the items from the puppet displays to spring a trap for him. He places a keg of rum with an oil-covered piece of rope as fuse under the arm of a snow-monkey puppet and with a sprinkle of pepper causes the flaming-demon LeChuck to sneeze a small fire which lights the fuse, causes an explosion and drops a mountain of ice upon him (burrying him until the next game).
Elaine and Guybrush are married and sail off to the sunset being waved goodbye by Guybrush's crew and Lemon Head.
Reviews
Main Characters
- Guybrush Threepwood
- Elaine Marley
- LeChuck
- Voodoo Lady
- Murray
- Stan
- Wally
- Rene Rottingham
- Haggis McMutton
- Minnie Goodsoup
Featured islands
Notes
- The game is dedicated to the memory of Brett Barrett, a programmer on the first two games who died in a motor-cycle accident a year before the game's release.
- Part III begins with a musical number, A pirate I was meant to be, in which the player's goal is to flop the rhyming of his crew in order to stop them from singing. This scene was dropped in translated versions. This is the first full-fledged song in the entire series in which the characters actually sing. Monkey Island 2 featured singing characters but no voice-acting. Another song Plank of Love was planned to play over the ending, but due to time-constraints the song was never recorded, though its lyrics were finished.
- The game has two difficulty settings, the standard mode and the Mega Monkey Mode. As opposed to Monkey Island 2's lite-mode which simplified many of the puzzles in the game the Mega Monkey Mode can be considered its opposite, extending puzzles and giving the game even more content than before. The player also has to collect a higher number of items and solve a higher amount of puzzles in order to beat the game.
- This is the only game in the series that does not have a version for Apple Macintosh computers, consequently creating a gap between the second and fourth games. The game is, however, playable on Macs through the use of the emulation-software ScummVM.
Reviews
- Adventure Classic Gaming
- Adventure Gamers
- Just Adventure + - First review
- Just Adventure + - Second review
