Arcade Berg aka. "Learning Game Design with Arcade Berg"

Monkey Island – Point (most often) & Click (sometimes)

I just finished Tales of Monkey Island: Launch of the Screaming Narwhal from Telltale Games, released yesterday.

A very likable and pleasant adventure with great music from Michael Land and first grade voice acting from the one and only; Dominic Armato as Guybrush.

I played it on the laptop using my Home Cinema equipment for audio and video, lying in the couch using a cordless mouse. In short: the perfect setup for a classic "Point & Click" adventure.

My to my horror, I soon experience Telltale's new(?) design for walking around.

You'd think you'd just point and click, right? Like in Sam & Max for example. Or it could be a keyboard/gamepad solution as with Grim Fangando or The Escape from Monkey Island.

But no, it's this idiotic system of you holding down the left mouse button and then moving the cursor in the direction you want to move. I ask you; why?

This is kind of how it looks.

Actually, I think I know why. It's because it's also released for the Wii and I'm guessing the movement is controlled using the analogue stick on the "nun-chuck". I'd be very happy if someone can confirm this.

Thinking about it, I'm sure it works GREAT with the Wii. But playing on the PC using the mouse, it was horrendous with me running all over the place. Oh yeah, to run instead of walk, you have to press both mouse buttons. Tedious! I lacked precision.

Luckily, I played it using a mouse but I was playing on a laptop, so I could just as well have been using the trackpad and that's near impossible to navigate with! I say: Shame on you Telltale!

Why not just let me Point & Click? And this is what bugs me the most. I know you could have done it Point & Click-style! I know you have to consider production cost and time. I work in the industry, I know all about it so to be fair, it's probably not because you're dumb.

But I still can't forgive it because I know you have the technology already!

Exhibit A:

You Point & Click to walk around in Sam & Max, also lead by programmer Randy Tudor using your engine.

Exhibit upper-case B:

No mather where I stand in the world, if I click on a object Guybrush walks over there by himself. Meaning? You have the path-finding in the game, you have nav-graphs or whatever you're using and it works brilliantly! So why can't I just click on the ground as well?

Really, this bothered me during the entire chapter and I feel sick about thinking I'll have to use it for the upcoming episodes as well.

But Hear Ye, Hear Ye, it's still a great adventure and I recommend it to all adventure and pirate fans out there!

Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge is my favorite adventure game along with Grim Fandango.