The Monkey Island SCUMM Bar: Scurvy Free Since 1996

Note that we probably will not update the ol' SCUMM Bar about this (let's be honest) shockingly announced Monkey Island 6. Instead, find our musings over at Mojo.

But, Monkey Island 6, huh? Woo!

Because, why not? (Other than you should read Mojo instead. And I think our birthday was back in September.)

Here’s what we got:

Check out this forum thread on LucasArts Posters for some impressive cover-art work by Laserschwert. To wit. Chef’s kisses all around.

In 2004 we spared you from an April Fool’s joke, albeit not entirely by our own volition. Read the story and watch the fake Monkey Island movie trailer to boot.

The two special editions of Monkey Island are available on Amazon’s Prime Gaming.

Want to read the Curse of Monkey Island audition material? Of course you don’t, but we got you covered over at Mojo all the same!

Monkey Island-content has made its way into Sea of Thieves which I’m sure is awesome if you’re familiar with that game.

Polygon has a story about the mercifully canceled Monkey Island movie.

And I think that covers the more important Monkey Island-news from over the last year – see you in '22!

I will quote our recently updated FAQ:

In the late nineties, we claimed in this very FAQ that Guybrush was named after the generically labeled Deluxe Paint character-graphics file guy.brush. Guy because the main character was a guy, and the extension indicating it was a brush file.

In a scathing indictment of our reporting, Ron Gilbert posted a long retort about the real name of the file, and thus the origins of Guybrush’s name. A quote:

During the early days of Monkey Island I didn’t have a name for Guybrush. We just called him the "guy".

When Steve Purcell was doing concepts for "the guy" he was doing them in dpaint. In dpaint you could select a section of the screen called a "brush" and save it out.

It was these files I got from Steve. I saw the file names so many times that the name "guybrush" stuck.

We maintain the crux of our FAQ was correct, but apologize for the mistakes made with regards to the file extensions. And make sure you read the full secret behind Guybrush’s name.

(Incidentally, Tim Schafer wanted to name the character Hank Plank. Source: Tim’s tweets.)

Hopefully, that will put an end to guy-dot-brush-gate.

If you didn't catch Video Game History Foundation's fireside chat with Ronzo, then do not worry. The video is now available:

As importantly, there is also a full article with sketches, hidden assets, drafts, and misc. awesomeness.



It all keeps on coming: 2020, the year that could have been worse, probably.

Get ready to burn through $174.99 this Friday when Limited Run's Monkey Island anthology orders start. Among the many, many items, you'll get:

• Behind the scenes book
• Murray candle holder(!)
• Posters
• Disk 22
• Code wheels
• The games (obvs.)

That's this Friday, 7am Pacific from Limited Run's website.

Let’s just dive into it:

First, Video Game History Foundation will be hosting a fireside chat with Ron Gilbert in celebration of The Secret of Monkey Island’s thirty year anniversary. Anecdotes will be told, cut scenes from the two first games shown, and Q&As will be had. Tickets are $10; event takes play on Friday, October 30th, 1 pm PDT. Go get tickets and then read The Verge’s story on the event.

The Limited Run Monkey Island boxset is coming. For $160 you’ll get all five games, and a bunch of stash, as explained on Twitter:

Announcing the boxset of every mighty pirate's dreams: the Monkey Island Anthology for PC! Including all five games in the Monkey Island series and many beautiful works of Guybrush art, this anthology sets sail on Friday, October 30th. More details later this month! pic.twitter.com/DNpbrmTHBg

— Limited Run Games (@LimitedRunGames) October 19, 2020

And finally, enjoy this Monkey Island documentary, because why the hell not?

That’s right our forums, last seen over at LucasForums, are back, this time fully shared with Mojo. Even a day in, Monkey Island chats are going (what is your favorite game in the series?), and more is sure to come.

So go chat!

NB! The email verification system for new account verification is currently down, so we’re approving accounts manually for now. Just be patient.

Speaking of Nicolas Deneschau -- author of the talkie prototype article -- he is also the author of the French Monkey Island book, Les mysteres de Monkey Island: à l'abordage des pirates! You can get the book on Amazon, but if you just want to stare over the Steve Purcell cover, well here you go, courtesy of Nicolas…



And another one…

That’s right. In what probably is the biggest Monkey Island news ever (ever meaning the last few years), you can download the voiced Monkey Island 2 prototype and read interviews and tutorials about it over at Mojo. Not much more to say about it – as I’ve literally said what there is to say on Mojo – so go read and play!

Much like The Legend of Monkey Island, we have the COVID funk here, so let’s write an update. Hell, we might even make some more additions here and there to the site, because we feel MILegend threw the gauntlet down with its new design. Oh, yes, The Legend of Monkey Island is back! After the timely^* demise of World of Monkey Island, the balance has been restored, and two of the old-school Monkey Island sites are as active as… well, not active at all.

So what else do we got? Limited Run will release an anthology box with the first four Monkey Island games this fall. How about that? More over on Twitter.

Tales of Monkey Island is back on Steam and GOG, in case you’re in need of another copy.

A prototype of a voice-over LeChuck's Revenge exists…




What else? That is it for now. Follow us on Twitter for more^**.

^* Hands up if you remember petty site rivalries!

^** There will be no more.

Or at least we could after reading this Mojo post, where it is revealed that The SCUMM Bar theme is not an original recording, but rather a retread of an old standard . . .



You learn something every day.

Update! And now Stan's theme, too?

I mean if you have a PC that is . . .

Limited Run has queued up the three first Monkey Island games, and while I don't know what that'll look like, it is, apparently, happening.

Check for more at Limited Run's web site.

And that makes it five: All of the Monkey Island games are available for sale now -- run to GOG to grab the fourth entry in the series.

Speaking of Escape from Monkey Island: We recently partook in a podcast on Mojo, where we discussed the game for an hour. That's right. One hour, listening to us. Why would you not want to do that? Listen!

Do you want to listen to Curse of Monkey Island in glorious CD quality? Well, we’ve uploaded the tracks over at the Mojo! Run and download!

Oh, and as our cost has rapidly risen over the last year, a Patreon pledge would be appreciated -- it funds both The SCUMM Bar and Mojo, which, of course, for all intents and purposes are the same site these days. Thanks!

First, Curse of Monkey Island is actually back for sale. Run over to Steam or GOG and you can grab the game for Windows and -- what the hell?! -- macOS.

Over at Mojo we have posted a re-recorded MI1 soundtrack in the style of CMI, which you can use with ScummVM and the Special Edition. It sounds pretty awesome.

The SCUMM Bar -- We’re Not Above Updating Now and Again™.