The International House of Mojo

Those theorizing that Mojo is in fact cursed may be on to something. Yes, less than a day of uptime and the server decided it would do a nice faceplant for about 6 hours. Lovely. To celebrate this, the first ever downtime since the last one, I have compiled a brief list of downtime-related posts which have appeared on Mojo over the years...

Here's from when Mojo 7 opened following a 2 or 3 week delay in 2000, this gem is the first sign of life after our 4 month vacation in '01-'02, and finally this now lie-filled post was the last post from Mojo 8 to survive the hacker attack. Ahh, dreams of downtime, MojoMessenger, and folder-tab navigation...

Good God. Five months. Five. It's always right in the middle of our E3 coverage, too, isn't it? Mojo is at the top of it's game, actually managing to provide daily feature stories and news updates when --blip-- all is deleted.

But fear not. We've wasted some no time in getting back to you with an all new site featuring some additions you won't hate! First off, if you don't have a user account, we suggest signing up. After that, you have no choice but to check out the gigantic Game Database, featuring a lot of information you didn't know you wanted to know. Maybe top it off with a visit to the new good news archive, dating back to 2000 (AKA "Mojo 7"). We'll be adding more games, walkthroughs, and in-jokes to the game database, as well as a searchable news archive, in the coming weeks!

Also, don't miss our interview with Grim Fandango and Psychonauts composer Peter McConnell, and our review of Jedi Academy. And finally, if you're incredibly bored, you can find out who's online reading the site. We'll be heaping more content on in the coming weeks, so stay tuned.

Ultimate awesome X-Treme thanks to DJG, Remi, tabacco, and Metallus for helping get all the code and content prepared! Triple ultimate thanks to Spaff for saying he was going to cry tears of joy upon viewing the half-completed site. ?

We've done what none thought possible: Mixnmojo got a Star Wars gaming fan to write the review of a Star Wars game. Yes, LFNetwork's Boba Rhett has written us up a nice review of Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy. It's a good honest review that deserves your patronage, so you'd best be off, then.

Okay, so we actually did this interview back in May at E3, but we're running it now! Peter McConnell, composer behind the soundtracks to Grim Fandango and Full Throttle agreed to talk to us about his upcoming game scores. Unfortunately for us (and him), one of the two was Full Throttle 2. Fortunately for everyone, the other upcoming McConnell score is Psychonauts. Check it out for McConnell goodness and a few bonus MP3's.

Ye best be brushin up on your pirate lingo, as today be International Talk Like a Pirate Day. To pass the day in a right piratey fashion, we be recommendin' playin' all three Monkey Islands, or watchin' the, er, piratical Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Arr.

And, of course, it be too late to alter course, mateys, and there be plundering pirates lurking in every cove, waitin' to board. Sit closer together and keep yer ruddy hands inboard! That be the best way to repel boarders. And mark well me words, mateys, Dead men tell no tales!

In light of the recent announcement that LucasArts has decided to stop production on Full Throttle 2, we asked Tim Schafer, creator and director of the original Full Throttle, for comment. Here's what he had to say:

“I heard they just couldn’t go on without the emotional support of Tom Sarris. I mean, Tom was the person Ben Throttle was based on. Not a lot of people know that. So I guess they finally just realized there was no way to do it with out him.”

Deep down, didn't we all know it to be true? (for the dense: Schafer is joking) Check out this thread on the Mixnmojo forums to discuss all of the insanity.

We have finally uploaded our LucasArts Press Day 2003 article, which you can find here. So click on this link right now to read about the new, upcoming games as well as look at pictures of us acting stupid.

late and still working
will mojo come back to us?
where is the hard drive?

Well... nothing seems to be happening here then... maybe i'll start planting easter eggs arounbd this limited site of ours.. hmmmmmm... Hang in there folks! Mojo will, at some point perhaps return.

The word on the street is that we'll be receiving our repaired hard drive with all of our files on it in the next day or so. Cross your fingers, as hopefully that means everything will just blink back into existence. Of course by "blink back" I mean "will probably take a day or two of wading through setup pages and file permissions," but that doesn't concern you.

In other news theres a party this Friday. Also this site is pretty cool (thanks Marek).

And of course, as usual, the Mixnmojo Forums are still totally operational and demanding your presence.

It's quite a shame that we're still offline. The drive recovery place seems to have indicated that they can recover everything (see previous update), but as far as I know, we haven't received the hard drive yet. More on that as it develops.

Looking for something interesting to do? Well, Double Fine Action News has received two updates in the last week, talking about Psychonauts' recent appearance on a Discovery Channel documercial about the XBox. We also get some trivia about Nick Jameson, the voice actor providing the voice of Doctor Loboto, and his past work in LucasArts games. Its quite the wild trip, let me tell
you. Marek of Adventure Gamers has pointed out that you can view the XBox show featuring Psychonauts clips, right here.

Special Mojo shocking fact of the day: Remember a few days ago when the venerable Scumm Bar closed its doors "for good?" Well, after numerous pleas and cussing-outs by their fans (and a couple ex-Monkey Island game designers), they've apparently had a change of heart. A visit to their site reveals a very funky flash animation promoting the return of the Scumm Bar in mid-July, with new management. Apparently Gabez is in charge now, and Remi will be merely taking a back seat to help with scripting and occasionally bark orders.

You also might want to check out the recent return of Mojo hosted sites LucasTones (now with a new and improved ringtone-sender script), and the Church of Tim (now with polls!). Any other sites currently left alive are available in the menu to your right. Also, any hosted site webmasters who want their web space back (all are welcome to return. Please do!) should definitely be emailing me pronto.

So, I've tried my hardest to entertain you, but I am spent. It's your turn. Please find some way to entertain the rest of us (That doesn't involve elderly porn, grossly inflating your post count, or the death of adventure games) by depositing some worthwhile thoughts or fart jokes in our Forums. I'm desperate.

We aim to please here at Mixnmojo. By "please" we generally mean "bore and torture," but that's beside the point. While we all wait for our data to return to us so we can upload it and run an actual site again, we've unearthed one of our oldest site designs, from around 1997, to amuse everyone. Anyway, here's an update on our server situation:

The good news is, we just heard back from the disk recovery specialists, and our damaged hard drive can be recovered 100%. That means that sometime in the near future Mixnmojo, its hosted sites, and pretty much the rest of the LFNetwork community will be back on its feet. The bad news (besides you being subjected to Mojo 3's design all day), is that we still have to wait a couple more days for it to be mailed to us. Oh well.

We'll give you more news as we learn it. For now, be sure to check out our fully-functioning Forums. If you're keen on viewing more Mojo's of years past look no further than here.

To anyone who's been around a while, this will sound all too familiar. Our website is cursed. Though that might seem ironic, given that we are "The International House of Mojo," none of us really appreciate it that much. Once a year, or year and a half, something supremely bad must happen to our site, causing it to go offline in a giant ball of flames. First time around we were offline for a few weeks. Second time, we were down for a month. Third time... three months. We're now living in number four. So, what's going to happen this time? Well, who knows. We do know, though, that our former server completely died, and took all of our files and all of the backups of our files with it. Is that bad? Yeah, it's bad. Despite all of this, our primary concern is to stay up and running as a hub for you guys, the bitter masses that are the LucasArts fan community. Even though all our files might have been erased, we're going to stick around to keep you informed. After all, what would your day be without telarium informing you of yet another KOTOR screenshot update? Come on, you love it. Please address all large sums of cash and pity-donations to Jake Rodkin; paypal to jake @ mixnmojo.com.

Here are a couple of new old features that were deemed salvageable by, well, me. They are both from the Mojo 6 era, which occurred from early-ish 2000 to late-ish 2000. Now, if you'll follow me, let's step forward... INTO THE PAST!

Today's Offering:

Rebel Assault II Review, by DJG

E3 Expo 2000 Coverage, by Jake

Check them out, and please, don't judge the authors by their apparent giddiness/friendliness/optimism. In the three years it's been since these articles were written, they've both outgrown those troublesome traits. For instance, Jake is entirely baffled as to how he was ever so enthused over anything, ever. Read on, and beware.

Don't you love how the polls on this site are entirely arbitrary in both content and duration? I sure do, and that's why its time for a brand new one. This time around we're simply asking: Who's the real man? Be on your toes, as spelling is important, unless of course you pick our lovable mystery person.

The previous poll, the one about the three-headed guy, ended (predictably) with Tim Schafer and Ron Gilbert taking up the other two heads, leaving you in the middle to piss all three of your pants while you drool over yourself in fanboyishness. Should have voted for the Dan.

Wow.. our first on-time-review of a game ever! Surely a time for celebration! Yes, after a weekend of gaming, Lemonhead has thrown out this superb look at the new Indiana Jones action title for the Xbox. Here' a snippet:

After a spectacular intro sequence giving a brief insight into what you may expect to find in Emperor?s Tomb, you?re dropped straight into the action on just another treasure hunt (which Indy invariably finds himself in at the beginning of every movie) for the lost idol of Kouru Wato. Perhaps unsurprisingly, this particular artefact is located in a deep recess, under the ruins of a lost temple in the tropical wilderness.

We certainly had a fun time playing this title! Read it here, adventure fans!

Bah, sorry it took so long to get the final Mojo7 features converted, but there was an extreme bout of laziness on the part of resident slave, Metallus, as well as some other priorities which pushed feature conversion to the backburner.

But, do we care? HA! These excuses were, of course, unacceptible, and he has since been confined to the underground Mixnmojo catacombs (available only on disks 22, 36, and 114), not to be released until this year's E3 Expo.

Speaking of E3, Look! The final features are all from E3 2001:

E3 2001: Day 1 - Game Previews

E3 2001: Day 2 - More Game Previews

E3 2001: Day 3 - Disneyland Madness

E3 2001: Day 4 - Interview with Simon Jeffery

I hope you enjoy these, for poor Metallus's sake. Be sure to stay tuned for some new articles coming to Mojo in the next week or two. In addition to that, keep your eyes peeled for some possible Mojo6-era reviews and articles bubbling to the surface. Until next time, Huz Webmonkey out.

PS: Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch!

YES! after over a year without cooking with your favourite british webpimp, he has returned with a valentines lurve special! This episode features Spaff cooking a Tuna bake from a recipe by Tom Sarris, Director of Public Relations at LucasArts, and best friend of Mojo!

It may not be valentines day until tomorrow, but this should give you plenty of time to organise the meal that you should blatantly cook for your beloved one! Now go and cook!

After a bit too much planning and a surprisingly quick development time, we're proud to announce some brand spankin' new Monkey Island Discussion Forums on LucasForums. These forums now serve as Mojo's Monkey Island forum, as well as the official forum for the SCUMM Bar, Brimstone Beach Club, and EscapeMI.com. Of course, any other MI sites or communities are free to use them as well.

The lovely art at the top was painted by none other than Dan Lee, so be sure to thank him somehow, as it looks amazing. Go talk. Now.

Here's your second chance to ask Dan Pettit some questions. (Bumped from two days ago)

We finally landed the big one, the one we Mojo updaters dream of night after night: an interview with Dan Pettit! (Yes, that Dan Pettit. Yes... that Dan Pettit). Dan has worked at LucasArts for a while, including being the lead tester on Curse of Monkey Island, and some sort of producer on Jedi Knight II, but more important than that, he has appeared in a large percentage of our polls for no reason at all.

For this interview to be any good, we need your unique off-beat questions to make up for our overused trite ones. So, please help us out and leave some potential questions in the comments section of this post.

It appears we're back after a lovely 20 or so hours of downtime. Something exploded at our web host's office, hopefully killing a couple of their employees. Of course whenever the server is down like this and comes back, it inevitably dies again for another couple hours, but let's hope that's not the case.