The International House of Mojo

Anyone who reads the Scumm Bar knows that this summer they've been celebrating the "Summer of Retro?," AKA a chance to upload and divert attention to lots of old content that's fallen through the cracks through the years, or things that may have intentionally gone away but need to be unearthed for nostalgic purposes. And to hide that there's no new Monkey Island news worth mentioning anymore.

Well, here at the Mojo, we've decided (without the permission of Remi or Gabez), to launch our own unauthorized Summer of Retro? Hasty Bootleg Edition. Over the next couple months I hope to unearth some of the old hosted sites, bring back many of Mojo's missing articles that disappeared over the years, and (God willing) drop in a couple new things. Of course this is Mojo Time we're dealing in here, so the Summer of Retro may in fact turn into the Endless Summer of Retro, but really, nobody's complaining right?

I might as well point out that I accidentally started the Summer of Retro Hasty Bootleg Edition just last week with the reintroduction of the classic hosted fansite Highland Productions. You might also enjoy the Scumm Bar's recent posting of a ton of those old link buttons which used to litter the Mojo Network, back when the Mojo Network existed. Nostalgia City. Enjoy.

Apparently we can't stop adding new guys to help with the database! Okay, actually we can, we're stopping now. But if you see some random guy named "scaryrobot" skulking around, he's in fact James Denness, a regular Mojo reader but infrequent Mojo news commenter, who has volunteered to do some time this Summer with the game database. Just thought I'd let you know.

Hi everyone, just a quick note to let you know that Spaff and I have brought aboard two new webmonkeys to clamor around behind the scenes. Long time readers and community members JBRAA and ATMachine have volunteered to help finally bring the sagging games database up to speed (Yes, we have a games database! Bet you didn't even know). Please give them a warm welcome!

As you've noticed, they might occasionally be posting news, but as Mojo is trying to focus more and more on "The Classics," its become blindingly obvious that our database is severely lacking. Expect it to be featured more prominently on the site as they beef it up.

LucasArts are at E3 and so are some of the Mojo crowd, however nothing is happening.. there are some Star Wars previews around but im sure you can find them elsewhere if you really care... No news from Psychonauts anywhere yet either, but when there is it will be here!

For some E3 round up news head over to Idle Thumbs!

As everyone knows, we aren't exactly rolling in things to cover on Mojo these days. There is the odd announcement or proclaimation of some sort from LucasArts once a week or so, and there's Psychonauts, but on the whole, not a whole lot going on. Which is why we've decided to massively expand our horizons, and take on anything we deem interesting. Definitely not limited to LucasArts. No, I'm no longer talking about Mojo.

Since around last year's E3, Spaff, Marek Bronstring (of Adventure Gamers) and I have been planning a new site, called Idle Thumbs, and its launched today. Our goal with the Thumb, much like the Mojo, is to write about the games we love from the past, and the interesting games on the horizon in a way that isn't so boring that you just stop visiting. Please do check out Idle Thumbs, stay a while, and let us know what you think. Its not much yet, but we've got big plans.

So, what does this mean for Mojo? Not a lot, really. Mojo isn't closing. We'll still have the occasional daily news posts. The hosted sites aren't going anywhere (unless they want to). And of course, we'll have coverage of LucasArts' presence at this year's E3 (though there won't be a lot to write about). So don't fret about anything (except LucasArts' lack of unique games), and instead rejoice, and visit Idle Thumbs every day!

Well, now that we've gone and confirmed many people at LucasArts' worst fears about Mixnmojo, what's there to do? Until E3 rolls around and we get heaps of new things to poke at, we'll probably be scaling back on the current LucasArts coverage a bit, but you saw that coming right? What does that mean? It means, basically, we'll be focusing on news about the LucasArts community, Tim Schafer's upcoming game Psychonauts, and maybe some more ranty editorials.

So, how about yesterday, eh? In case you missed the ruckus, take a peek at the reader comments on Slashdot, Gamespot, Evil Avatar, Evil Avatar again, Blue's, Blue's again, Shacknews, and a couple of threads and an article over at Adventure Gamers. Also, from the responses in those threads (and from WWHS), one might guess LucasArts has had a few letters emailed to them.

Now, how about Mojo's editorial? I mean, kick ass we got Slashdotted. Our feeble server was completely owned, twice. Thanks to all who read it.

As for how LucasArts might take it, as I said earlier I'm sure we've confirmed all their worst fears about this site. I don't know what to say other than we did the best we could. I'm sure we got some facts dead wrong, and we probably pointed the finger at some people who didn't deserve it, and stepped on a few extra toes, but that's the best its going to get, and we stand by what's been said. We're obviously not LucasArts, and much as we'd like to we don't live under the meeting table in the conference room, we're a fan site. We don't know exactly whats going on, so we made educated guesses. So, something had to be said about Sam & Max 2 and the greater state of things at LucasArts, and harnessing our brains and the past six to seven years of watching them on this site, we took our best stab at it. Anyone is welcome to talk about it, email me at jake@mixnmojo.com.

The fact that so many people agreed with it is making me worry a little less, and I hope it woke the right people up, or at least poked them a little bit in places that needed a good poking.

Yikes. All this inner-worry and angst, this is beginning to sound like a LiveJournal or something. ... Oh God, noooo...

Current Mood: tired
Current Music: soft cell - tainted love

Gamespot is currently running a poll that reads "Are you sad LucasArts has canceled the Sam & Max sequel?" Currently 39% has voted yes, with 47% going "Sam and who?!" This is a good way to make your voice heard on a large site, so go vote "yes" now.

Pssssst! Have you or someone you know written a walkthrough or hint guide to a LucasArts game, new or old? If you haven't, are you interested in writing one? Do you need an excuse to finish one you started years ago and left for dead? Now is your chance to shine!

With the exception of a few games listed below, Mixnmojo has almost no walkthroughs in its game database, and we really want some! We have had the functionality for walkthroughs ever since the new Mojo opened, but nobody on staff has been keen on writing them. This is where you come in.

I know you've written walkthroughs and hints and lists of codes for old LucasArts games, but have only posted them on the forums, or maybe your old Dark Forces page on Geocities that got deleted back in 1998. I know you're totally sitting on this goldmine of hints and cheatery and you're not sharing.

If you have a hint guide or walkthrough you'd like to let us run, please contact me!

You'll be properly credited and we can link to your email address, Mojo user name, or website in the walkthrough. You're welcome to submit more than one of course. Thanks a bunch!

Here are the games we already have walkthroughs for:<:MORENEWS:>

Monkey Island 3
Monkey Island 4
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Sam & Max Hit the Road
Day of the Tentacle
Rebel Assault II

Since the little forum tracker in the sidebar seems to be broken, I thought it might be good to point you guys to a few interesting threads which have shown up in the last few days. Lets see....

Lost Maniac Mansion Demo Found
The original demo for Maniac Mansion, formerly believed to be lost, was recently unearthed by bgbennyboy, and can be found here! The demo, which is playable with the latest daily build of ScummVM, gives you a guided tour of the mansion, and is actually pretty entertaining.

Artwork for Brian Moriarty's The Dig
After some furious digging, ATMachine was sent, by a secret source, some artwork from Brian Moriarty's version of The Dig. For those who don't know, The Dig went through three or four designers including Noah Falstein (co-designer of Fate of Atlantis and others), Dave Grossman (co-designer of DOTT), and Brian Moriarty (the creator of Loom), ending with Sean Clark, all with varying versions of what the story, the world, and the artwork should look like. Its a pretty cool treat to see art from an old version like this, so go take a look.

Fan-made Classic Game DVD Cases
To alleviate boredom, and fill the hole LucasArts has left by more or less abandonning their classic titles, quite a few readers have started working on a set of high-res slip-in covers so you can make your own DVD-box series of LEC titles. They're still looking for concepts, so throw your design into the ring.

There's other stuff going on as well. The usual discussions about LucasArts collecting, ScummVM, and Mojo being broken are out in full force. You're totally missing out, man. Go check out the forums.

Just a quick note letting you know that DanSky, creator of some of those nice 3D Monkey Island wallpapers, the Cooking with Spaff logo, and a lot of other fine artwork, has returned to teh Mooj. Well, he's almost returned. His full site, featuring lots of great artwork and other crazy stuff, will be back soon.

It was offline for a long time, but the Unofficial Sam & Max Website is back, with some new content. Please go take a look around, and be sure to enjoy the nice high res Sam & Max Frelance Police artwork we've got there. Thanks for waiting so long.

As usual, we're late. A few weeks ago Metallus reviewed Secret Weapons Over Normandy, but it took us this long to publish it. Sorry. Most people have probably already made up their minds about the game, but I know there are a couple SWON addicts in the audience who just want to hear a bunch of good things about their current obsession. Enjoy.

Since Jake was at Grandma's house all week and was without email, we foolishly missed being able to share this with you before Christmas, but it's here now. Steve Purcell, creator of Sam & Max and artist for many classic LucasArts games has sent along his annual excellent holiday greeting card for all to enjoy. Sorry for not sharing this with you earlier. Blame Jake.

Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas<:MORENEWS:> Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas Happy Xmas.

Pass the brandy......

Sorry about the day of downtime. Our web host decided randomly to change our IP address, so that change to the DNS info had to go and spread througout the net over the course of yesterday for anyone to be able to see our sites.

Finally a new article. Our own The Scumm Bar's Remi Olsen has taken a good long face-numbingly pensive look at the recently released Armed & Dangerous, and reviewed it, too. Does he like it? We suggest you read the review to find out, instead of cheating and reading the caption over there in the sidebar that says he likes it.

We'd like to wish a happy Thanksgiving to all our readers in the states... and a happy Novembertime to everyone else, especially if "Novembertime" exists. Thanksgiving celebrations or no, nobody can deny the joys of turkey gobbling in midi form! At Mojo everybody goes home happy.

After three or four years without the ability to search our news archives, we've received a lot of emails telling us we're idiots. Well, you can all shut up now, because the news post archive is now fully searchable! (If you're wondering how to get to that link normally, look at the bottom of this page, or at the bottom of any news comments page)

The other nice addition added tonignt is that when you click on the name of a news updater (or a user who has posted a comment), you'll actually be able to email them. Up until an hour ago, the usernames just linked to nowhere. Oops.

Thanks to tabacco for getting the search script up and running.

Johnny "ThunderPeel2001" Walker has re-uploaded his game guide and walkthrough site for the classic Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade adventure game, and in addition to the old Last Crusade site, he's added a new section dedicated to helping you through Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis. Check it out at indyguide.mixnmojo.com.

I'm not really here, I'm dead... Let me explain: I was about to help, but then a night dwelling rabbit shot me... Erm, I fell into... a kind of... pit. Yes, pit. A pit filled with... flaming... Erm, zombie-spiders?... And I... I... I... I was too lazy, bored and busy to help rebuild (save) Mojo. I Admit it!!

I guess there's only so many times a man can rebuild Teh Mojo before he can't be bothered any more. It's true what Jake said though, tears of joy were indeed shed.

Welcome back again then Mojo. "Triple Ulimate?" thanks to all you cheeky folk who got it back online. I will now skulk off into the corner and wait for some kind of random, but never the less amusing, mildly related LucasArts Tidbit? to post.