I wish I liked it, but...
Feel free to read my spoiler-free-ish thoughts on Sea of Thieves: The Legend of Monkey Island: The Journey to Mêlée Island. And feel free to disagree. Or agree. I feel how I feel; that’s just how it is.
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On the eve of the Monkey Island-themed Sea of Thieves expansion, Rare has released a spoilerific deep dive into the game:
What is there to say, really? I’m still uncertain about this whole SeMI thing, but there is no doubt that the team is showing downright reverence for Monkey Island. So whatever my personal opinion may be, I can already say I respect their dedication.
Download the game tomorrow and decide for yourself how it all stacks up.
(Oh, and the Voodoo-theme woodwind deserves a chef’s kiss.)
I’m sure some (or many) are on the fence about this whole Sea of Thieves thing, and if getting the game just for another taste of Monkey Island isn’t your “thing,” you always got this.
Almost five minutes of a Mêlée Island walkthrough. Hey, if all you were interested in was seeing the island in full 3D, this at least is something.
For the rest of us, the expansion is two days away.
Update! Hey, there’s an interview, too!
As is often the case, I have not watched this before posting it here. But there is no way this video...
... is not interesting. Land, McConnell, and Bajakian chatting for almost two hours? Just do yourself a favor and watch the thing. (I’m planning on doing myself the same favor as soon as I can.)
Let’s just get to it shall we: First, SeMI keeps expanding its own name: With the first part now having a title, we got Sea of Thieves: The Legend of Monkey Island: The Journey to Mêlée Island. Two more episodes to go—this first one releases next week.
And as the video above reveals, there’s a lot of Monkey Island swag coming to the game, too. You even get a quick musical snippet from the MCU (Monkey Island Cinematic Universe) so the video is worth a gander even if you don’t care about the crossover.
Speaking of swag: As mentioned by Sopa on the forums, more Sam & Max action figures are being made available from Boss Fight Studios.
The reference material:
Once they hit 750 backers the production begins. Be prepared to shell out $80 for each figure.
Got five minutes to spare? You could do worse than spend them watching this mini-tribute to the infamous The Secret of Monkey Island stump joke.
Sure, there are some oddities—if you’re going to use art from our LucasArts' Secret History #12: The Curse of Monkey Island
article, at least credit Paco Vink—but hey... A fun watch all the same.
As expected, Return to Monkey Island is set to release on iOS and Android. On July 27, you can perform yet another act of penance for that copy of The Secret of Monkey Island you pirated by tossing $10 to Apple or Google. Or both. Here’s the trailer.
And speaking of mobile: Mojo has yet again gone social, this time on Threads. That’s right. We’re all about the 'gram. For now. (Email us a Bluesky invite if you want even more of us!)
So, that’s @internationalhouseofmojo for the only social account you’ll ever need. We’ll see if it sticks.
Hey, psst, want a book recommendation? We asked pretty much every writer and designer who’s worked on a LucasArts, Telltale, Terrible Toybox, Double Fine, Autumn Moon, etc. game on here for good recent reads, then added a few of our own. (Every writer, that is, except Chris Purvis, Sean Clark, and Brendan Q Ferguson, whom we couldn’t find. We assume they’re mythical creatures now, living off the grid, somewhere in the northern wilderness, swept up in starlight.)
Some people never got back to us (understandably), and some said they would but hadn’t by the time the article went up (also understandably), but we’ll happily (to crib video game dev parlance) patch in any updates to the article should they reach out. (Sincerely, we'd love that. Unlike, say, Jim Ward, the brows being furrowed over here aren't over silly things like deadlines, but books. And I don't joke when I say we reached-out to all the designers/writers.)
Video game documentary filmmakers Noclip have somehow acquired themselves a lot of boxes of tapes (remember those?) that they're now digitising—a decade's worth of video game history, mostly feature and BTS material, that was apparently headed for a landfill from the GameSpot vault. Among the initial batch of unearthed videos is this behind-closed doors demo of Knights of the Old Republic, from E3 2001 (remember E3?).
Source: Noclip Games History Archive
Never you mind about what Rotten Tomatoes or some Reddit mega thread has to say. The final word on cinema, as on all matters, is Mojo’s, and you are all her constituency. With pride in this civic duty, we bring you our release date review of Indiana Jones and Dial of Destiny. After reading it, you will require no other review, or much of anything, because you’ll be dead of old age. Cripes, Jason.
Disclaimer: While we tried to be mindful about spoilers by refraining from any explicit summary of the plot beyond the first act, we can’t vouch for what your personal standards are. Go to the cinema clean if you want to experience the movie that way. And who are you kidding, anyway -- it’s not like you aren’t going see this like a good little consumer.
The best thing to happen to Mojo is the rise of YouTube interviews: Others create content; we reap the benefits. In this case:
We’re there tomorrow.
If you want to play The Legend of Monkey Island DLC from July 20, you're going to need the base game Sea of Thieves. And if you don't have it yet, to celebrate its 5th birthday, Steam have it on sale at half-price, as well as the other related soundtracks, wallpapers etc, for the next day.
Go buy it the instant you have Dialed up your Destiny. Or now. Whatever.
Source: Steam
By now you’ve probably watched one or two DOTT-related celebrations, so why not make it a trifecta? Laura Cress will be streaming a Q&A with Tim Schafer tonight at 8 pm. What 8 pm is that? Who knows! Presumably, BST, which is 12 PDT, which is... Oh, just check the conversion table.
Fun is sure to be had!
I have no problems admitting I don’t really “get” speedruns, but as others do, I feel like I should link this “Monkey Island 2 Speedrun History” video.
Ron even makes an appearance, so that must be worth something even for those who don’t hurry through games.
I haven’t watched the video yet, but I can only assume it takes place to the dulcet tones of “The Cook Chase.”
Source: Legend of MI
Sure, by being someone who is “with it” and therefore a confirmed reader of the forums, you’re about to be told redundant information, but a new version of DREAMM always has to hit the broadsheets. Here is Aaron with the rundown of your newest testing mission, DREAMM 2.1 Beta:
I've started testing beta releases of DREAMM 2.1. Grab the latest version here:
https://aarongiles.com/dreamm/beta/
New games supported:
- Indiana Jones and His Desktop Adventures
- Mortimer and the Riddles of the Medallion
- Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire
- Star Wars: Yoda Stories
- Outlaws
- Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II
- Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Mysteries of the Sith
- Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine
- Windows versions of: Afterlife, X-Wing, TIE Fighter
Major new features (documented in more detail at the link above):
- Linux support
- Portable mode -- put DREAMM and all your games/settings on a USB stick and take it with you!
- Standalone mode -- two ways to launch DREAMM directly into a game!
- Built-in OPL MIDI synthesizer -- because Linux needs a default synth, and who doesn't love the soothing FM sounds?
- Command-line installation -- drag & drop is cool, but command lines are for true old skoolers!
- Telemetry (yes, you can opt out) -- help me know when DREAMM crashes or encounters a previously-unknown version of a game!
Source: Aaron Giles
The thing’s a week away and so the marketing machine is belching out exhaust in choking quantities now. How diligent do you expect Mojo to be about collecting all that smoke with a butterfly net? Well, we’ll see what we can do.
First off, we’ve got a new piece from Variety with James Mangold that’s reasonably substantial as far as these things go. There’s some new behind-the-scenes photographs as well as a little more light shed on the process of Spielberg passing the torch.
It was the fall of 2019, and Mangold had joined the team working on the film adaptation of “The Call of the Wild,” in which Ford plays a rugged frontiersman, to help with reshoots. In their downtime, Ford began confiding in Mangold about the fifth “Indiana Jones” movie, which had been bouncing around in development for the better part of three years. Steven Spielberg and screenwriter David Koepp had conceived a roughly five-minute opening sequence set during World War II, in which Ford would be digitally de-aged. Ford wasn’t sure it was a good idea.
“Harrison told me he was nervous, because he felt like if people saw him younger, when they confronted Indiana in his 70s they’d be disappointed,” Mangold says, sitting on a cream-colored couch inside his sunlit office on the Fox lot in early June.
At the time, the filmmaker had no reason to think he was auditioning to be the guy to solve Ford’s dilemma. But Mangold impressed the actor. “He seemed to have a keen perception of what was required,” Ford says. “I just found it very easy and comfortable to work with him.” So much so that when Spielberg decided later that year that it was time to bequeath Indy’s signature whip and fedora to someone else, Ford recommended Mangold.
Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy, who has produced every “Indy” film since serving as Spielberg’s assistant on “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” recalls, “It was pretty much immediate that Steven said, ‘Oh, he would be fantastic. Let’s do that.’”
The director gave another good interview to Uproxx as well. If reading bores you, Mangold and the cast have been junketing their way through no end of taped puff pieces for morning shows and the like, so a “fun” day on Youtube awaits the PR-addicted. I think the most worthwhile plug is gonna be an upcoming appearance by Ford on Conan O’Brien’s podcast, likely dropping Monday. It’s comforting to know that despite Conan’s television show being over and the general improbability of a fifth Indy with Ford even existing, that the tradition of the two of them behaving like jackasses survives for one final round. A good sampling of the arts they’ve worked together in the past:
There’s also a bunch of new clips, promos, and featurettes. Probably more than the four below, and there’s undoubtedly more to come, but I think we’ve done our part by now. On the Dial of Destiny score, let’s agree to meet up again at Mojo’s release day review. Our topicality streak can’t possibly last, but why not go out swinging?
We’ve already granted you access to one YouTube celebration, but, not surprisingly, more keep popping up. And equally not surprising, Daniel Albu is responsible for this one.
One June 25th, one Dave Grossman will face the interrogation squad. Exactly why the description says In this conversation they discuss the history of the SCUMM engine and go over all the major milestones in Aric's career!
is anyone’s guess, though maybe Dave will talk a lot about Aric? Or it’s a typo—who can even say these days?! (Mojo famously has none of those. (Footnote: citation needed)) Anyway: June 25th is when it all goes down, so check it out.
Breaking news! The typo has been corrected. On the YouTube page that is. Mojo will keep having 'em.
Today we have two minutes of people blowing smoke up John Williams’ ass (note I don’t say it’s undeserved), with some hitherto unseen footage from the movie sprinkled in.
For those interested in owning up to 30% of the recorded score, an official release will drop ahead of the movie on June 28th, at least digitally. A pressed album will follow later in the summer. Here is the cover art, showcasing a level of effort that some have called “Remi-esque":
The Los Angeles premiere of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny took place at the El Capitan Theatre on Wednesday. Still needing to fill some seats after indiscriminately inviting every TikTok profile with a fedora, Disney took the measure of hauling in some actual heavyweight dignitaries, including Temple of Doom reps Ke Huy Quan and Raj Singh (who played the doll-stabbing Maharajah in what some (Footnote: citation needed) have called LeChuck’s prototype):
The attendees were treated to a little John Williams concert before the screening, and here’s Spielberg giving an intro for it. George Lucas’s demeanor is best described as “My Consent Wasn’t Sought By Disney For A Sea of Thieves Crossover.”
We’re not far from the first part of the seminal SeMI-expansion release, and even with my tepid expectations I have downloaded Sea of Thieves. Hey, Monkey Island is Monkey Island, right? Right! And, over at the forums calls for new crews
has already started. If I understand it correctly, Thieves allow for four-person parties, so if you haven’t joined one yet, now is the time to do so. In other words, jump on our forums and start organizing. I have no clue if there are any particular ways for crews to intermingle—I saw some mentions of fleets—but this also seems like a good way to spread the glory of the Mojo community. And create free grassroots advertising for us be part of something bigger.
To continue the SeMI chatter, more after the cut.