Xbox 360® owning fans of talking anthropomorphic dogs, hyperactive rabbity things and great gaming comedy rejoice! Telltale today announced that Sam & Max Beyond Time and Space will launch on Xbox Live® Arcade this Wednesday. All five critically-acclaimed episodes of the award-winning series’ second season will be bundled together and sell for 1600 Microsoft Points – a great deal for five games at only 320 points each.

This is exactly what this week needed. A little Telltale love. Be sure to check out the game on XBLA. I’ll be doing a review on it shortly.

Well break out the Grog and brace yourself for this Saturday. Sept 19th marks Talk Like a Pirate day, what better way to celebrate then playing the 1st Episode of Tales of Monkey Island oh and did I mention it’s for free.

On September 19, Telltale is making the premiere episode of Tales of Monkey Island® a FREE download on their website (http://www.playlikeapirate.com/) all day.

In addition, today through September 21, LucasArts is offering a virtual treasure trove of deals on several versions of The Secret of Monkey Island®: Special Edition titles, including:
• 50% off the iPhone and iPod touch version of LucasArts’ new The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition via Apple’s App Store
• 50% off The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition on Steam®, Valve Corporation’s delivery and management platform for the PC and Direct2Drive, IGN Entertainment’s digital download store

For a in depth review of the Episode 1 Click Here

After the wonderful playthrough of Sam N Max I’ve been itching to get into another Point N Click Adventure. My requirements were pretty high as I wanted that lovable charm and twisted sense of humor that was Sam N Max. After various failed attempts at getting my old copy of Full Throttle to work I had all but given up. Avast, Tales of Monkey Island of the port bough? Oh yes it was time for Guybrush Threepwood Mighty Pirate™! Though to my dismay Vista had to give me just a little bit of shit. After sitting there “patiently” and updating my flippin Direct X Drivers it was time to set sail. How does this game hold up against one of the most beloved Point N Click Adventure series.

Gameplay

Let me start by saying TellTale delivers again. I don’t know about you I really liked Sam & Max but I felt it was a bit hard to control with just Point N Click. With Tales of Monkey Island you use the Mouse to Point N Click and the WASD to move Guybrush around. I felt this worked really well with the genre. Almost an evolution of controls. Clicking on things constantly to move your character can be a bit annoying. Luckily they added both options, so you can still click for navigation if you would like. Giving you the best of both worlds. Next up is the inventory screen, I was really impressed how the whole package felt very user friendly. Essentially you have small screen that pops up to show you inventory. On the left hand side there is a combination area. Simply drag and drop items and click plus to combine. Felt really simple, you also have the ability to examine Items using the Magnifying Glass. This comes in handy especially when items contain other items. The overall gameplay is much like you’ve seen in other Monkey Island games. You guide Guybrush through many different puzzles and try to save the day while taking in the some odd humor.

Graphics

I have to be honest I wasn’t really to sure on how the art style was going to fit the Monkey Island series. Seeing Guybrush with facial hair made me a little concerned. I buckled down and booted up the game and was wowed by the transition to 3D. I’ve seen Monkey Island 4 and it’s attempt at 3D but it never felt right. Right off the bat though everything felt so alive with this version. From the awesome character models to the more the gorgeous backgrounds. Everything just looked right. I was also amazed with the Lip Syncing. All the character models seem to really be delivering their lines. With great facial and body expressions.

Sound

Again with the booting up of the game. Within a couple of minutes I was whistling away to the Theme Song. All the SFX sounded fantastic and really brought a nice atmosphere to the game. With the great lip syncing was a top notch voice acting. I really liked how the characters sounded especially with the combination of the expressions. It just gave this game that very alive feeling.

Overall

I think this is a great addition to the Monkey Island Series. From the Art Style to the Graphics this is a true Monkey Island game. If your looking for a great laugh and enjoy oddly styled humor this is your game.

Gaming for me started in the early years of my childhood. Evolving from NES to Apple IIe to the glory days of the PC. During the glory days Lucas Art’s wasn’t just releasing the next iteration of the Star Wars Franchise. They were releasing these Point N Click adventures and they were great. Now I’d played plenty of Point n Clicks back in my time ranging from King’s Quest up to Full Throttle. The sad thing was for me during this time one particular Point N Click slipped through my grubby mouse clicking fingers. This jewel was constantly advertised and various demos were included in almost all Lucas Art’s Games. This game of course was Sam & Max. I heard the series was going through a rebirth and I got really excited well for a moment and then I saw the PC requirements. Again to my dismay I would be unable to play Sam & Max lucky for me Telltale Games has released it on both the Wii and the Xbox 360. How does the Point and Click hold up to today’s standards? A question that I shall answer.

Gameplay:

I got to play the XBLA version of Sam & Max and from the very beginning it was very clear that Point N Click is far from dead. The Gameplay is pretty much the same as it’s always been. You Point your cursor on something and then you click. This was handled very interesting considering the transition from Mouse to Controller. Your left stick essentially controlled the cursor while your A Button was your Click. I have to say that it worked out very nicely and it was quite a relief to see the cursor. Some Point N Clicks attempted to remove the cursor and replace it with text on the screen. Often times you would miss items and it became more of a pain. The thing that’s sets this game apart from most is the story and humor. This isn’t King’s Quest this is Sam & Max which essentially means think outside of the box. From Dropping Bowling Bowls from Open Window or feeding Actors Cow Pies the Humor never stops. It’s also interesting in how the game is broken up. It’s broken up into multiple chapters, at first I had my concerns that it would make the game feel choppy. After a couple of Chapters I discovered quite the opposite, it actually made the game flow better. It was also fun to load up a New Chapter and be intrigued with how the Game Elements would change. Each Chapter had various types of themes that would also effect characters that you know. It made it really fun to always expect something new.

Sound:

This game delivers the sound and then some. One thing that certainly stood out was the Voice Acting. Like most of the newer Point and Click titles there is full voice overs. Which is one of the bigger drawing points of the game. The Diolouge is always pretty funny and at times there are those one jokes that just push to a LOL status. The Music was also a nice touch, adding to what felt like a really polished game.

Graphics:

I was really surprised how well the transition was from 2D to 3D. The characters look solid, especially Max. It really helped set the tone, it looked cartoony but still with a certain edge. At times I was surprised by how well everything seemed to mesh together. It was also nice to see the Lip Syncing was down pretty well to. Really added and extra depth on each of the characters.

Overall:

Well I can say with great confidence that the Point N Click Adventures is far from dead. They hold up really well to today’s standards. With the recent announcement of Monkey Island it seems that there is still plenty of interest in the genre. Hopefully it will only continue and slowly evolve. With consoles going the route of motion control it only appears that it will. I can only imagine what a Point N Click with Natal could be like :)

ARRRR! The first episode o’ Tales o’ Monkey Isle “Launch of the Screaming Narwhal”, arrr be available fer PC this comin’ Toosdee, July 7th. To hold ye off until then, we be havin’ got a gameplay video, screenshots an’ idee art straight from Tell Tale Games. Be havin’ a look.