Subject: REVIEW: Monkey Island II
From: Jarno Kokko <[email-masked]>
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.reviews

Monkey Island 2 is a massive icon driven graphical adventure.

     And again a little review from Jarnis(tm) - This time its
 
  M O N K E Y   I S L A N D   2  -  L E C H U C K ' S   R E V E N G E
 
   Publisher: Lucasfilm Games     Formats: Amiga (reviewed here)
                                           PC (Has been out before,
                                           is better than this)
 
   Price: Not sure, maybe 29.95 UK pounds. Out Now.
 
   Requires: 1 MB ram. More recommended.
   Massive *11* disk game. Naturally fully HD installable.
 
 Monkey Island 2 is a massive icon driven graphical adventure. 
 
 Idea goes something like this: After Monkey Island 1, Guybrush
 Threepwood had defeated the evil pirate LeChuck and everything was
 just fine. In the beginning of Monkey Island 2, Guybrush is stuck 
 in the Scabb-island, which is just about the worst place in the
 universe.  Evil guy named Largo LaGrande (Pal of the LeChuck, by
 the way) is controlling the whole island with a true Mafia-style,
 ripping people off all the time, etc. Also all the pirate friends
 of our hero have totally fed up hearing his stories about how 
 he defeated the horrible pirate LeChuck. In other words, life sucks.
 Guybrush Threepwood decides to seek for the legendary treasure called
 'Big Whoop' - and it's time for another adventure again!
 
 First impressions: 
 (note, I first loaded this game from floppies, which is *NOT* 
 recommended. Non-HD users should have at least 3 floppy drives
 and LOTS of patience.)
 This game really has loads of disk access, and the animation
 is a bit slow on basic A500. But it's not so important on an 
 adventure game anyway. Graphics is damn close to the VGA 
 originals, and it's VERY VERY WELL drawn with 32 colours. You 
 can tell the difference between PC's 256 colour mode and Amiga
 32 colours, but the difference doesn't affect the game anyway. 
 Graphics are truly lot better than I feared. Music is very well
 done, when it's playing - shame that quite large areas of the game
 has no background tune at all! Scrolling of the screen is done
 better than on PC, but it's still a bit jerky. Overall the game
 looks very good. Maybe bit slow, but still very good.
 
 Good points: The adventure itself is the same as on PC - meaning
 it's MEGA! Not too hard, but not too easy either, and it will keep
 you hooked for days. The adventure system (SCUMM) is also just as
 good as on PC. All the great jokes are there, and you will have lots
 of laughs while playing. Only Space Quest series had better jokes.
 Graphics is VERY well done considering we're talking about 32
 colours. Music - whenever anything is playing - is good.  Gameplay
 is bit too slow on an A500, but A500 and a hard disk will make it
 easily playable, and I suspect it's excellent on accelerated Amigas.
 
 Bad points: HORRIBLE amounts of disk access if played from floppies.
 Floppy users - FORGET THIS GAME until you buy a HD. Music stops
 during floppy access. (HD users will have no problems with this.)
 Too few tunes - only few of the tunes that played on the background
 on PC are there. Too large areas of the game are just silent.
 
 Graphics: 9   Sound: 7   Value: 8   Playability: 8 / 4 (HD/Floppy)
 
 Summary: A good graphical adventure, that is much more playable
 than the new sierras. Very well coded. Will keep you hooked
 for many days, maybe even weeks. Cries for HD. Adventurers GO
 OUT AND BUY IT!
 
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