In the first game, swashbuckling was handled by using insults to demoralize the pirates until you were victorious. You "leveled up" in sword fighting by learning witty comments. Then, at the final duel, all of the punchlines become useful for different insults. Source of this fascinating gem of video-game writing: Orson Scott Card.

Ugh. I wish I hadn't learned that he was behind them.

Orson Scott Card is a complex and fascinating person and writer, who writes nuanced and sympathetic characters (Athiests, Catholics, independent women, housewives, nuns, children, Aliens, etc.) with not-clichéd interrelationships.

I find knee-jerk reactions like yours here pretty odd.

I love that this game series is still spawning theories like this, 20 years later.

The Monkey Island theme song gives me an adrenaline rush.

Then you'll probably like Eduardo Gouveia's "Monkey Island Rocks".

http://imuse.mixnmojo.com/fan.shtml#eduardo

Awesome track! Thanks! :)

Interesting theory, but I thought the secret was "Never pay more than 20 bucks for a computer game."

Monkey Island: greatest game ever.

There's something really inspiring about creating something quite as enduring as Monkey Island, that still has people talking about it all these years later.

as far as Schafer games go, it was much better than Psychonauts and a true classic but not as good as Grim Fandango.

Is there anywhere I can play Monkey island right now? Online perhaps or download to Linux?

I've never played it and would love to see what the fuss is about.

ScummVM will let you play a lot of old games in that style. You will have to "acquire" the data files for it.

http://www.scummvm.org/

Steam, Xbox Live Arcade or iPhone.

They need to bring out a movie. But I only think they'd do it justice if done in CGI rather than acted out with real people.

I think Ron Gilbert himself said on his blog that it hardly seemed worth it now that it had basically been done in the Pirates of the Caribbean

I hope you mean 2D pixelated CGI

That has to be the most satisfying theory yet. The "it's just a theme park" theory robs MI of its wonderful story-telling.

oh wow! my head was just blown