Monkey Island: The Siege of Spinner Cay

While spoilers are mostly avoided in this review, if you haven’t played the first episode you are warned to steer clear. Also if you haven’t read our review for Launch of the Screaming Narwhal, stop on your tracks and read it now .

Welcome back. Done? Good. Now, with most of the bases covered, it’s worthless to go in depth over the same things again, as The Siege of Spinner Cay plays pretty much the same as the first episode. Picking up exactly on the cliff you were left hanging in the last episode, you’re immediately greeted with a puzzle that needs to be solved while you’re battling femme fatalle Morgan LeFlay. Piratey.

The Siege of Spinner Cay takes better advantage of 3D this time around with the dynamic camera angles doing some neat stuff with depth of field as you move around, making good use of Guybrush's surroundings. The change in scenery is also appreciated and helps differentiating between the episodes, with several small islands to explore this time around.

The sassy Pirate Hunter Morgan LeFlay.

In good Monkey Island fashion, you need to explore everything thoroughly to get through the game and while the puzzles are, perhaps still a tad too easy they seem to flow better than in the first episode. There’s still a slightly annoying jungle though, but thankfully it’s not nearly as bad the one in Floatsam. The dialogue is funnier, more interesting and ripe with references to Screaming Narwhal and the previous entries in the series. Fans will be pleasantly surprised.

One of the flaws we pointed out the first time was that the dialogue lines you picked were mostly inconsequential, with Guybrush saying something completely different than what you chose almost every time. It’s something that can lead to great jokes, but in the end was overused, making a dent on both the humour and the logic behind the conversations.
This time around Telltale didn’t fall down the same hatch, Guybrush says what you've chosen for him to say, sometimes exactly like it was written, other times changing slightly and others completely, all done in a way that can surprise you and get some laughs out of you while still keeping your choices relevant.

Someone doesn't like Threepwood's facial hair!

The main characters are memorable and funny, with special mention to LeChuck, who's taken a very interesting turn. Elaine on the other hand seems to be going way too soft , at least when she’s in her normal mood. Unfortunately, the secondary characters are very forgettable with unremarkable and unoriginal designs. The voices actors did a great job once again and the Caribbean soundtrack is spot on, but unfortunately the audio on the Wii version is still too compressed. The framerate problems from before are still here, but slightly better and with less hiccups. It’s still a shame that Telltale couldn’t get the engine right for the Wii version though, even if progress was made.

The Siege of Spinner Cay, while flawed and shorter than the first episode, is an overall better experience and if you finished the first episode you should of course get this one, once again with the warning that the Wii version’s audio and framerate aren’t as good as the PC version. And remember, you'll surely avoid scurvy if you all eat an orange!

Comments

Auntnadia Says:
October 7th, 2009 at 05:44 || Total Comments: 740

i'd give it 4 or 5/10. the sound (to my ears) was much worse than episode 1. i had to adjust the levels just to hear the narrative, which was often crackly. it tended to freeze between every section. when i attempted to return to wii menu, it crashed. the game was too short for the price tag. the environments had obvious seams running through them. when you return to the cannon, lechuck has gone, but the game thinks he's still there. when you return to the shrine (after opening it) the graphic returns to closed, but the game thinks it's open. the only saving graces are that it's monkey island (probably something to do with the inflated scores) and that it's very well written.

Hellfire Says:
October 7th, 2009 at 06:10 || Total Comments: 735

Well opinions are opinions :) I deny however that the score was inflated just because it's Monkey Island, not only do I place little importance in the final score, I thought this episode better than the 1st one and it was improved from the first one, so it deserves more praise than the first one. Again, the number at the end, is the least important part of the review.

Auntnadia Says:
October 8th, 2009 at 06:20 || Total Comments: 740

i agree. but it is inflated nonetheless. your average score is 6.8, but you gave it an overall of 8 :p i wasn't just talking about your review though. every review i've read has picked out many unforgiveable flaws, then given it 70 or 80% i wonder if people would be so forgiving if it was developed by EA or capcom.

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