A quick bit of history. In 2016, I bought the Daedalic bundle, at a really good price (a 90% discount). The bundle was definitely an impulse purchase as point and click games are not normally the type of games that I play. To my surprise, many of the games weren't half bad. Since then, I have bought a few more Daedalic games, also at a discount, and with mix results. With point and click games, Telltale games seems to have a really great reputation, so, in 2024, I decided to buy a Humble Bundle of Telltale games, hoping to get similar results (or perhaps even better). Tales of Monkey Island is the first game of this bundle that I tried. This game was chosen for a few reasons. It seems to have a comedic feel similar to Deponia (Daedalic flagship game), and it is connected to Lucas Arts, which also used to make point and click games. So, what is my opinion of this game? And how does it compare to Deponia?

Interestingly, unlike other TellTale games from the bundle, this game is broken into different chapters (as different games). So, this means that I will be doing a review of each chapter separately -- with a general review somewhat copied and pasted between the chapters (and updated as I go along). For this review, it will be for the third chapter, but I will also be comparing it to the previous chapters.

Story and puzzles. The story follows a comedic track, very much like Deponia -- albeit, with a lot less cruelty from the protagonist. Also, this game is a sequel to the Lucas Arts series, which I have not played. Overall, I thought it was well done. The characters are very likeable, and the story makes sense (arguable, since I only played three chapters so far). The puzzles are, IMHO, much better than Deponia. Arguably, it is a bit less complex, but the solutions makes sense. Deponia has much more complex puzzles, but they may not make sense. A harder puzzle with a nonsense solution, meant that it needed to be solved by trail and error, which is not good. The puzzles from the third chapter of Tales of Monkey Island, although not as good as the first chapter (IMHO), are still pretty good.

My main concern with the puzzles seems to be the type of puzzles. The puzzles in chapter 3 seems more focused on conversations, than with clues/maps. One cause could be location, and that backtracking is not possible. With chapter 1, it takes place on a relatively large island. With chapter 2, it takes place on a group of islands. However, with chapter 3, it takes place inside a (censored for spoilers). There just isn't enough space for the need for a map. And since the previous chapters are different games, you can't even backtrack to older locations. This means that chapter 3 feels very different from chapter 1 and 2. This is both good and bad.

Graphics/Sound. Nothing spectacular here, nor is it expected to be. Definitely serviceable, and almost as good as Deponia. With the first chapter of Tales of Monkey Island, there are a few puzzles that depended on the sound, so, you couldn't play with the sound off. With these last two chapters, technically, you can play without sound, but why would you?

Controls. Uses Mouse (and sometimes keyboard). No controller support. All in all, by this 3rd chapter, I am definitely getting much comfortable with the setup.

Overall, I liked this game, and highly recommend it. It followed the first two chapters very well. Arguably, I only played three chapters, but if the remaining concluding chapters are just as good, I may go back and buy the series from Lucas Arts. Great series of games.