3/5
Let me speak about the entire game here. All 5 chapters in one go.
Ultimately the game is mid. If you are familiar with any of the Monkey Island games you may find this one to be familiar in design only, not in quality.
GAMEPLAY:
The greatest feature about this game is it's puzzles. The puzzles are equally as good as the previous titles. As usual they sometimes flop and sometimes they do something revitalizing and new. Movement was fine. Inventory was simplified but combining items made worse.
VISUALS: The general design is forgettable and not 2009's finest. No zone or area sinks into my heart like a Plunder, Blood, or Phatt Island (MI2-3). To nobody's gain, it may even remind you of a completly different game, eg. Chapter 2's Spinner Cay is a poor man's Zora's domain from Zelda, with now a different race of humanoids to boot. The character design is deplorable. Many major side characters are so plain and unremarkable I had a hard time recognizing them. I can think of five of these clowns that even share the exact same body frame, copy, paste, change the skin color. One idiot even looks like a rejected Mii.
WRITING: The larger part of characters themselves are massively irratating, and not in a fun way. Aside from a few examples like Winslow, Voodoo Lady and maybe De Singe. But even if the character is one of the better ones (eg. Morgan, Elaine) they are not free from inconsistent character actions nor... the worst type of humor of our age, 2005-2015 humor. Back then it was known as SO RANDOM, today it goes by Quirk Chungus. Almost every single character, Guybrush included, will make long winded, dramatic, overly obtuse retorts. Nothing like a bunch of theatre kids bowing to each other while regally speaking about tacos, pop-culture idiosyncrasies, and cats.
Then, Taletell added a growing set of character arcs that are fundamentally undeserved and wildly out of place. Never before has a Monkey Island game needed a 1 on 1 power talk to motivate the main protagonist into beliving in himself. I'd applaude the idea of trying something new as I will for several other ideas such as Le Pox. However, the games major narrative feels split on weather it wants to be a quirky heart warming cartoon for preteens or the satirical college age lampoon a Monkey Island game is supposed to be. I'm not joking. I don't think there was a single 4th wall break this entire game, a staple of the series.
I should also mention this game includes overly verbose dialog boxes with no info or humor for 5/6 choices.
Did I laugh? sometimes yes, but less than usual. But by many more accounts did I hate. In previous games I hated the puzzles often, sometimes even an overkilled joke or two (MI2). This game made me hate characters, plot, and puzzles.
Audio:
Not a single song or track to remember.
