Monkey Island SPEEDRUNS? Ron Gilbert Opens Up

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[@ChaosPootato]

His point about why random puzzles are there is absolutely crucial to me. The a-ha moment when you figure out what goes where or you connect several events in the game is super addictive

[@Lektuerekurs]

Yes, but also 10year old me from the past responding: playing something like Indy 3 and stuff randomly working can also be a relief😅😅 Of course his point is very valid. That was just the first thing that came to my mind 😂

[@burtcolk]

Hearing him mention “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” as an inspiration right before the question about the “fake world” recurring motif in his games really made it click for me (even though he didn’t actually draw the connection in the interview). The abrupt “oops this was just a movie and we have to stop now” anticlimax punchline of Holy Grail is so clearly the progenitor of all the Ron Gilbert anticlimax-endings. I’m sure this has been pointed out before, but if I’d seen it, I’d forgotten. Thanks for the interview!

[@Airosteh5th]

That punchline also happens in his other example, Blazing Saddles.

[@wodmarach]

Holy grail's ending though, the amount of people who never get that it's a literal "cop-out".

[@MichaelPohoreski]

16:39

[@kiefrichards]

ron is like the man who invented the bicycle watching the tour de france and cheering the riders on

[@trustnoone81]

Ron is like the man who invented the air conditioner watching smart nerds repurpose the compressor as jet engine and cheering them on.

[@navyman4]

This is the smartest comment on this video

[@theredeft5319]

I think his perspective on why Guybrush wouldn’t really work in a non-interactive setting is really interesting. It shows how he really has a good understanding of the character and gets why it works for the game setting.

[@MichaelPohoreski]

18:10

[@High_Priest_Jonko]

In the game you are Guybrush, in a movie you'd just be watching some guy called Guybrush

[@BanksZero]

I'm biased for sure but Ron just seems chill. And down to earth despite the weight of his legend.

[@Lektuerekurs]

D'uh, he's "down to earth" **because** of the "weight" of his legend.... he has no other chance 😂

[@kcccc5682]

I think it's interesting that his disparaging example of not having RNG is "just look in the second coffin and he's there" because that's exactly the puzzle solution in Lite mode.

[@someoneelse1534]

Ron seem really humble. I love his outtakes on Speedrunning, some devs get way too worked up about someone "skipping" their work even when that person has played it thousands of times

[@wowsnav]

he's not humble at all though, Return to Monkey Island was him giving the fans the middle finger, intentionally picking an art style he knew long term Monkey Island fans would hate, and then further twisting the knife by making the ending of that game boil down to "all Monkey Island games are fake, they are lies Guybrush told to his son Boybrush to entertain him" which seems more like an intentionally vile destruction of his own game franchise than anything remotely related to humility.

[@Lektuerekurs]

21:13 I specifically remember, as a kid, that I thought that Guybrush wasn't this upbeat youngish hero an Monkey Island II. I would agree that he is either more jerkish or but at least he gets more negative/annoyed reactions from his surroundings or the game points it out more. Also Monkey Island 1 is my favourite video game and brought so many positive moments into my 8-9 year old life. So thank you Ron Gilbert and thanks for the Interview OSE !

[@Finsternis..]

3:20 Anyone familiar with the detective adventure "Mortville Manor"? They actually had that issue where the solution was fixed and a magazine printed it out, so people could literally solve the game without really interacting with the characters and finding clues doing a couple of mechanical things. In later versions of the game, they introduced a questionaire shortly before the conclusion, making the player answer what the plot is. Actually somewhat deep questions. It is contextually really unfitting that these questions pop up, but it shows there is, or at least was, some interest in having the player actually experience the game rather than just be done with it.

[@RotundRager]

What a chill guy. Feels like talking to your uncle that did a lot of stuff back in the day, and he takes joy talking about some of the stuff you have in common.

[@mattyjohnsson257]

Ron's great.

[@mikedrop4421]

OSE flexing that Ron Gilbert friendship on us again. We get it man, you have cooler friends than we do. 😜

[@OneShortEye]

Heh, I wouldn't say we're friends, per se, but it was great talking with him

[@CreativeSteve69]

I'm so glad to have grown up playing computer games in my late kid-early teen phases in the mid 90's. Starting out with Monkey Island playing the third one at the time. Alognside the CD rom that came with the computer known as captain claw another fun filled pirate platformer. Ron seems such like a humble guy to talk to. Also if it weren't for gaming in my early years to now. I probably wouldn't found my love on being a solo learning indie dev. Thanks so much Ron for making MI. :)

[@mecjamoss5535]

Ron: "Speedrunners...go through as fast as they can without cheating..." * _lowers cheat hat_ * 😬

[@W3bba]

18:20 Oh come on Ron. The perfect answer would be: A Theme Park called Big Whoop

[@plingiu]

Very cool that Ron Gilbert was up to this :)

[@mistercallme3047]

Not sure if you will see this comment Ron. Just want to say a huge thank you for giving us some indredible games! Grew up playing lots of adventure games in the 90s and i still hold those memories in my heart to this day.

[@Lektuerekurs]

The moment us 8 year old kids discovered to use the bucket as the helmet in the circus ..... - opened a new world for me - is a moment I will always remember - uhm, can you please repeat what you just said

[@PregnantOrc]

As far as non game projects if money was no issue I'd say an escape room or murder mystery mansion event based around Monkey Island would fare better than a film or show in terms of retaining player agency will offering something fun

[@user-nt1yb5kr8x]

Literally has "Escape" in the name. Markets itself in the escape room industry xD

[@MagusMarquillin]

What a great idea! In fact, I never realized escape rooms have a lot in common with adventure games, they could adapt so many IPs towards the idea to great effect! Maniac Mansion, Indiana Jones, The Last Express, Laura Bow, or 5 Days a Stranger, Broken Sword, Myst or Conquest of Camelot's Catacombs would be perfectly suited. Unfortunate that adventure games aren't more popular, it's kind of unlikely for them to get licensed for that, but next to Indiana, or other games like Sherlock Holmes that are adaptations themselves, Monkey Island could have the best chance to be realized that way.

[@adventuring_sam6589]

Awesome stuff! Ron is sooo leChill :) I'd propose that RNG in adventure speedrunning also has SOME positives too (or am I the only one that thinks this :D) - it adds a certain extra special quality to WR runs, with the excitement of knowing that the runner has had to pull off that top execution in those very rare instances of top RNG

[@OneShortEye]

It's a weird balance. Too much RNG, it gets frustrating. No RNG, and there's not as much excitement to it. (And people complain, "where's the challenge? Isn't this just like following a walkthrough?")

[@crowhaveninc.2103]

What an inspiring man. Loved the interview :) Always nice when developers are so close to the community of their games.

[@spladam3845]

This was great, thanks for taking the time and getting him on.

[@Karanagi]

Great interview! As long as Ron Gilbert keeps making games, I'll keep playing them :)

[@oumtjackawillie]

In a short period of time I've stumbled across videos featuring people I never realized I was a fan of. Last week I was recommended Genndy Tartakovsky answering questions and now this. Two major contributors to a much better childhood than it otherwise would have been... 🥰

[@weirdproq]

This was a great interview. Loved this! Ron seems like such a nice guy.

[@High_Priest_Jonko]

Such an honor to hear a mastermind designer and programmer game pioneer talk so openly like this

[@AmedeusMkII]

Monty Python and the Holy Grail and Blazing Saddles are tied for my favorite movie. I was so giddy when he listed them both off. Man has taste.

[@daveg7516]

I agree fantastic taste 😂

[@T0mek87]

I think its really heartwarming on how they approached the Return to Monkey Island. So, Ron had this great idea on Monkey Island trilogy, with the supposed reveal in the third part, that its all a theme park. And for years he wanted to do a third game of his own, where he would reveal this. But then when he actually got to it, he was much older, with different perspective on life, realized that this game has a lasting legacy, that's no longer just his own, and he can't just dismiss everything that came later. And even if there were no other games than MI1 and MI2, he said it himself, that the great idea he had for the ending might not have been that good of a twist, when you need to design the entire game around it. So i love how RTMI ended - a love letter to all MI fans, that pays respect to all the creators that worked on other games as well. I hope we get some more Monkey Island adventures in the future - maybe some more self-contained stuff, without lechuck, or even with guybrush and chuckie as kids, without that much reliance on existing MI lore, but kinda there as well. C'mon Ron, do it :)

[@Mantis47]

Excellent interview, very interesting! Funny thing, the "Guybrush is a jerk" thing kind of extended to the rest of the genre. Tons of point & click protagonists take whatever they need and screw over whoever they have to obtain their goals, and without malicious intent, most of the times, they just have to do it.

[@matthewwalker5430]

Not that he'll ever see this, but thank you Ron for all your games but, in particular, for Return to Monkey Island. As a fan of old point and click adventure games really good ones come few and far between and to have a new instalment of one of my favourite series done so well was just such a joy to play. I don't speed run, I take my time and enjoy every puzzle, but it was really nice to see other people love these games too but in a totally different way. I hope speedrunners and players like me show that there is still a market for these great games, please never stop making them, you're a legend!

[@CoolGobyFish]

Ron, is that you?))) Nice try. You deserve all the hate you get for Return. I hope you never get funding ever again.

[@rancid83]

Honestly I was surprised at his answer about Monkey Island: the movie. The first Pirates of the Caribbean movie literally felt like MI: the movie to me, all the way down to the insult swordfighting and how Orlando Bloom looked.

[@thefonzkiss]

That project started as a MI movie then they changed it to a more general thing. Steve Purcell has confirmed it.

[@PregnantOrc]

Very much ageee. Will and Jack are a good split of Guybrush and the player with neither being one or the other but a mix of both

[@connie_d]

There was that bit in one of the films rowing through the swamp to the voodoo lady too which was obviously a direct rip.

[@rancid83]

@@PregnantOrc I actually thought Jack represented post-MI2 Guybrush, and Will was pre-MI1. But I guess that's up to interpretation 😅

[@MyAmazingUsername]

​​@@thefonzkiss No. Monkey Island was based on the Pirates of the Caribbean amusement park ride from the 1960s, and the novel "Stranger Tides" by Tim Powers. Ron Gilbert has confirmed it. And even though there was indeed work on a Monkey Island movie, and they met with people who later made Pirates of the Caribbean, all people involved on all sides have denied any copying between the two movies. The PotC movie was based on the amusement park ride.

[@lancebaylis3169]

It's interesting hearing Ron introspect a bit about game design. He made a lot of these games as antitheses of Sierra's adventure games, and much of his frustration with those was about puzzles not feeling intuitive, so hearing that he feels the same way about the ending of MI2 is really interesting. For the most part Gilbert was successful in his aim of getting the balance right between challenging puzzles and them being fun to figure out, but that whole LeChuck sequence feels in some ways like a Sierra puzzle more than a Lucasarts one. Everything you need is right there, but it's not exactly intuitive. Giving him the hankerchief was something it took me a long time to figure out the first time I played the game as a kid, and meanwhile there was a LOT of frustrating getting zapped by LeChuck and wandering around without a clear idea where to go next.

[@Cowclops]

Not monkey island or even ron gilbert, but I have a story that will certainly amuse people: My wife needed emergency surgery and it was scheduled for 3 sundays ago. That day just happened to be the 30th anniversary of the release of Day of the Tentacle (not something I had marked in my calendar, I randomly found out about it from a facebook lucasarts fan group). Well when they rolled her into surgery i knew I had a couple hours to kill and I had my laptop on me... so I fired up dosbox and beat Day of the Tentacle in one sitting. I was able to finish it with plenty of time to spare before she was out of the OR. I'm not a speed runner, and I'm pretty sure that was the first one-sitting playthrough of that for me but I felt like that was an absolute win.

[@janew2108]

This was a great interview. Ron seems like a cool dude.

[@skRapKlan]

Ahh what a treat! Thanks for the awesome video!

[@piratepop7115]

Ron Gilbert is a legend

[@Ledore464]

Yes!

[@Hdx64]

1 second in, and you already got me hooked!

[@CultureFiendMedia89]

Great interview! It was a good start to my morning

[@boffyb]

As a fan of _Monkey Island_ and _Our Flag Means Death,_ I’m chuffed to hear Ron Gilbert praising that show out of the blue 😃

[@Keatwonobe]

The saga of this channel is the most wholesome thing

[@bobdedbuilder463]

I would have loved to meet him in person and sign his name on something. I am jealous that you even got to talk with him really cool

[@j.walker6845]

Great interview, what a creator!

[@AdventureGameGeek]

From the thumbnail it looks like speedrunning Ron Gilbert's games is the ultimate insult 😜

[@aSwineofCulture]

How appropriate. You fight like a cow!

[@vaderwalks]

I'm currently grinding the world record on clicking an OSE vid when it's uploaded.

[@LaukkuPaukku]

I'd like to some day see what Gilbert has to say about the forest map warp in Monkey Island 1.

[@Lektuerekurs]

I habe finished watching this awesome video! now it's time to go outside, pick some flowers, or annoy the neighbour's dog 😊

[@High_Priest_Jonko]

24:32 Game mastermind

[@BenBreard]

That was epic! Thanks

[@esotericVideos]

This video was great! I loved it. I just subscribed as a result.

[@OneShortEye]

Glad to have you around!

[@MagusMarquillin]

You know your channel is legit with interviews like this! Hope you reach out to more creators, and record their reaction to this odd gaming evolution. Al Lowe would almost certainly willing.

[@redmoose1447]

can confirm that our flag means death is definitely worth a watch. the first season atleast anyway. thanks for the enjoyable interview

[@ashen-one--x]

great video!

[@davidsenra2495]

As for being a jerk, my feeling is that in Monkey 2 Guybrush is more mature and his naive illusion of pirate life from Monkey 1 has kinda worn off. While in Monkey 1 he's adventuring in a new and exciting world for him, in Monkey 2 the stakes are much higher and he just wants to get rid of whatever is his current problem/situation. Kinda like getting into adult life? Lol

[@ignaciovecino]

I liked hard puzzles in the first Monkey Islands. Return, I finished it in a day or two. Monkey 2 would take weeks. You had to really imagine possible things to do. That was part of the magic, I didn't get frustrated as a kid, it was just that, we're stuck in the game, we don't know what to do, and that was great. I used to play them with my brother, great memories. You had to think, really think.

[@SvenQ45]

Interesting. Didn´t know that about Lechuck but I always thought that sometime he comes faster and sometimes slower.

[@PadanFain836]

Thank you Ron

[@dylanmiller9162]

Blazing Saddles as a comedic influence? Truly a man of culture

[@gustavosantos106]

Thank you for this

[@InstitutoPianoBrasileiro]

Hello OneShortEye, thank you for your terrific work on preserving the history of point & click adventures. Could you please share with us the setup you used to make the online interviews? The result is great! We're looking for the right softwares to have that kind of side by side result, with no echo or lag issues. Thank you

[@OneShortEye]

I use Zencastr (zencastr.com/) as my recording platform for interviews. It records each person's audio and video locally and separately, then uploads it. That way, you have the best possible quality without dropouts or lots of compression. The rest of it, like the side-by-side, was done in DaVinci Resolve, a video editor. But you can do that with any video editing program. There are some editing features in Zencastr itself, but I've never used them.

[@InstitutoPianoBrasileiro]

@@OneShortEye excellent, thanks for the info. And which software do you use for the video calls? Skype? Zoom?

[@OneShortEye]

@@InstitutoPianoBrasileiro Zencastr is the software for the video calls. Sorry if I was unclear on that.

[@OneShortEye]

@@InstitutoPianoBrasileiro To add to my previous response: Zencastr works very similar to how Zoom and Skype work, but it's done in-browser. The difference is, instead of recording the live feed, it records locally on each person's computer. Then the separate audio/video tracks are automatically uploaded as the conversation goes on, and you download them all afterwards. Then you have to put those together in a video editor.

[@johnsknows3135]

great!

[@AdventureGameHotspot]

Nicely done

[@HorseTeethModano]

A brick is a brick is a brick.

[@NeonNijahn]

This is dope

[@nngnnadas]

I love how the comment tell us lechuck-appearance-chance is x mean after we already seen it earlier, and then it lies that it's 1 : 10 instead of 1 : 11.

[@OneShortEye]

I think Ron just made an easy-to-make off-by-one error. But I did confirm with a few people that, in SCUMM, random(10) gives a number from 0-10, not 1-10

[@r.rodrigues9929]

Dude is chill as fuck! I like him!

[@englishwithphil42]

This channel has officially peaked.

[@katanasteel]

The monkey island theme park.... was what instantly thought about

[@MagusMarquillin]

Yep, full circle from Pirates of the Caribbean. But, really, I want Adventure Land, with at least one ride made for each game, if not a full district.

[@johnwisdomtv]

OneShortEye posted... TODAY IS A GOOD DAY

[@MostlyUnrelated]

I've actually tried visiting all the map squares to find the sunken ship in my childhood because I couldn't figure out the puzzle otherwise, but there was no sunken ship in the final one, all of them were empty, and I dived into each one as well. Where does the info about the last square come from? Was it not present in all the versions?

[@OneShortEye]

I was informed of this by KCadventure (who I interviewed in the MI2 video), and he figured it out from reading the SCUMM scripts. Was it possible that you visited a square, then reloaded a save when it wasn't there? Because that would've made it so you couldn't find it. Other than that, I don't know much, but here's verbatim what KC posted in discord: -The location is set on reading the book, or on visiting the final square if you've visited every square -You don't have to dive down to set a square as "visited" -There are 100 squares, but 18 of them are classed as "visited" from the start of the game (4 around Booty, 8 around Scabb, 6 around Phatt) -If you read the book, it will set the location to a non-visited square.

[@MostlyUnrelated]

@@OneShortEye it could be, was a long time ago and I was just a kid back then. Now I'm a little upset that I must've messed it up somehow and spent a lot of time for nothing, but oh well, that's what kids do I guess. Thank you for replying in any case, love your videos, always a treat and a pleasant nostalgia trip when a new one uploads!

[@davidsenra2495]

I feel like I wanted a bit more info from that interview regarding the games themselves and a bit less regarding the speedrunning aspects (which are interesting, but are much more well covered in the related videos). Still, I understand your channel is pretty much devoted to speed running, so I understand it's hard for you to get away from it. Anyway, thanks for the interview, your work is really good.

[@OneShortEye]

If you want a more comprehensive interview with Ron, I'd recommend this one: kzbin.info/www/bejne/rXrLqY2PhreNbrM

[@davidsenra2495]

@@OneShortEye thank you, buddy.

[@ColinfromCanada]

Quest for Glory 4 speedrun history next, please?

[@Nillerus]

How did i miss this one!? This is amazing I mean, sure, I started watching 2 minutes after it released, but that's still too long.

[@aglioeolio7730]

what do you mean, miss it? it just got uploaded

[@snowblack90]

what do you mean by missing it? this has just been uploaded.

[@henryokeeffe5835]

Yeah, I can't believe how I missed this one either

[@ramigilneas9274]

Good old times when amazing games were still made by a hand full of people or even just one person. It still happens… but today the expectations are simply way too high.

[@reaper84]

Cool interview! Could have gone longer. ❤

[@nowwithvitaminr]

Just noticed he's wearing Stan's shirt 😅

[@skidwardshlongington8025]

im down for another monkey island. or full throttle. or loom

[@The.Crawling.Chaos.]

watching Ron Gilbert makes me think of him as a cousin of George Lucas, that mighty shirt!

[@boffyb]

That's interesting, I was just thinking that with this beard, he looks like Matt Groening.

[@The.Crawling.Chaos.]

@@boffyb Good point. he looks like both! :D ps. Let's make a compromise :D

[@briangoldberg4439]

Ron should make a retro version of Return to Monkey Island with MI2 style graphics and less hand-holding. That would be awesome.

[@averagefez]

Did you just get here? Complaining about RTMI's graphics is old hat. It's all about hating the ending now

[@Mewyabby]

Next up: Roberta Williams!

[@caesaria]

he really doesn't come across as a guy who's made the funniest game in history

[@matthewrease2376]

I hope he releases the source code

[@Nortoplpopolis]

Are you related to Jeffrey Combs?

[@OneShortEye]

No, but I have heard the comparison before lol

[@elasmojones]

Stapler...

[@ffrisby]

Disagree w/Ron about MI2 ending being badly designed :p

[@FINSuojeluskunta]

He fumbled Return so hard. But 1 and 2 were legendary games along with 3 and 4.

[@kcccc5682]

Cool to see a fellow defender of Escape, but rare to find anyone who prefers it to Return!

[@SchizophrenixTheGaul3478]

I basically grew up with Escape. And anyday would prefer them than the much modern ones with a little too much handholding

[@ch.k.3377]

In the single content it might be "Ok" but I see it in group play that people who just say "quick, quick" aren't really good for any game.

[@TaylorHelmutf5c]

ron is wrong.

[@HvH420]

The thumbnail comes across as misleading after watching the video, you make it seem like he is upset by people Speedrun ing his game when in reality he enjoys it.

[@daveg7516]

Using the compass 🧭 to get the key off the wall 😳😳😳 Also blazing saddles and monty python what a legend 😂