You're playing it wrong: Monkey Island 2 LeChuck's Revenge

From thecrankyhermit

Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge was originally released in 1991 for DOS. It featured a MIDI score composed for the Roland MT-32, a high-end consumer grade synthesizer of the time. It was also compatible with OPL2 FM synth, which was used in Adlib and Sound Blaster cards, and is well emulated today.

The game introduced an important innovation: LucasArt's iMuse engine. This allows the MIDI score to flow dynamically; tracks transition seamlessly and interactively from one to another, and react to the player's actions. Upon leaving a location, the current theme ends with a flourish (one of several are possible depending on the current position of the music) and a new theme fades in. Events sync up with musical cues, and vice-versa. Tempo can change, music can play out of tune, instruments can be added or removed from the mix.

Nearly 20 years later, long after the DOS Monkey Island games ceased to be available, the original The Secret of Monkey Island was given a high definition remake and released on several platforms as "The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition." Unfortunately the new art style ranges from mixed to hideous. Fortunately, "original" mode can be toggled with a button press.

This was successful enough that in 2010, Monkey Island 2: Special Edition was released. It features:

  • Redone graphics and music
  • Full voice acting
  • Tweaked interface
  • Ingame hints
  • "Classic" mode toggleable with a button press


Graphics comparison:

DOS version

Special Edition


But there are several downsides too, and here is the biggest one; the music in "classic" mode is awful. Also, neither mode gets iMuse completely right (more on that later), but "classic" mode just sounds bad, like they picked the wrong instruments for everything.

Monkey Island 2 really needs to be experienced with its original graphics and sounds. It is just as much of a standalone work of art as the remake is, and subjectively, I would say the original's art direction is stronger and more consistent than the HD remake's. The toggleable "classic" mode SHOULD allow this, and in the case of The Secret of Monkey Island SE, it does. But in Monkey Island 2 SE, the music makes "classic" mode worthless for anything but comparing old graphics to new.

On iMuse, there's a good reason why the modern mode isn't quite the same. Modern mode uses a pre-recorded, digital soundtrack, as nearly all games of the 21st century do, which is an inherently less flexible format than MIDI. Tweaking it at all is much more difficult than tweaking MIDI, and most developers are content to use simple fade-out transitions to bridge from one piece to another. In the case of MI2:SE, they clearly put some effort into re-creating the effects of iMuse, and the music overall sounds pretty good. But not all of the tricks are preserved, and scene transitions feel a bit forced.

But "classic" mode's soundtrack appears to be a series of blunders. They could have used OPL2 FM synth emulation and played the original MIDI tracks, using the original iMuse system, and that would have been fine. But instead, classic mode ALSO uses a pre-recorded, digital soundtrack. They seem to have converted the MIDI tracks to this format, using poor or wrong instruments, resulting in the worst of all worlds; the synthetic sound of MIDI, with the inherent inflexibility of the pure digital format.

In addition to the music flaws, MI2:SE also truncates the intro. The intro isn't part of the plot, and a new player isn't likely to notice if they don't know what's missing, but that doesn't make the omission justified. The intro builds atmosphere, plays a role in pacing, and has some neat music and graphics, as well as dialog. Skipping it and heading straight to the main plot would be like having Star Wars skip the iconic scrolling yellow text at the beginning and jump straight to space ships shooting at each other. The ending is also cut a bit short, losing one final gag.

However, you can fix this! The original data files are included with MI2SE - you just have to dig for them. These data files can then be used with ScummVM, which much better approximates what the game SHOULD be like.

First you need Monkey Island Explorer.

Once you have it, run it. Click "Open," "Monkey Island 2: Special Edition," and then browse to the game directory, which should be: <steamDir>\steamapps\common\monkey2

Open the file "monkey2.pak." Click "Save all files" -> "Save all as is (raw)." Choose a directory to save the files in. Then wait awhile. You might get ScummVM while waiting, if you haven't already.

Once it's done, which will take several minutes, go to the directory you saved stuff in. One of the folders should be "classic." In that folder should be a folder called "en," which should contain two files - monkey2.000 and monkey2.001. Rename this folder (the one called "en") to something like "monkey2," and move it to your ScummVM directory. Then delete everything else that Monkey Island Explorer generated.

Launch ScummVM, click "Add Game," browse to that monkey2 folder you put in the ScummVM directory, and click "choose." Click "OK."

You can now play Monkey Island 2 through ScummVM, and hear that Adlib iMUSE in its full glory. Or MT-32 iMUSE if you're a real nerd and have an MT-32 (or can emulate one). As a bonus, ScummVM can play MT-32 music and play Adlib sound effects at the same time; the original could only do one or the other.

I highly recommend playing through it via ScummVM this way the first time.