Welcome back me 'hearties to the second part of my swashbuckling tale were we'll explore the magic of the second iteration of the popular adventure game series.

Another famous cover art by Steve Purcell

After the enormous success of The Secret of Monkey Island it was only natural to create a sequel. Monkey Island 2: Le Chuck's Revenge was voted the most anticipated game of 1991 on numerous websites. To most people it was hard to believe that something better than The Secret of Monkey Island could be created. Gilbert, on the other hand, did not. Monkey Island 2 has come to be known as the definitive MI (Monkey Island ) experience. The puzzles were better, the gameplay was smoother and less clunky, the script was funnier, the graphics were even more breathtaking than the first and the music has only ever been matched by Monkey Island 3. MI2: LeChuck's Revenge was better in all aspects than the first. It wasn't an easy task.

Again Dave Grossman and Tim Schafer helped co-create Monkey Island 2 keeping their signature humor style intact and building on it to make it even more hilarious. Meanwhile due to the lack of flexibility in the music department for Monkey Island 1, Michael Land decided to create a system that allowed him to re-compose music in real time from within the game, allowing for seamless transition between musical scores. The system was called iMUSE. The team for MI2 retained most of the guys that worked on TSoMI.

The ideas for Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge were conceived in mostly the same way as TSoMI. More references from the Disneyland ride were also present in this iteration.

Monkey Island 2 also had versions for the PC, Amiga and most recently the PS3, XBOX 360, iPhone and iPad via the Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge Special Edition remake. The remake includes full HD graphics, full voice, updated UI and developer commentary with the 3 creators themselves.

Cover by Steve Purcell

Cover from the game remake

The story in MI2 again is very funny with some of the funniest lines in gaming. The "How much wood, would a woodchuck chuck" conversation between Guybrush and the Wood-smith is highly entertaining.
Guybrush Threepwood, after defeating LeChuck, decides to embark on a new adventure in search of the legendary treasure, Big Woop. The myth behind Big Woop involves 4 pirates who find Big Woop and decide that it's too great for anyone to have so they bury the treasure and split the map into 4 pieces with each pirate taking 1 of them. When Guybrush enters the pirate town of Woodtick he is immediately held up by a short ruffian, Largo LaGrande. Largo steals all of Guybrush's money which pushes him to put a stop to Largo's mean streak. To do this a voodoo doll is assembled and used against Largo. At this time Guybrush shows Largo the animated beard of LeChuck. Largo then snatches the beard and runs from Woodtick. From here, the plan to revive LeChuck goes underway.

Guybrush must now locate the treasure of Big Woop before, the now Zombie pirate, LeChuck does. In Guybrush's quest he'll run into characters that we know and love like Stan, the salesman and meet new characters like Wally, the cartographer.

The story is more complex this time around with numerous conversations surfacing about the ending of the game as well as what the so called "Secret" of Monkey Island actually is. However the secret still hasn't been revealed even to this day and Ron Gilbert, the creator, is the only person that can rectify that.


The gameplay in MI2 is the same the first. Additions include less verb options and a Lite Mode for the new players while the hardcore guy's got to enjoy the iMUSE system which heightened the gameplay experience.

The primary objective is to use these commands to solve logical puzzles which on completion will progress the story of the game.

The inventory and dialogue are still heavily present in this iteration. Even more so than the first game due to the larger amount of content in this game. It's almost 3 times longer than the first.

The puzzles in MI2 are fantastic. Using foreshadowing to give clues on how to solve puzzles that are still hours away. The flow of puzzles is also great. The game is broken up into 4 parts and each part has a big puzzle that needs to be solved and to solve it you need to solve the smaller puzzles. For instance in the first chapter you need to get Largo off the island because he is mean. In order to solve that puzzle you need to create a voodoo doll of Largo. To create the doll you need 4 ingredients. Each ingredient has a puzzle associated with obtaining it. This pattern is apparent in 3 of the 4 chapters.

Again the graphics are fantastic and have taken an upgrade since the first game to feature more colours and more detail. The game still has it's realistic style graphics which WILL change in the next installment in the series.


The audio in MI2 is arguable the best in any adventure game. It also features iMUSE which is actually not technically possible to do today. iMUSE allows composers to blend their music/re-compose their music on the fly which means there is no cut when 1 score switches to another. It's only possible because the music is MIDI which means created electronically. That means being able to change the music with programming is possible. In todays games all the music is created via real instruments that need to be recorded into the computer making it hard to edit in great detail afterward. For this reason MI2 has some of the best music/sound design ever to grace the game industry.


Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge is regarded as the best adventure game ever created.
Due to the game building on everything that was present in the first, as well as introducing iMUSE to the industry, it's not hard to see why.

It would be 5 long years before Guybrush would go on another crazy adventure. However when he finally re-surfaced the splash he made was the biggest yet. With a whole new team and upgrades to SCRUMM and iMUSE the next Monkey Island is seen by some as the best of the series before it's downturn. Stay tuned to find out why.