This post was triggered after the shitstorm that hit social media in the previous days and was directed at the art direction that Return to Monkey Island took.
A quick TL;DR for those unaware: yes, Monkey Island is coming back, and in great style.
Made by its original creator, Ron Gilbert, along with all the gang that made The Secret of Monkey Island and Monkey Island 2 and the lovely voice that dubbed Guybrush Threepwood in Curse of Monkey Island, Dominic Armato.
It is real and a gameplay trailer was released few days ago which separated the fan base into two main categories: those who hated the new art style and are raging hard at the dev team in the hopes of pulling a Sonic the Hedgehog movie and see completely different graphics in the finished product and those who love the art and can’t wait for the game to come out.
There’s also a third category, those who don’t care about the art and are just in for the game, but those don’t make the news so we’re not going to talk about them here. Sorry.
A small premise: my opinion and view on this is a bit biased because I personally love the art and find it perfectly fitting to this type of game and I think that it sets the perfect atmosphere.
Despite this, after seeing Dominic Armato, the voice of Guybrush in Curse of Monkey Island, reply so passionately to many people on Twitter, I decided to give it a good night of sleep to think over what happened and try to analyze the situation from a different point of view.
Imagine waiting for something for a long time, maybe more than 30 years, building up your expectations, knowing that what you’ve been dreaming up to this day may never see the light. And then, on a magic morning, you find out that it’s real. Whatever you were expecting, be it a music album from your favorite musician, a movie or, in this case, a videogame, it is there, it’s coming out.
And it’s completely different from what you’ve been expecting.
30 years of waiting, hoping, not knowing if something like this will ever be done, and it’s here and you can’t help feeling absolutely destroyed as you watch the trailer. Be it the story, the music, the graphics or whatever: there’s no saving it, it is terrible.
All this time waiting, and it’s crap.
You go online on social media and you see lots of other people just like you sharing their grief. And you (and all the others) do what every human being would do: you share your frustration and anger, you make sure that your voice, among the others, is heard.
That voice is a scream.
It says: “I am hurt. I am in pain.”
And that’s because those people love that franchise, love the creators, love the games that they played as kids or young adults.
They care.
And the more they care, the more they feel hurt.
And the more they’re hurt, the more they are angered.
It is human emotion, and it manifests itself in various ways.
Some are more rational and subdued, others are more impulsive and violent.
Let me say this right here and now, though: it doesn’t matter how hurt and how passionate you are about something, personal attacks, insults and, generally speaking, lack of respect is not excusable by any means.
What poor Ron Gilbert had to suffer through the last days is inexcusable and should have never happened.
Letting the creators of a piece of art knowing of your disappointment is fine, but your criticisms should always be carried out gracefully.
I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge and reply to a tweet made by Jonathan Ackley, who has previously worked on Curse of Monkey Island:
Many great movements in art and design were set in motion by dissatisfaction with the status quo. It is valid to dislike a piece of art. Saying 'I don't like it,' does nothing to improve the situation. Helpful change happens by creating or supporting the art you'd like to see.
— Jonathan Ackley (@ackley_jonathan) June 29, 2022
Jonathan, most people are not artistically trained and lack the knowledge, expertise and experience to provide proper, constructive criticism and feedback. The best they can do is just share their “gut feeling”: as fans, sometimes the best they can do is just say “I don’t like it” and, sometimes, they could point you to examples of how they would have liked it.
Disregarding the “I don’t like it” of a fan who has never made a drawing and isn’t able to make a more in-depth contribution not out of laziness, but because he doesn’t have the skills or knowledge to do so, is, in my humble opinion, disrespectful.
On the other side, what can the artist do against such an argument?
The answer is simple: nothing.
The best they can do is to make a note of it and, should they find themselves working on a similar project, remember that the art style used in that particular game, in that specific context, wasn’t well received from a portion of the fan base.
And, of course, realize that you’ll never be able to make everyone happy, but as a professional artist you should already be well aware of this and know how to cope with it.
As I said in a tweet, sales number will speak more loudly than all the criticisms of all the angered fans put together. From there, the dev team and artists will decide whether it is wise to revise the art direction in their future projects.
Finally, a thought lingered in my head while I was half asleep yesterday night.
To us, gamers, the developers are like Kings (capital K): they create and dictate the rules of what we’re going to enjoy and we praise them and love them for their work.
But then I thought… what is a King without its kingdom?
Can a King still call himself such without anyone acknowledging him, without his people?
Does a King really own his kingdom?
Do game developers really own their game?
Or are their people, the fans, the ones who really own the game?
What is a game without players?
What is a franchise without fans?
Can a game even be said to exist without anyone playing it?
Those are the questions that have been buzzing in my head and to those questions, I’m afraid, I have no real answer.
Logic would have it that the developers of a game are, of course, the owners.
But on the other side, can a game without players still be regarded as a game?
Aren’t the players playing the game the ones that make it “real”?
As I watch the carnage that happened over the Return to Monkey Island art direction, I felt like I was watching the French Revolution happening: people with pitchforks assaulting their own King and the King slamming the doors shut and abdicating (admittedly, it didn’t end up exactly like that in the original thing, but you get the idea).
I keep wondering: is this how this was supposed to happen? And should the fans really have the final word on how a game should look, sound and play?
As stated in the premise, I absolutely love the art of Return to Monkey Island and I find it perfectly fitting, but what about all the others?
I’ve just recently created this blog so I’m not expecting it to create much buzz, but hopefully some kind souls will chime in.
Personally, I’m not sure there’s a definitive answer.
The only definitive answer I have to what happened is that the criticisms on art direction, from my own point of view, were due and reasonable, but the form of the protest was completely wrong and it took an ugly turn really quick.
Maybe, before asking ourselves those kind of questions, we should first try and help other people finding better ways of funneling their thoughts into forms that are more respectful and less aggravating. This would definitely lead not only to better communities, but in the end, probably, also to better games and happier gamers (and, most likely, happier developers).
I’ll close this article with a very short excerpt from an interview with Steven Wilson (who is a musician, producer and audio master engineering), about a theme I think translates perfectly into this whole situation. Hopefully it will inspire the people watching it, both fans and creators, and lead to a better future for both.
“If you are going to make music, find the things about what you do, about the way you make music, that are all wrong. […] In a world where there’s already way too much music, accentuate the things in what you do that are unusual and that a big record company guy, a marketing guy, would probably tell you you shouldn’t be doing. Accentuate those things.” –Steven Wilson