vili's recent activity
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 REMOVE CARTRIDGE ⏏️ The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
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Comment on In most countries, imports from China account for less than 10% of GDP, even where China is the top partner in ~finance
vili LinkTo be honest, I don’t really know what this actually means beyond the surface level, or what the actual macroeconomic implications are. I just found it interesting.To be honest, I don’t really know what this actually means beyond the surface level, or what the actual macroeconomic implications are. I just found it interesting.
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In most countries, imports from China account for less than 10% of GDP, even where China is the top partner
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Comment on I don't care much for symbolism in ~creative
vili LinkThere is an Akira Kurosawa quote that I quite like. In discussion with Donald Richie (quoted from Akira Kurosawa: Interviews, p. 8), he says: “If I could have said it in words, I would have—then I...- Exemplary
There is an Akira Kurosawa quote that I quite like. In discussion with Donald Richie (quoted from Akira Kurosawa: Interviews, p. 8), he says: “If I could have said it in words, I would have—then I wouldn’t have needed to make the picture.” Elsewhere (same book, p. 185), he has also expressed that "If I had a message or thesis to express, I could do so in words, and it would be much cheaper and quicker to paint those words on a sign and carry it around for all to see."
The way I see it, in a good piece of art, representation of things through non-literal constructs like symbols and metaphors is not used to hide things or to make puzzles out of them, but to convey complex ideas and feelings that would be difficult, time-consuming, or perhaps impossible to just plainly “say in words”.
If you have ever read philosophers like Hegel, Heidegger, Kant or their kind, you have probably learnt how extremely difficult it is to put across even the simplest ideas, if you aim for unambiguous precision. Some have fared better at it than others.
But metaphor and symbolism is not restricted to just artistic expression. Much of our day-to-day human language actually operates in a very similar manner. In your post, for example, you write that “when dissected, fiction tends to die”, but as fiction is not a living being, it cannot really die. You talk about an “elevated way to read things”, but you surely do not mean putting the reading material to a higher vertical position. According to you, “people have built interesting symbolism from [your] writing”, but again, I doubt anything is literally built in the sense of physical construction.
I’m not criticising your choice of words, of course. There is nothing wrong with them. Instead, I’m pointing out that this is how language fundamentally operates. The more abstract the topic we discuss, the more language needs to lean on metaphorical mappings, borrowing the vocabulary of one concept to discuss another. Through this process, inanimate ideas can be seen as living things that live and die (or “thrive”, “flourish”, “suffer”, etc.), the concept of vertical position can mark success or abundance (prices “rise”, you can take the “higher ground”, when you are not doing too well you are “down”, perhaps even “depressed”, etc.), and abstract ideas can be a little like buildings (you “construct” arguments, they have “foundations” and if those are “weak”, the whole argument can become “shaky”, so you need good “supports”, etc.).
Some argue that this is not just a linguistic feature, but a more fundamentally cognitive one. If this sounds interesting, check out the theory of conceptual metaphor.
In any case, I would take the view that when good art uses metaphor or symbolism, it does so by using a somewhat similar process in an attempt to grasp and represent thoughts or feelings that go just beyond the capability of language or logic. It gives us access to something that we cannot (yet) quite talk about or rationalise, but which we can understand and relate to through other means of representation. And if done successfully, that access can become more easily available to us, perhaps even develop into a common metaphorical mapping in the same way language has mapped things between domains and standardised many such borrowings. If that happens, others can later build on top of the bridges that an artist built and continue to reach even further towards the unknown through processes like reuse, reference, reinterpretation and recalibration, whether in a modern, postmodern, metamodern or whatever manner.
I know that this is a very romantic, somewhat anti-rationalistic, perhaps even mystical take on the role of arts, and I don’t claim it to be the only valid use for things like symbolism and metaphor. Sometimes it’s fun to just try to crack open a narrative puzzle, too. But in many ways, I do agree with you that one’s raw visceral response is often more important, or at least more immediate, than the need to logically puzzle out details. And I totally share the view that @CannibalisticApple expressed in another response here -- pieces that work on multiple levels are also my favourite. Which reminds me that the works of Akira Kurosawa, with whose thoughts I kicked off this comment, tend to do exactly that, managing to be both hugely entertaining as well as full of social, philosophical and personal commentary.
That said, I also think that it’s valuable to self-reflect, ask the question why something affects you in some way, and why something else doesn’t. Perhaps vital even, if you want to develop as an artist or just understand yourself better. So in that sense, trying to figure out the magic trick can be quite useful.
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Comment on Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 becomes first indie game to win Game of the Year at The Game Awards in ~games
vili Link ParentAs with indie films and music, it's indeed a good question what is an indie game and what isn't. The Game Awards have certainly got it wrong before. I got curious, so I dug into this a little bit....As with indie films and music, it's indeed a good question what is an indie game and what isn't. The Game Awards have certainly got it wrong before. I got curious, so I dug into this a little bit. Perhaps their reasoning here could be:
It has a publisher, Kepler
Wikipedia notes that Kepler was set up by seven independent game studios and that "Kepler itself will not interefere [sic] with the operations of each studio, allowing them to stay independent".
This year, I believe Hades II was the only game in the indie category that was self-published by the company that developed it. All others had publishers.
and a budget that dwarfs any other indie that was nominated
Reportedly, the game's budget was under $10 million. I don't know what the other games have cost to make, but Hades II is estimated to have had a budget similar to the first game, which was around $15 million.
"Indie" games are getting expensive to make.
But personally, I still see games like Hades II, Blue Prince, Hollow Knight: Silksong and Clair Obscur as indies, just they are different kind of indies than something like a single-developer shoestring budget game. Maybe there should be more categories. In a perfect world, one for each game, so that everyone could be a winner? (Making games is hard. If you manage to get something out, I think you are already a winner.)
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Comment on Order of the Sinking Star | Official announcement trailer in ~games
vili LinkThis is the announcement trailer for a new game by Jonathan Blow, the mind behind Braid and The Witness. I think it's now my most anticipated game of 2026. That said, I'm a bit taken aback by the...This is the announcement trailer for a new game by Jonathan Blow, the mind behind Braid and The Witness. I think it's now my most anticipated game of 2026.
That said, I'm a bit taken aback by the "hundreds of hours of gameplay" claim. I like my games a bit more compact than that. But perhaps it'll be similar to games like The Witness and Blue Prince, where there are multiple levels of completion and challenge.
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Order of the Sinking Star | Official announcement trailer
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Comment on You're not crazy. The bugs are disappearing. in ~enviro
vili Link ParentI've used something called Maxforce ant bait gel for years. Bought a set of syringes a decade ago. The way it has worked since is that ants decide to come in once every spring when it starts to...I've used something called Maxforce ant bait gel for years. Bought a set of syringes a decade ago. The way it has worked since is that ants decide to come in once every spring when it starts to rain. I say no, put a few pea-sized nuggets of the gel around where they enter, they go wild about it, take it back to the nest and... uh... something happens that I don't really want to think about, and then no more ants inside the house until next spring, when the cycle repeats.
I still see plenty of ants outside of the house, so at least it doesn't kill everything everywhere. I can't say I'm particularly happy using the product, but it does keep the ants out for us at least.
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Comment on How do you plan out your meals for the week/meal prep? in ~food
vili LinkFor dinners, we have a list of regular meals on our fridge door, in total currently about 80 of them that we rotate. They are divided into sections (meaty, fishy, vegetably). The lists are written...For dinners, we have a list of regular meals on our fridge door, in total currently about 80 of them that we rotate. They are divided into sections (meaty, fishy, vegetably).
The lists are written on magnetic fridge pads that allow easy erasing. Each item has a checkbox next to it. Once a week on the shopping day morning, we put check marks on the meals that we plan to cook during the next week, as we write down the shopping list. We aim to have two from each column, and then a third one from the veggies section. Checkmarks can't repeat from one week to another.
During the week, we know our "menu" and can pick whatever we feel like eating from the list on that day. But all dinners need to be cooked. Some dinners are planned for two days so that there is less cooking. Sometimes we make bigger batches (of casseroles, meatballs, falafels and such) and freeze things for future weeks.
As for lunches, we make salads, hummus, boiled eggs and such in the mornings. So, when shopping, we make sure that we have ingredients for those, including proteins like tuna, cheeses, eggs, beans and such. Some, like hummus, we make for two or three days in a row.
We also chop fruits into little boxes to remember to eat a variety of fruits every day. We tend to prepare those for three days at a time.
This may sound a lot, but it actually saves time and energy for us, as it works quite efficiently. For instance, since everything is kind of pre-planned, we can throw a lunch together while waiting for the morning coffee to brew.
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Comment on The Charismatic Voice analyses Prince's Super Bowl halftime show in ~music
vili LinkPrince's 2007 Super Bowl halftime performance is often considered not only the greatest Super Bowl halftime show of all time, but also one of the greatest live music performances of any kind. Now,...Prince's 2007 Super Bowl halftime performance is often considered not only the greatest Super Bowl halftime show of all time, but also one of the greatest live music performances of any kind. Now, Prince has been a huge part of my life and identity and yet, for some reason, while I see merit in the performance, I have never thought of it being even among Prince’s own best live shows. For me, it’s just Prince being Prince on a particularly rainy night. He’s done better. I suppose it also matters that I have no emotional or cultural connection to the Super Bowl.
I don’t typically watch “reaction video” type content on YouTube, but Elizabeth Zharoff’s The Charistmatic Voice channel is an exception. She is not only educational and knowledgeable about vocal tracts and techniques, but also such a source of positivity and pure love for good music and vocal performance. She can make me smile and warm inside even on a bad day. I’ve often thought about sharing her videos here but never pushed the button until now.
Watching her react to Prince’s Super Bowl performance actually made me tear up. Not only because I genuinely miss the guy, but also because Elizabeth’s analysis helped me understand what other people see in that performance and why so many consider it so amazing. I hope you will too.
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The Charismatic Voice analyses Prince's Super Bowl halftime show
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili Link ParentYeah, I think Part One is the reason why people love the game so much. Certainly it is for me. If the first part was similar in quality to the later parts, I honestly don't think the game would be...Yeah, I think Part One is the reason why people love the game so much. Certainly it is for me. If the first part was similar in quality to the later parts, I honestly don't think the game would be such a classic.
Spending over half of your time in Part One is, I think, quite normal, even for speedrunners. The current world record spends about 13m 20sec on the first island, and about 11 minutes on the rest.
Speaking of speedruns, it's been three years since it came out, but I remember the mini documentary Secret of Monkey Island Speedrun History being really good. As was the channel's later interview with Ron Gilbert, where they talk about game design and the concept of speedrunning adventure games, which is sort of the exact opposite approach to what these games were designed for. The channel in question, OneShortEye, also has a lot of other adventure game speedrunning documentaries, including on Monkey Island 2. Highly recommended, if the topic interests any of you.
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili (edited )Link ParentNot obvious to me I'm afraid, even with the original release. I too was stuck with this for more time than I care to admit, and I have played the game at least half a dozen times before. The issue...I didn't even notice the hatch on the ship until I consulted the guide! It's obvious with the original graphics
Not obvious to me I'm afraid, even with the original release. I too was stuck with this for more time than I care to admit, and I have played the game at least half a dozen times before. The issue here, I would say, is that the graphic design shows us two directions that you should be able to go but have no reason to (fore and aft), and then not only places the hatch next to another, more prominent exit, but also hides it behind a bunch of characters and a mast. It's just too hidden in the midst of other visual information. Part Two is, in my opinion, already easily the weakest part of the game, and this only adds to the frustration.
Part Three also has its own issues with movement, like @Dr_Amazing pointed out in another comment. The puzzles in that part of the game are better (edit: than in Part Two), but for me at least the island suffers the most from it being too easy to miss things. I think a lot of it could have been better had the island been just one screen, like Mêlée Island.
Actually, a fun (?) question for everyone: which in your imagination is the bigger island, Mêlée or Monkey Island™? For me it's definitely Mêlée, even if it takes less space on screen. It has more happening, there are more locations, and a city. I guess they were going for an exploration feeling for Monkey Island™ but the design doesn't quite do it for me.
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili Link ParentI think it's a great example of a language puzzle which, once you have thought of it yourself, is really difficult to "unsee" to understand how it actually works for other people. So if I had to...do wonder how some egregious puzzles slipped through the cracks. The monkey wrench puzzle in MI2 is especially notable. What was Gilbert thinking when he designed that one?!
I think it's a great example of a language puzzle which, once you have thought of it yourself, is really difficult to "unsee" to understand how it actually works for other people. So if I had to guess, I suppose they got tangled in that a bit.
While not really answering your question, Gilbert and Grossman were asked in an interview a couple of years back if they had any regrets about puzzles from the first two games and this is what they had to say:
GamesBeat: Are there any puzzles from the original games that you regret making too difficult/too easy?
Gilbert: Two words: Monkey Wrench.
Grossman: The Monkey Wrench puzzle from LeChuck’s Revenge is notoriously unsolvable and was not a good design on several levels. Even if you are an English speaker from a location where the tool in question is commonly called a “monkey wrench,” and you realize that that’s what you need, you still have to make an astonishing predictive leap about how your actions will create that tool. Nothing in the game sets any of it up adequately. I use it to this day as my go-to example of what not to do with puzzle design, and it has influenced my thinking ever since. The player has to be able to somehow visualize what to do, and if they do give up and look at a hint, I want their response to be, “Oh, that makes sense, I should have thought of that!” rather than “How on earth was I ever supposed to think of that, you ridiculous, unfair clowns?!”
Conversely, I can’t think of anything I regret making too easy. The consequences are much less severe for that. It doesn’t bring the game to a grinding halt, at worst it’s just not very interesting, and you forget about that as soon as you start thinking about the next puzzle after it.
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili Link ParentLike @Boojum mentioned above, this sort of stuff was pretty much what Ron Gilbert was trying to change with The Secret of Monkey Island. Around the time they were working on the game, he wrote an...How was I supposed to know that the ant colony wanted to see my royal scepter?
Like @Boojum mentioned above, this sort of stuff was pretty much what Ron Gilbert was trying to change with The Secret of Monkey Island. Around the time they were working on the game, he wrote an article that laid down what was wrong with adventure games at the time and what rules of thumb should be followed going forward. A lot of it sounds very obvious these days, but we have come to take much of these for granted only because game design has changed for the better.
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili Link ParentThere is definitely plenty of shared DNA there. I remember Ron Gilbert had fun at the time of the first films' release writing that he's expecting a cheque in the mailbox any day now, but I think...There is definitely plenty of shared DNA there. I remember Ron Gilbert had fun at the time of the first films' release writing that he's expecting a cheque in the mailbox any day now, but I think he kind of summarised the situation in this interview, saying that "Well, I mean Pirates of the Caribbean is a rip-off of Monkey Island that was a rip-off of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride [at Disneyland], so it's hard for me to get too mad at Disney for ripping Monkey Island off when I just ripped them off initially."
Nowadays, Disney of course also owns both IPs.
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili (edited )LinkI've now played through Part One. My reaction to the game has been pretty similar to what I can remember from my previous playthroughs, the most recent of which was probably about ten years ago....I've now played through Part One. My reaction to the game has been pretty similar to what I can remember from my previous playthroughs, the most recent of which was probably about ten years ago. The writing, humour and creativity are on a level few games have come anywhere near since this game was released. And I also have pretty much the exact same main criticisms as always:
Spoilers for Part One: The Three Trials
While the gag where Guybrush auto-adventures himself through various obstacles and challenges behind the wall at Elaine's mansion is one of the highlights of the game, the file puzzle that results from it is not. The issue with it is that, in the EGA version at least, it's entirely abstract and text-based. We never see the reason Guybrush needs the file, we never see the cake that contains the file (and while the idea of prison cakes containing files is understandable, it's not all that clearly established that this will), and we never see the file itself either.
Additionally, if I remember correctly, if you are a 10-year-old player who doesn't speak English and plays the game with a dictionary, you will spend a lot of time walking around trying to do something with the various documents ("files") that you have collected from elsewhere, thinking that those are somehow the solution. All in all, I think it's not a particularly well designed puzzle.
I also very much dislike the haggling puzzle with Stan. It's just tedious, poorly signposted and it's not that funny. Or maybe it's funnier if the player has first hand experience with car dealers or some such. For me, it's just always felt like a gag that's drawn out far too long.
I had forgotten how quiet the game is. I guess the music is so memorable that I remembered it to be everywhere, while in reality there are a lot of rooms that have no background sound. I'm playing the original EGA version, so I have no voice acting either.
I also made something of a major discovery. Well, for me anyway. Elaine Marley, as she is depicted in the EGA version, looks quite a lot like my wife. Whom I married about twenty years after I first played the game. I'm now almost tempted to get a therapist just to hear what they would have to say about this.
I never really liked the red-haired imposter Elaine that appeared in the VGA version's close-ups. Her hair colour doesn't even match the character sprite in either of the first two games.
I actually don't care much for any of the character portraits in the VGA releases. They just feel off to me. But here's a bit of interesting trivia in case you didn't know: the guy who did the VGA portraits is a concept artist who has also worked on Terminator 2, some Star Wars films, Harry Potter films, Guardians of the Galaxy and Avengers: Infinity War. Here's an article about him, including comparisons between Monkey's EGA and VGA portraits.
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili Link ParentIt would be interesting to hear more about your history with the genre. Based on what you wrote, it sounds like there is intriguing tension in there. What adventure games do you remember playing,...my disdain for point and click adventure games ... I played quite a few back n the day ... I don't like the genre ... still quote a bunch of the games
It would be interesting to hear more about your history with the genre. Based on what you wrote, it sounds like there is intriguing tension in there. What adventure games do you remember playing, did you like any of them, and why do you think you had such a negative reaction to the genre?
It is often said that adventure games never really died, their design conventions just morphed into other genres such as action adventures and rpg games. Do you see modern games use old adventure game conventions in a way that you dislike, or like?
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili Link ParentWell, ya see... ya gotta squint and sorta turn your head and... ooooooooh! It's just SO good! The Curse of Monkey Island humour, sorry.- Exemplary
Well, ya see... ya gotta squint and sorta turn your head and... ooooooooh! It's just SO good!
The Curse of Monkey Island humour, sorry.
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Comment on CGA-2025-12 🏴☠️🏝️🍌 INSERT CARTRIDGE 🟢 The Secret of Monkey Island in ~games
vili (edited )LinkSince this is the first game in our CGA journey that actually has a CGA version, and since I have never played The Secret of Monkey Island in CGA, and since I have been wanting to explore CGA...Since this is the first game in our CGA journey that actually has a CGA version, and since I have never played The Secret of Monkey Island in CGA, and since I have been wanting to explore CGA graphics for a while now, I thought I'd be clever and play the game with CGA graphics.
To my great disappointment, it looks like The Secret of Monkey Island's CGA support is very basic. By which I mean, if you remember CGA as being an ugly four-colour palette of black, white, cyan and pink, that's exactly what CGA Monkey is. It's still fairly tastefully done, but it's not particularly interesting.
"Well, duh. What were you expecting?" I hear some of you ask. Well, first of all, rude, and second of all, some clever programmers used colour bleed in the CGA composite mode to produce a fuller range of colours, even when running in a graphics mode that technically only offered four. Earlier adventure games from Lucasfilm Games such as Maniac Mansion and Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders did interesting things in this CGA composite mode, and Sierra was also very good at manipulating the palette. But either I don't know how to get DosBox to properly emulate CGA composite, or Monkey Island's composite mode is just a blurrier version of CGA's default cyan and pink hellscape. Which I suppose makes sense, since by 1990, CGA was pretty much at the end of its lifespan and there was no point putting too much effort into it.
So, I guess I'll upgrade to my favoured EGA version of Monkey Island 1. But if you are interested in learning more about this CGA composite mode, The 8-Bit Guy had a pretty good video about it some years back. And if you want to try out Monkey's CGA mode yourself, note that the currently sold Special Edition doesn't include it (or an EGA mode). You'll need to dig up the original EGA release from somewhere and force it to run in CGA.
Some fun trivia: the term "cutscene" as used in gaming today was (or so they say) coined by Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert for his first adventure game, Maniac Mansion. I believe the SCUMM engine that both that game and Monkey Island use refers to these sequences as "cut-scenes" in the script. The concept of non-interactive sequences in games is older of course, but the term apparently was coined by Gilbert.
Your background and latest reaction to The Secret of Monkey Island sounds very similar to mine. The game still holds up really well, but is not quite perfect.
I actually played through Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge as well this month, and I must say it felt a bit worse than I remembered. I remembered it to be objectively the best game in the series, even if the first one is my personal favourite, but somehow Monkey 2 didn't quite click with me this time around. I mean it's not bad by any means, but felt a step down directly after Monkey 1. It could of course be just a case of too much of good stuff in one go. These games were not meant to be played with the speed that I went through them this time around. I had actually planned to play through Return to Monkey Island as well, but decided to take a break before I jump into it again, as I don't want to ruin the experience.