Herman Toothrot's MONKEY ISLAND - Babar joins the team!

[Chicky]

I am very pleased to announce...



A prequel to Secret Of Monkey Island

Play as Herman Toothrot and experience the golden age of piracy!

Experience the full story behind the gap toothed wonder!

Play with a genuine feeling of 90's pirate nostalgia!

No stupid plot holes here, true to Ron's initial vision for a trilogy.

Finally experience the real secret of Monkey Island!

Screenshots:

Explore the island


See the sights


Eat bananas







Story
Play as Herman Toothrot fresh on the shores of Monkey Island for the second time. After a lengthy intro tale on the decks of the Sea Monkey, first mate Herman and his captain stand face to face with fate in the hope of finding the secret of this seemingly harmless island.  Play through from the first footsteps in the sand all the way to meeting the mighty Guybrush Threepwood, as seen in SoMI.  

Development Progress:

Story: 60%
Scripting: 15%
Graphics: 60%
Sound/Music: 0%

Art, puzzles and story: Chicky
Programming: Babar


Development Diary:

21/02/06: Completed three new backgrounds today, mostly finished story planning.

15/03/06: I've been re-working the story somewhat and working on background art and scripting. I've come to the point where i'd like to include some music to add to the atmosphere of the game. I don't know much about composing but i want the music to sound retro, like the graphics.

19/03/06:I've been working hard on the game almost all day today and decided to play through MI1 again for some more ideas. I'm at part 3 of MI and have been taking a lot of notes and working on the story a lot more.

Fond a Musician now.

20/03/06: Finished Monkey Island 1 again this morning (first time in a good 2 years!) and i have over 3 pages of notes now! I am currently re-working the story to make is as true to the two first MI games as possible. At the moment i've got close to 15 backgrounds complete and am hoping to really explore Monkey Island a bit more. Maybe Melee island will have a few new footsteps too

Thanks for the comments and help guys, i've got a close circle of ags'ers keeping me going on this one and every comment is apreciated.

06/04/06: Release dates suck. College work, lovelife and band work has kept me from doing any serious work on the game the past couple of weeks but development will soon be underway again.

06/07/06: Ahh, been doing lots of little bits with the game, working with the palette is a pain but should pull off. I keep re-playing and re-playing the game to make sure everything feels right, i hope the humors up to standard of the series.

14/06/06 : Well progress has been going slow but sure, GUI, inventory and puzzle system have been implemented, few more puzzles have been programmed and i've managed to hook myself up with a tablet pc so i can work on the game anywhere i go.

REALLY NEED A NEW MUSICIAN - If you're interested please pm me on the forums or email cs.chicken@gmail.com. Cheers.

Much love x

05/03/07 : My my, doesn't this game making process take a long time, 'ey

I've started work in HTMI again, don't worry I'm not redoing backgrounds or rewriting story, just plodding along with the same stuff i've been working on all this time.

I'm a VERY slow programmer, scripting puzzles takes me hours so bare with me. I'm getting there, slowly but surely.

Like i've said a hell of a lot of art is done its just putting it all together now, i've coded another big puzzle today so i'm happy.

We WILL get there, in the end!

27/01/2010 : Blast from the past!

Teehee...

I have coined this year as the year of AGS so it seems i have to contribute in some way  Seeing as i'm a hopeless programmer and so many people have been waiting on this game I am very happy to announce i now have a code junkie helping me! Babar is the new weapon in the HTMI fight for release, this is awesome because he's very enthusiastic and has been a fan from the start. It also means that now i have someone else doing the editor stuff i can concentrate on getting every pixel perfect on every screen, i appreciate there are a few improvements that could be made.

I can confidently say that there WILL be a HTMI release in 2010

[scourge]

That's brilliant!!! 3 colours! It really looks awesome.

[Reven]

Haha!! This is awesome!!

I am for SURE gonna play this game!!

It looks pretty good!

[DanClarke]

Sweet!

I love the graphics and it's a great idea too, keep it coming

[Zooty]

this looks amazing. Im gladI'm not the only one messing around with mega lo res. (now we just need CJ to add support for it!)

keep up the good work, look forward to it muchly

This post was automatically edited for txt-style spelling

[Scummbuddy]

Surely someone will come and rescue you. I mean hey, why shouldn't they?

I know how it ends... 

First, I also adore the backgrounds. Adobe-Schmobe.
Second, I'm glad you are not retaining the wild and crazy storylines from MI4, but Herman sailed to Monkey Island and sent back his ship with a bunch of monkeys, I believe.

Unless this is a totally new tale of how he got to Monkey Island, gets rescued, and then gets stranded again. That'd be funny too.

[Chicky]

I have already taken the monkey thing into consideration Scummy. The game has it's own clever way of getting around that glitch (one that i did not consider when i first wrote the story, i admit) so don't worry too much.

I'm currently looking for someone who knows the world of Monkey Island inside out, i'm going to need someone who can check through my ideas and play thought the game to make sure that everything is true to the first two MI games. Any takers?


Also, thanks for the kind words Buloght, Peder, Dan, Sam and Scumm. It's all much apreciated. 

[Pablo]

Wow, Chicky! I don't have much time now, got to go to school...but WOW! You can expect me to play this!

[SteveMcCrea]

Stylish and beautiful.
Like MI on a Gameboy.
I look forward to it!

[Mats Berglinn]

I'm sorry to say this but I don't like the way you changed the story of Herman Toothrot and claiming it to be a prequel of MI1 mostly because both the tales of LeChuck in MI3 and in MI4 explained a lot that was totally mystery. Of course the only fact that I consinder wrong in MI4 that it was about 20 years before MI1.

Here's why (if you haven't played MI3 or 4 to the end don't look below):
Spoiler below, select the area to read the text

We know from MI4 that H T Marley was Elaine's granpa but the event with LeChuck trying to impress Elaine by going to Monkey Island and the thing with Marley and his crew happened about some time right before MI1 (About a year or so, don't know) so how can it be 20 years since Herman gets sucked by a whirlpool and got to Monkey Island if he confronts LeChuck about 1 year before MI1 and then gets sucked into a whirlpool. It would make more sense that the thing with LeChuck and Ozzie Mandrill happened the same time. I believe that LeChuck used somekind of Voodoo magic to kill H T and then created a whirlpool neirby but the magic only made him faint and when he gained consciousness Ozzie pushed H T's boat into the whirlpool.

If this game is just a fun spin-off, like Night of the Hermit, it feels more okay but I wouldn't count on being a "true to story" MI game.

Well, the three color graphic thing is quite unique but if it's a "true to story" MI game then that style would rebel against the other games which feels wrong (not development wise like having MI1 in MI3 style because that's only good). It's like mixing togeter The Dig with Sam and Max, it's like oil and water.

I apologize for being a complainer but I have to say this. If there any of you going to hate me because of all I say, I just say this one thing: I don't care about it.

[Chicky]

Well thanks for the nice positive feedback there Mats! I'll be sure to treat your 'unique' art style the same way!

CMI was written by Jonathan Ackley and Larry Ahern and EMI by Sean Clark and Michael Stemmle. Do i see a Ron Gilbert there? No. I'm trying to stay as true to the story of the first two Monkey Island games as possible. If you're trying to show some sort of intense knowledge of Monkey Island then could you please do it elsewhere or take it to PM. I don't need 'complainer's in this thread thankyou.

[DonB]

Chicky, I gotta compliment you about the stylish gameboy-ish graphics you made.. very.. very original! and playable! it really sets a good atmosphere..
i totally dig it..!

I think if you make this true, it will be a masterpiece.

Good luck and keep us updated!

[Barbarian]

Hey "C"... Love the low-res-retro-graphics style! Good schtuff.
Keep a MI type of humor injected in your story along with your other interesting ideas, and I'm sure you'll have a great game to share with us.

  Now for my complaint: What?!  We need to wait 'till about April for the release of this? Me wants it sooner. *Crackz Whip* (Says in Mr. T voice) "Work harder , Foo!"   
   Heheh, just kiddin'.  It takes as long as it takes, no need to "rush" anything.
Best wishes.

[CaptainBinky]

That's absolutely smashing!
Kudos to the idea  - I hope the music will be appropriately catchy boopy ditties.

[Grundislav]

It's like mixing togeter The Dig with Sam and Max, it's like oil and water.

Oh really?  So I guess that mixing Monkey Island and Grim Fandango is okay?

(From Mats' website)

The story so far: Guybrush Threepwood meet the Voodoo-lady on Scabb Island to find out that he needs to find the Death-controller, which is twice as powerful as the Ultimate Insult and can use the powers of Life and Death, before LeChuck who has come back from the dead as a Skeleton-pirate together with Ozzie Mandrill (Who is fully restored). Guybrush travels together with Manny Calavera, his wife Elaine and Manny’s companion Glottis throughout the Tri-Island Area in search of the Death-traveler which can teleport living people back and forth through the Living world and the Land of the Dead.

I like the look of your game, Chicky.  It's nice to see a Monkey Island fangame that actually has an original idea behind it.

[big brother]

Hahahahahahahahaha......oh, man. I did not expect to see Manny or Glottis in that statement! Mats unintentional sense of humor cracks me up!

I love the low color style you've got there, Chicky. One concern - the orange may be a bit too saturated. I mean, if the majority of the backgrounds is that color, you might want to tone it down so it doesn't hurt people's eyes. To prevent it from looking bland then, I'd bump up the saturation of your mid value color. Also, I wouldn't use black, but a very saturated dark color. I'd make sure all three colors are different hues.

I know this isn't the CL, but let me know if you want me to demonstrate what I mean.

Hope this helps!

[CaptainBinky]

One concern - the orange may be a bit too saturated.

I sort of agree, but I think it depends on whether or not the intention is for it to run fullscreen or in a window.

[Fuzzpilz]

Sounds interesting! I too enjoy the graphics. Looking forward to it.

I'd make sure all three colors are different hues.

Unless you meant slightly different, I disagree with this bit fairly strongly, though your other points may be reasonable (the bright red/orange doesn't look eye-hurty to me, but that's going solely by my monitor and eyes, which aren't everyone else's). The (more or less) monochromaticity is part of the style's appeal, in my opinion.

[big brother]

Quickie example... I think these better describe a sort of jungle island.

My monitor is calibrated, Fuzzpile. You should check yours. As for the hues, if you're going to only have three colors, you best make the most fo them.

[CaptainBinky]

Unless you meant slightly different, I disagree with this bit fairly strongly

I totally agree - the garishness is part of it's charm for me. Like I said earlier, if it's fullscreen I can see the point in desaturating it a bit, but windowed it looks grand. And the orange is great because it's kind of old-computer-monitor-orange.