Tales of Monkey Island Episode 4 Review

Tales of Monkey Island: The Trial and Execution of Guybrush Threepwood continues the tradition of excellent adventure gaming and humor started by the ToMI series, even if it doesn’t improve over Episode 3 as much as the past episodes have improved on each other. The Trial and Execution of Guybrush Threepwood is just as good as Episode 3, but don’t worry, that still means it’s absolutely fantastic.

Episode 4 starts out with a betrayal that affects how the rest of the episode plays out. Predictably, a large portion of the game involves a trial where Guybrush must defend himself. I won’t go into detail for fear of giving away too many jokes. Suffice it to say that Episode 4 has just as many funny jokes and character interactions as we’ve come to expect.

In past episodes we’ve traveled around and met a new cast of characters every time. In this episode we come back to a familiar area and see how many of the characters we’ve met before are fairing. We also meet a classic character from the original games, and it’s a fan favorite too. It’s not exactly a happy reunion, but anyone familiar with the series knows Guybrush has a tendency to inadvertently leave destruction and tears in his wake. That’s why we love him, isn’t it?

For all of its continuation of the Monkey Island aesthetic, The Trial and Execution of Guybrush Threepwood represents an important advance in how the ToMI tale is told. Episode 4 adds some significant character development and emotion that we haven’t seen in previous episodes or even the original games. Telltale Games have introduced a few plot developments that go beyond the classic humor and happy-go-lucky nature of gameplay. Some of the things that happen will have a much bigger emotional impact than anything I’ve seen in the Monkey Island universe thus far, and the main characters seem to have more to lose than ever before. Frankly, the ending was unlike any Monkey Island game before despite the expected cliffhanger. Let’s just say that Telltale has made the storyline much more compelling and the consequences more permanent than they have been before.

Let’s hope that the final episode is just as compelling because I really love where the story is going. We’re getting all the pirate laughs, gags and one-liners that we want, but the story is also becoming more meaningful with the introduction of some serious elements. This is Monkey Island reaching maturity, and it had a much more hilarious trip through puberty than the rest of us did.

See the previous reviews:

Episode 1

Episode 2

Episode 3