I've noticed that on many forums over the years that there is general consensus that The Curse of Monkey Island was not as good as its two predecessors, The Secret of Monkey Island and Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge. It's finally gotten to the point where I had to choose a forum and speak up. All I have to say is this: I really, really don't get it.
As in, I don't understand how people can think Curse was such a disappointment. Call me a a forum troll, but the whole notion is just beyond me, as I believe the exact opposite is true. Let me explain something: I've been an adventure gamer my whole life. I've been playing them since I was physically able, starting at five years old in 1987 and having watched my mother play them for at least three years before that. My reading skills were dramatically increased by the amount I played adventure games as a young child.
I've played through all the old Sierra and LucasArts adventures, most of them for the first time at their release date. Although I've always enjoyed Sierra adventures, I always thought LucasArts adventures were of a higher, purer caliber; a higher level of general quality, in just about every area of gameplay.
This is all to say that I'm no stranger to adventures games in general or LucasArts adventures games. But for many years, my friends, I was a semi-stranger to one series: the Monkey Island games. Try as a might, when it was first released, I never could get into The Secret of Monkey island. It just didn't hold my attention. The same occurred when the sequel was released. Personally, I just found them somehow... lacking. As a result, I've never finished either of them; I could never get by the constant "eh" feeling.
But then came The Curse of Monkey Island. I avoided it for about a year, convinced I would find it as unappealing as its predecessors. A friend convinced me to pick it up, so I did, and my suspicions couldn't have been more wrong! I devoured the game from beginning to end on Mega-Monkey Mode and felt every minute was a blast. Throughout high school, it, Sam and Max, and Day of the Tentacle were the foundations of my social circle's entire sense of humor, and all three games were often quoted. Murray, the diabolical skull with world domination plans, became our much-beloved mascot (and yes, we were a collection of hardcore geeks and nerds...).
After Curse, I tried to go back and play Secret and MI2, but I ran into a new problem: Curse was so good to me that a shadow had been cast over what came before. This shadow was so thick and oppressive over them, that once again I couldn't bring myself to finish either of them.
Again, I'd like to reiterate that I'm not trying to make enemies here. I'm just being honest and have expressed my feelings in the most compassionate way I know how (given the circumstances, anyway). I'm also not trying to say that Secret and MI2 were bad games -- please don't think this! I'm simply expressing my own reaction and opinion.
I would have kept quiet about the whole issue but I'm getting tired of seeing so many people on the Internet complain about Curse being such a grand disappointment and saying that it's completely inferior to its predecessors. I felt I should rise and defend one of my favorite games of all time!
But, to each his own I suppose...