The Secret of Monkey Island

モンキー・アイランドMS-DOS, Other, Sega CD, Windows +51990

  1. JP1992
  2. NA1990
  3. EU—
  4. RU—

The Secret of Monkey Island kept its English title in the West; in Japan the FM Towns release was called モンキー・アイランド and the Mega-CD release モンキー・アイランド ユーレイ海賊大騒動!. The simplest legal way to play today is The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition on Steam or GOG, which still contains the original as a classic mode.

The Secret of Monkey Island is a pirate adventure game developed by Lucasfilm Games and first released in October 1990. It was designed and written by Ron Gilbert, Tim Schafer and Dave Grossman, with Gilbert as director. Gilbert conceived it in 1988, and production began in 1989 under the working title Mutiny on Monkey Island; the game cost $200,000 and took nine months to make. Michael Land wrote its MIDI "pirate reggae" score, his first project at the company.

The game runs on the SCUMM engine. It dropped the "What is" command in favor of mouse highlighting and added dialogue trees. The first DOS release used 16 colors, a 256-color VGA version followed in December 1990, and a CD-ROM version with a CD soundtrack came in 1992. In Japan, Victor Music Industries released an FM Towns version in September 1992, and a Mega-CD version followed in September 1993.

In July 2009 LucasArts released The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition, with new art, Dominic Armato as Guybrush Threepwood and a switchable classic mode.12

Names and releases

RegionTitle on the boxPlatformDatePublisherSrc
NA The Secret of Monkey Island16-color EGA version on floppy disks. U.S. Gold published the game in Europe. MS-DOS October 1990 Lucasfilm Games 1
NA The Secret of Monkey Island256-color VGA version. MS-DOS December 1990 Lucasfilm Games 1
NA The Secret of Monkey IslandCD-ROM version with a high-quality CD soundtrack. English Wikipedia gives 1992; Russian Wikipedia gives June 1992. MS-DOS June 1992 The Software Toolworks 3
JP モンキー・アイランドFM Towns Other September 1992 ビクター音楽産業 2
JP モンキー・アイランド ユーレイ海賊大騒動!Mega-CD Sega CD September 1993 — 2
WW The Secret of Monkey Island: Special EditionDigital release, also on Xbox 360 (Xbox Live Arcade) in July 2009; later on PS3 and OS X. Windows Jul 15, 2009 LucasArts 4
WW The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition iOS Jul 23, 2009 LucasArts 5

Also known as: モンキー・アイランド ユーレイ海賊大騒動! JP2The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition WW1Mutiny on Monkey Island WW1Тайна острова Обезьян RU3

Box art by region

  • The Secret of Monkey Island box art, North America release
    NA The Secret of Monkey Island

Box art © its publishers, shown to identify each release. Scans: Wikipedia.

Version differences

  • GraphicsDOS EGA (1990)DOS VGA (1990)

    The first DOS release ran in 16 colors (EGA, 320x200); the VGA version from December 1990 added 256 colors with better backgrounds and character art.1

  • AudioCD-ROM (1992)

    The 1992 CD-ROM version added a high-quality CD soundtrack.1

  • Contentlater editions

    Later editions removed the "stump joke", a gag in which a tree stump showed disk-swap messages and sent confused players to the LucasArts hotline.1

All differences (5)

Translations

  • German Official

    LucasArts2009Windows · Special EditionReleased

    The Special Edition includes German text; GOG also lists German audio, while Steam marks full audio only for English.6

  • Spanish Official

    LucasArts2009Windows · Special EditionReleased

    The Special Edition includes Spanish text, and GOG also lists Spanish audio (Steam marks full audio only for English). In the classic mode the text stays in English.6

  • French Official

    LucasArts2009Windows · Special EditionReleased

    The Special Edition includes French text; GOG also lists French audio, while Steam marks full audio only for English.6

  • Italian Official

    LucasArts2009Windows · Special EditionReleased

    The Special Edition includes Italian text; GOG also lists Italian audio, while Steam marks full audio only for English.6

Where to play legally today

  • GOG Purchase

    The Secret of Monkey Island™: Special Edition

    Windows; 2009 remaster with switchable classic mode

    Checked: 2026-10-136gog.com

  • Steam Purchase

    The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition

    Windows; 2009 remaster with switchable classic mode

    Checked: 2026-10-134store.steampowered.com

How to run it today

Buy The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition on Steam or GOG; it runs on current Windows and includes the classic mode. Owners of the original DOS, Amiga, Mac or FM Towns disks can play them with ScummVM, which rates its support for the game as "Excellent".

7

Best version

The Special Edition on Steam or GOG is the simplest legal option: it adds new art, voices and a hint system and still contains the original game as a classic mode you can switch to at any moment.6

Reception

Ron Gilbert said the game sold well but was never a big hit, and Dave Grossman estimated sales at over 100,000 but far below a million. The 2009 Special Edition scored 86/100 on PC, 88/100 on Xbox 360 and 87/100 on PS3 on Metacritic.1

Sources

  1. 1en.wikipedia.org
  2. 2ja.wikipedia.org
  3. 3ru.wikipedia.org
  4. 4store.steampowered.com
  5. 5en.wikipedia.org
  6. 6gog.com
  7. 7scummvm.org
  8. 8es.wikipedia.org
  9. 9es.wikipedia.org

Checked: 2026-10-13Text reviewed: 2026-10-13

Spotted a mistake? Write to atlas@old-games.net.