The Joy of Scumm

Or how to waste a Sunday evening and most of the rest of the week.

Perhaps I was feeling a bit nostalgic or maybe it was just they typically boring Sunday night television. In any case, I decided I'd like to play Maniac Mansion. I remember spending hours in front of our Apple IIe trying to help Dave and his friends rescue Sandy. There were mad scientists, evil tentacles, indie rock tentacles and nuclear reactors. It was great! I think I spent much of the late 80s playing Maniac Mansion and Oregon Trail. OK, there were the frequent trips to Twin Falls, midnight excursions to Windy Point and Poi Dog Pondering shows to balance it all out. But I digress.

I'd previously played Maniac Mansion Deluxe, but it's Windows-only, and I was feeling too lazy to boot up Vista on Parallels. So I downloaded ScummVM, which will run all the old LucasArts games. I played Maniac Mansion for a while. It was good, but I already knew it. Some friends have talked about The Secret of Monkey Island, so I downloaded that. The graphics -- impressive for the time -- are pretty dated, but it's great! The same bizarre humor that informed Maniac Mansion pervades the game. There are pirates and monkeys, so you know I'm loving it.

Once I finish, I may just boot up Vista and play Oregon Trail. I've got to do something while I'm waiting for EA Games to release Spore for OS X.