Monkey Island 2: A soundtrack analysis, comparing the PC -DOS and the Amiga version
“As scholarship begins to build a canon of game music (as problematic as such activity is) Monkey Island 2: Lechuck’s Revenge has been mentioned so often in research papers and books that it has become an established ‘great work’ of video game music.” (Summers 2016: 72). This sentence of musicologist Tim Summers excuses the long audio analysis below, between the versions for the PC and the Amiga.
Monkey Island 2 is one of the first adventures with wall to wall soundtrack. The project leader Ron Gilbert described its soundtrack as “an ever-evolving piece of music”, because the music begins at the start of the game and finishes at the finale (cited in Smith 2008: 65). The PC version has 3 and half hours of music, but the Amiga port has only 90 minutes. The reason is that the PC computer uses MIDI files to play music that they contain only music data inscriptions. Instead the Amiga computer uses MOD files that they contain music data inscriptions and digital sample of the instruments. This meant to be inconvenient for the Amiga system, “because the songs were so much larger while games were still shipping on floppy disks” (Wing 2015: 3). The reason was always the space, because more data meant more floppies for the game and more costs for the company. This limited port can also be noticed on the graphics with the motionless backgrounds instead of the vivid moving images that they give liveliness to the game. A great missing element is the dynamic music at the village of Woodtick, which it sonars as film like quality on the changes between the scenes.
The soundtrack’s style is an upbeat calypso reggae that matches apparently the world and the visuals. The initial theme of the Woodtick village sets the mood of a peaceful Caribbean island, but it also reflects the peaceful state of mind for Guybrush and his ignorance about the upcoming events. The main composer Michael Z. Land stated before the game’s release that he wanted the music to cheer you up like a happy syncopated music coming out from a radio, but as the evil pirate LeChuck becomes prominent, the tones gets darker and more sinister. (cited in The Adventurer Staff 1991: 13). The music can describe the world, the thoughts of the characters and it can also give clues and hindsights about future and past events.
Still in the first chapter there is plenty use of leitmotifs. The tough guy Largo LaGrande has its own dark swing melody. The leitmotif can also be heard on a more free version at Largo’s hotel room when he is away, but it is absent on the Amiga port. The music in the gameplay has the ability to directly link persons with locations, but it further helps to show new perspectives of the characters with the expressiveness of variations and the different style of the songs.
Largo’s hotel room combines the two themes: when Guybrush enters the room in Largo’s absence, the Woodtick theme continues supplemented by Largo’s theme, which is now tonally and rhythmically adjusted to the slow Woodtick reggae. This is one of the examples of the smooth transitions iMuse became known for: no break will be noticed by the player/listener as the semantic nature of the musical signal is just as clear at the same time. Because of Largo’s absence, there is only a hint of his presence in the hotel room — and a hint of his theme in the music. What we have here is a combination of horizontal resequencing and vertical re-orchestration that is very subtle but still paradigmatic for the Monkey Island 2 soundtrack. (Strank 2013: 83)
The compositional form for the adventures’ soundtracks have the opposite structure from the linear music as it is generally conceived. While on a typical song the music starts simple and it gradually become complex and richer, on adventures the music quickly depicts the image and then it starts gradually to become lighter (e.g. by dropping out some instruments) leaving out more space for the user to think the solutions. “In other words, the music for each location is intended to catch the player’s attention initially, then eventually become more subdued, until finally it is registering with the player almost at an unconscious level.” (Pidkameny 2002) Does the silent Amiga port affect the player’s experience on puzzle solving? It’s hard to say. The minimalist scoring approach is widely used and acceptable for games like puzzles and adventures, because the music gives little aural information about the environment, but also “it must intrigue and encourage the player without getting obnoxious” (McConnell 1999). The adventures are based on narration, the constant changes on the plot are indispensable for story-driven games. The music can easily set the mood for such important moments and strongly tie the whole artistic entity.
There are plenty scenes in Monkey Island 2 that the music acts as commentary. The completion of the game lasts up to 30 hours, therefore it is impossible to analyze the whole score. The critic upon five musically interesting scenes will help to see if the target messages are being portrayed correctly:
Booty Island: At the start of the second part of the game, Guybrush Threepwood arrives at Booty Island where the inhabitants live into the rhythm of the Mardi Gras party. The music plays a swing whacky tune giving the vibes that a fiesta nearby goes on. The song is a mix of diegetic and underscoring music. Willem Strank finds the music of Booty Island as an additional motivation for the player to solve puzzles and finally Guybrush to arrive at the governor’s mansion where the party is being held: “The player has to walk across the whole island to find the source of the initial theme. A detailed look at a large part of the Booty Island section of Monkey Island 2 reveals that iMuse not only smooths the transitions between musical variations, it also enables the composer to construct the music along the lines of the narration” (Strank 2013: 85). Therefore in this case, the silence on the Amiga’s version doesn’t function as a feedback medium that informs about the environment and pushes the player to act, but it stands as irrelevant and neutral at what is happening on the screens. Composer James Hannigan explains this ambiguous role of game audio:
[T]he player is both audience to and a participant in the game, the game is sending a message to the player that they both belong to the game-world yet are also audience to it. My feeling is that you are somewhere in between watching and being in a game, and it follows therefore that music and sound must take this into account. […] You are an audience to the extent that you want to be emotionally manipulated by the events of the game, but you are sufficiently involved to feel the game is an open reality. (cited in Mera 2009: 110)
The Library: The audio in the library of Phatt Island is silent on both versions. Although the silence on the PC puts an extra comical layer, because the whole rest of the game is musically underscored. Whatever action might Guybrush undertake, the librarian request him to be quiet, having respect to the library’s rules. The absence of the music gives more humor to the scene resulting that even a non-diegetic music is forbidden here! A review for the PC version correctly comments: “Another thing to note is that in this game music is always playing, excepting a few moments where its absence is called for as an intentional effect” (The International House of Mojo Staff 2008). The player of the Amiga doesn’t receive this joke, because the majority of the game stays silent.
The Tunnel: At Phatt Island, Guybrush enters into an underground tunnel that it has nothing to do with the pirate era. There are electric lights and metallic tubes. The anachronistic references are common on the Monkey Island series, but this acts as a foreshadowing scene to the cliffhanging end where Guybrush finds himself in identical tunnels underneath an amusement park. The jazzy eerie music is the only thing that comments the scene, as there are not any hotspots for the player to interact. The Amiga’s version has no music neither outside nor inside of the tunnel, therefore the player doesn’t receive the transition between the Caribbean happy themes and the unsettling musical arrangement. “Using leitmotifs [in reverse], music can deliver a wealth of subtext that is otherwise difficult to convey” (Phillips 2014: 60).
This common practice of scoring areas is referred in Zach Whalen’s vocabulary as “leitmotif acting in reverse”, because the player passes many locations and the music acts as a medium to distinguish them more easily (Whalen 2004).
Wally: At the end of Part 2, Guybrush has found the four map pieces of the treasure Big Whoop. He goes to Wally the cartographer for gluing the pieces together and recognize the yet unknown island. After a short break, Guybrush returns to take the whole map, but he surprisingly finds out that Wally has been kidnapped by the villain pirate LeChuck. A suspense crescendo is being played leading to the leitmotif of Lechuck. The music of the cartographer comes back, but at this time without the main melody, only the counter melody and the rhythm section. It is an ingenious way to associate a melody to a character’s absence. It is of course obvious that Wally is missing but representing this also on the audio, it increases the emotional attachment. The loss of the melody makes the music to seem like it mourns. The Amiga port is rather again silent.
“Multi-sensory integration refers to the ways in which we synthesize information from two or more of our senses, such that the combination of those sensory inputs is more than what we would have obtained from each of the sensory modalities separately. […] In other words, when it comes to sound and vision, “the viewer/listener builds verbal and visual representations and connects between them” (Ben-Shaul 2003: 2).” (Wharton and Collins 2011).
Dinky Island: Close to the finale of the game, Guybrush finds himself at Dinky, the island of the mythic treasure of Big Whoop. Before he gains the treasure, falls to the hands of his nemesis LeChuck and finally realizes that they are brothers, he is lost in a forest. The music, with the addition of small fragments from the main theme, is minimal and ambient highlighting the nature of the forest. Winifred Phillips separates the main melody of a game from the rest leitmotifs calling it a fixed idea, as it must be associated with most important events. The subtle appearances of the main theme gives clues to the player about the importance of this island and what secrets might hides below. No music plays on the Amiga.
An idée fixe, as originally described by Berlioz, is by its nature a singular phenomenon. Otherwise, it would lose its special significance. In this regard, an idée fixe may display unique properties that set it apart from all other themes. […] This is why an idée fixe is best associated with an intangible aspect of the story, whether that be a belief, an emotion, or a goal. Whatever it may be, this association should function as a central driving force in the overall story. (Phillips 2014: 62)
Except the previous scenes that the music wasn’t there to add an aural rendition into the ventures of the naive Guybrush, there were also some well-thought underscoring moments on both versions. When Guybrush surprisingly learns about the resurrection of LeChuck, he looks for shelter in the International House of Mojo, home of the Voodoo Lady. Unfortunately Guybrush doesn’t find a hideout and terrified he exits the hut. The music of this location has a unique property, because iMUSE construct or deconstruct the piece as Guybrush enters or leaves the place respectively. The musical layers are gradually disappearing, but now the dark motif of LeChuck is always playing on the foreground. Tim Summer writes about this sinister melody: “Lechuck’s chromatically slippery motif in low brass tones immediately encapsulates his dastardly character, so players understand the threat he poses without the need for dialogue to establish the character” (Summers 2014: 209). Here the leitmotif doesn’t associate the melody with the physical substance of LeChuck, but it shows the inner feelings of Guybrush as the music fades out and the ominous theme insists to being heard. I find this hearing of Lechuck’s leitmotif, as one of the most subtle musical narration in adventure games.
Like a silent movie, the soundtrack of Monkey Island 2 characterizes persons, locations and the pivotal actions of Guybrush Threepwood, and so “the music in Monkey 2 has such an integral role in the game’s overall effect that it’s truly a inseparable component” (The International House of Mojo Staff 2008).
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