Although the season is spread out across five stand-alone episodes released in as many months, the overarching story connects them so deeply that the season is best played in a continuous block and treated as one complete game. The story starts off well, but doesn't really pick up until the third episode. The chapters also share the same gameplay issues, like the awkward movement system where players hold down the mouse button to direct characters when there aren't any clickable hotspots on the screen. In many cases, the levels aren't designed to support this system, which makes it a pain to get around. Specifically, there's one point where the Guybrush has to walk from one end of town to the other without interacting with anything, which equates to fighting against the movement system. We can't figure out why a revival of a point-and-click adventure game wouldn't use a nice point-and-click interface. There are a couple of other gameplay quirks, but fortunately the game is entertaining enough to make up for them.

Puzzles are generally set up in a Monkey Island fashion, where players must substitute objects with like ones and smooth talk their way out of situations. Like the main plot, the puzzles has its ups and downs. Some are brilliant while others are ruin the experience when players get stuck on them for too long. One that we found particularly entertaining is the double insult sword fighting, where we had to pick phrases that raised the morale of one opponent while putting down the other. However, there were plenty of times when were stuck wandering around, trying to figure out what to do next. Guybrush drops a hint now and again, but the hints are often too vague and don't come fast enough, even with the hint setting set to maximum. There's also no way of calling up a hint specific to the puzzle you want to solve. One example is during the funny face showdown, where Guybrush has to build up a repertoire of facial expressions to defeat the master. We appreciate the spirit of the puzzle, and had a good time searching through different areas for expressions, but soon became frustrated when trying to get the last face. We eventually figured out the clever a clever solution, but the game's pacing took a major hit and it didn't help that Guybrush kept repeating the same unhelpful clue. The issue becomes especially problematic during long sequences like the final battle in the last chapter, where players have a limited time to figure out how to set things up before the scene loops to the next part.

Tales of Monkey Island goes out of its way to please both newcomers and fans of the previous games and sometimes suffers from getting stuck somewhere in the middle. There are numerous points where characters will reference events from the games from the 90s with a nod and a wink. This is a great game for Monkey Island fans, but those without prior knowledge might end up getting a little lost, especially when characters from the original games suddenly start showing up. Only one or two of the new characters are memorable while the rest feel like props to set up the next puzzle or one-liner. On the bright side, the voice acting is superb and the game uses many of the actors featured in the original games. The only down side to this is that sometimes the background sounds drown out the dialogue.

As with most comedy, a lot of the humor is pretty hit-or-miss. Maybe it's just nostalgia, but we remember the old games having some really off-the-wall humor that had us on the floor laughing. Those moments happen all too rarely with the new series. We're sure a lot of creative puzzles could be created using a electromagnetic monkey. Serious laugh-out-loud moments in Tales of Monkey Island include the evil voodoo skull Murray making a cameo to lash out the insults all the way through end credits.

Also, many of the areas come off feeling small, like the town on Flotsam Island, or has a sameness quality that makes it easy to get lost, like in the jungle. Tales of Monkey Island isn't necessarily a game that emphasizes exploration, but some more bonus content would have been nice. Repeatable minigames might have improved the experience, even though it would have probably made it too similar to the Sam & Max series. Ultimately, the first season of Tales of Monkey Island proves entertaining, but a little too straightforward for our taste. Maybe the Mighty Pirate will be more daring in the next season.