BOUNTIFUL BUCCANEERING
THE SECRET OF MONKEY ISLAND
DEVELOPER: LUCASFILM GAMES
RELEASE: 1990
◼ Somewhere, deep in the Caribbean, wanna be pirate Guybrush Threepwood began his journey and charmed a generation of gamers in this seminal graphic adventure. Ron Gilbert’s most famous game married warm-hearted, goofy humour with brilliant pixel-art backdrops and pleasing puzzles. It sold well on release, but not to an extent that matches current levels of fandom for the series, meaning copies are in high demand. This is even more the case when the Dial-A-Pirate copy-protection wheel – a circular, cardboard contraption for lining up pirate face parts – is present and intact.
Although UK budget-label release versions start at around £30, first edition Amiga and Sega Mega-CD copies can easily go for £60 or more. For a complete IBM PC big-box edition, you’ll be looking at somewhere in the region of £130 and upwards. The Japanese Sega Mega-CD game is quite rare, but rarer still is the Japanese FM Towns version – the only copy we could find for sale anywhere had attracted 27 watchers at an asking price of £865.
WINGING IT
STAR WARS: X-WING
DEVELOPER: LUCASARTS
RELEASE: 1993
◼ When George Lucas launched a games games. Ten years later, he was able to bring that development control back in-house (albeit working with contractors who would later form Totally Games) with . The 3D space combat simulator placed PC gamers in the cockpit of a Rebel Alliance starfighter to strikingly cinematic effect. It was also the first game outside of LucasArts graphic adventures to use the iMUSE system, which harmonised shifts in music with action unfolding on the screen. Sequels included and .
