Maniac Mansion
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''Maniac Mansion'' is a 1987
graphic adventure An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and/or puzzle-solving. The genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based m ...
video game developed and published by Lucasfilm Games. It follows teenage protagonist Dave Miller as he attempts to rescue his girlfriend Sandy Pantz from a
mad scientist The mad scientist (also mad doctor or mad professor) is a stock character of a scientist who is perceived as " mad, bad and dangerous to know" or " insane" owing to a combination of unusual or unsettling personality traits and the unabashedly a ...
, whose mind has been enslaved by a sentient meteor. The player uses a
point-and-click Point and click are the actions of a computer user moving a pointer to a certain location on a screen (''pointing'') and then pressing a button on a mouse, usually the left button (''click''), or other pointing device. An example of point and ...
interface to guide Dave and two of his six playable friends through the scientist's mansion while solving puzzles and avoiding dangers. Gameplay is non-linear, and the game must be completed in different ways based on the player's choice of characters. Initially released for the
Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness ...
and
Apple II The Apple II (stylized as ) is an 8-bit home computer and one of the world's first highly successful mass-produced microcomputer products. It was designed primarily by Steve Wozniak; Jerry Manock developed the design of Apple II's foam-m ...
, ''Maniac Mansion'' was Lucasfilm Games' first
self-published Self-publishing is the publication of media by its author at their own cost, without the involvement of a publisher. The term usually refers to written media, such as books and magazines, either as an ebook or as a physical copy using POD (pri ...
product. The game was conceived in 1985 by Ron Gilbert and
Gary Winnick Gary Winnick is an American financier best known for founding and being Chairman of Global Crossing between 1997 and 2002, when it declared bankruptcy. As of 2015, he was Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Winnick & Company, a Los Ang ...
, who sought to tell a comedic story based on horror film and B-movie clichés. They mapped out the project as a
paper-and-pencil game Paper-and-pencil games or paper-and-pen games (or some variation on those terms) are games that can be played solely with paper and pencils (or other writing implements), usually without erasing. They may be played to pass the time, as icebrea ...
before coding commenced. While earlier adventure titles had relied on command lines, Gilbert disliked such systems, and he developed ''Maniac Mansion''s simpler point-and-click interface as a replacement. To speed up production, he created a
game engine A game engine is a software framework primarily designed for the development of video games and generally includes relevant libraries and support programs. The "engine" terminology is similar to the term "software engine" used in the software i ...
called SCUMM, which was used in many later LucasArts titles. After its release, ''Maniac Mansion'' was
ported In software engineering, porting is the process of adapting software for the purpose of achieving some form of execution in a computing environment that is different from the one that a given program (meant for such execution) was originally desi ...
to several platforms. A port for the Nintendo Entertainment System had to be reworked heavily, in response to
Nintendo of America is a Japanese multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto, Japan. It develops video games and video game consoles. Nintendo was founded in 1889 as by craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi and originally produced handmade playing card ...
’s concerns that the game was inappropriate for children. ''Maniac Mansion'' was critically acclaimed: reviewers lauded its graphics,
cutscene A cutscene or event scene (sometimes in-game cinematic or in-game movie) is a sequence in a video game that is not interactive, interrupting the gameplay. Such scenes are used to show conversations between characters, set the mood, reward the ...
s, animation, and humor. Writer
Orson Scott Card Orson Scott Card (born August 24, 1951) is an American writer known best for his science fiction works. He is the first and (as of 2022) only person to win both a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award in consecutive years, winning both awards for both ...
praised it as a step toward "computer games ecominga valid storytelling art". It influenced numerous graphic adventure titles, and its point-and-click interface became a standard feature in the genre. The game's success solidified Lucasfilm as a serious rival to adventure game studios such as
Sierra On-Line Sierra Entertainment, Inc. (formerly On-Line Systems and Sierra On-Line, Inc.) was an American video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Williams. The company is known for pioneering the graphic adventure game genr ...
. In 1990, ''Maniac Mansion'' was adapted into a three-season television series of the same name, written by Eugene Levy and starring Joe Flaherty. A sequel to the game, ''
Day of the Tentacle ''Day of the Tentacle'', also known as ''Maniac Mansion II: Day of the Tentacle'', is a 1993 graphic adventure game developed and published by LucasArts. It is the sequel to the 1987 game ''Maniac Mansion''. The plot follows Bernard Bernoulli a ...
'', was released in 1993.


Overview

''Maniac Mansion'' is a
graphic adventure game An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and/or puzzle-solving. The genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based m ...
in which the player uses a
point-and-click Point and click are the actions of a computer user moving a pointer to a certain location on a screen (''pointing'') and then pressing a button on a mouse, usually the left button (''click''), or other pointing device. An example of point and ...
interface to guide characters through a
two-dimensional In mathematics, a plane is a Euclidean ( flat), two-dimensional surface that extends indefinitely. A plane is the two-dimensional analogue of a point (zero dimensions), a line (one dimension) and three-dimensional space. Planes can arise as ...
game world and to solve puzzles. Fifteen action commands, such as "Walk To" and "Unlock", may be selected by the player from a menu on the screen's lower half. The player starts the game by choosing two out of six characters to accompany protagonist Dave Miller: Bernard, Jeff, Michael, Razor, Syd, and Wendy. Each character possesses unique abilities: for example, Syd and Razor can play musical instruments, while Bernard can repair appliances. The game may be completed with any combination of characters; but, since many puzzles are solvable only by certain characters, different paths must be taken based on the group's composition. ''Maniac Mansion'' features
cutscene A cutscene or event scene (sometimes in-game cinematic or in-game movie) is a sequence in a video game that is not interactive, interrupting the gameplay. Such scenes are used to show conversations between characters, set the mood, reward the ...
s, a word coined by Ron Gilbert, that interrupt gameplay to advance the story and inform the player about offscreen events. The game takes place in the mansion of the fictional Edison family: Dr. Fred, a
mad scientist The mad scientist (also mad doctor or mad professor) is a stock character of a scientist who is perceived as " mad, bad and dangerous to know" or " insane" owing to a combination of unusual or unsettling personality traits and the unabashedly a ...
; Nurse Edna, his wife; and their son Weird Ed. Living with the Edisons are two large, disembodied tentacles, one purple and the other green. The intro sequence shows that a sentient meteor crashed near the mansion twenty years earlier; it brainwashed the Edisons and directed Dr. Fred to obtain human brains for use in experiments. The game begins as Dave Miller prepares to enter the mansion to rescue his girlfriend, Sandy Pantz, who had been kidnapped by Dr. Fred. With the exception of the green tentacle, the mansion's inhabitants are hostile, and will throw the
player character A player character (also known as a playable character or PC) is a fictional character in a video game or tabletop role-playing game whose actions are controlled by a player rather than the rules of the game. The characters that are not control ...
s into the dungeon—or, in some situations, kill them—if they see them. When a character dies, the player must continue with the remaining of the three selected characters; the game ends if all characters are killed. ''Maniac Mansion'' has five possible endings, based on which characters are chosen, which survive, and what the characters accomplish.


Development


Conception

''Maniac Mansion'' was conceived in 1985 when Lucasfilm Games employees Ron Gilbert and
Gary Winnick Gary Winnick is an American financier best known for founding and being Chairman of Global Crossing between 1997 and 2002, when it declared bankruptcy. As of 2015, he was Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Winnick & Company, a Los Ang ...
were assigned to create an original game. Gilbert had been hired the previous year as a programmer for the game '' Koronis Rift''. He befriended Winnick over their similar tastes in humor, film, and television. Company management provided little oversight in the creation of ''Maniac Mansion'', a trend to which Gilbert credited the success of several of his games for Lucasfilm. Gilbert and Winnick co-wrote and co-designed the project, but they worked separately as well: Gilbert on programming and Winnick on visuals. As both of them enjoyed B horror films, they decided to make a comedy-horror game set in a haunted house. They drew inspiration from a film whose name Winnick could not recall. He described it as "a ridiculous teen horror movie", in which teenagers inside a building were killed one by one without any thought of leaving. This film, combined with clichés from popular horror movies such as '' Friday the 13th'' and ''
A Nightmare on Elm Street ''A Nightmare on Elm Street'' is a 1984 American supernatural slasher film written and directed by Wes Craven and produced by Robert Shaye. It is the first installment in the ''A Nightmare on Elm Street'' franchise and stars Heather Langenka ...
'', became the basis for the game's setting. Early work on the game progressed organically: according to Gilbert, "very little was written down. Gary and I just talked and laughed a lot, and out it came". Lucasfilm Games relocated to the Stable House at
Skywalker Ranch Skywalker Ranch is a movie ranch and workplace of film director, writer and producer George Lucas located in a secluded area near Nicasio, California, in Marin County. The ranch is located on Lucas Valley Road, named for an early-20th-century l ...
during ''Maniac Mansion''s conception period, and the ranch's Main House was used as a model for the mansion. Several rooms from the Main House received exact reproductions in the game, such as a library with a spiral staircase and a media room with a large-screen TV and
grand piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...
. Story and characters were a primary concern for Gilbert and Winnick. The pair based the game's cast on friends, family members, acquaintances, and stereotypes. For example, Winnick's girlfriend Ray was the inspiration for Razor, while Dave and Wendy were based, respectively, on Gilbert and a fellow Lucasfilm employee named Wendy. According to Winnick, the Edison family was shaped after characters from
EC Comics Entertaining Comics, more commonly known as EC Comics, was an American publisher of comic books, which specialized in horror fiction, crime fiction, satire, military fiction, dark fantasy, and science fiction from the 1940s through the mid-195 ...
and
Warren Publishing Warren Publishing was an American magazine company founded by James Warren, who published his first magazines in 1957 and continued in the business for decades. Magazines published by Warren include '' After Hours'', '' Creepy'', '' Eerie'', '' F ...
magazines. The sentient meteor that brainwashes Dr. Fred was inspired by a segment from the 1982
anthology film An anthology film (also known as an omnibus film, package film, or portmanteau film) is a single film consisting of several shorter films, each complete in itself and distinguished from the other, though frequently tied together by a single theme ...
''
Creepshow ''Creepshow'' is a 1982 American horror comedy anthology film directed by George A. Romero and written by Stephen King, making this film his screenwriting debut. The film's ensemble cast includes Hal Holbrook, Adrienne Barbeau, Fritz Weaver ...
''. A man-eating plant, similar to that of '' Little Shop of Horrors'', was included as well. The developers sought to strike a balance between tension and humor with the game's story. Initially, Gilbert and Winnick struggled to choose a gameplay genre for ''Maniac Mansion''. While visiting relatives over Christmas, Gilbert saw his cousin play '' King's Quest: Quest for the Crown'', an adventure game by
Sierra On-Line Sierra Entertainment, Inc. (formerly On-Line Systems and Sierra On-Line, Inc.) was an American video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Williams. The company is known for pioneering the graphic adventure game genr ...
. Although he was a fan of text adventures, this was Gilbert's first experience with a graphic adventure, and he used the holiday to play the game and familiarize himself with the format. As a result, he decided to develop his and Winnick's ideas into a graphic adventure game. ''Maniac Mansion''s story and structure were designed before coding commenced. The project's earliest incarnation was a paper-and-pencil board game, in which the mansion's floor plan was used as a game board, and cards represented events and characters. Lines connected the rooms to illustrate pathways by which characters could travel. Strips of
cellulose acetate In biochemistry, cellulose acetate refers to any acetate ester of cellulose, usually cellulose diacetate. It was first prepared in 1865. A bioplastic, cellulose acetate is used as a film base in photography, as a component in some coatings, and ...
were used to map out the game's puzzles by tracking which items worked together when used by certain characters. Impressed by the map's complexity, Winnick included it in the final game as a poster hung on a wall. Because each character contributes different skills and resources, the pair spent months working on the event combinations that could occur. This extended the game's production time beyond that of previous Lucasfilm Games projects, which almost led to Gilbert's firing. The game's dialogue, written by David Fox, was not created until after programming had begun.


Production and SCUMM

Gilbert started programming ''Maniac Mansion'' in 6502
assembly language In computer programming, assembly language (or assembler language, or symbolic machine code), often referred to simply as Assembly and commonly abbreviated as ASM or asm, is any low-level programming language with a very strong correspondence be ...
, but he quickly decided that the project was too large and complex for this method. He decided that a new
game engine A game engine is a software framework primarily designed for the development of video games and generally includes relevant libraries and support programs. The "engine" terminology is similar to the term "software engine" used in the software i ...
would have to be created. Its coding language was initially planned to be Lisp-inspired, but Gilbert opted for one similar to C and
Yacc Yacc (Yet Another Compiler-Compiler) is a computer program for the Unix operating system developed by Stephen C. Johnson. It is a Look Ahead Left-to-Right Rightmost Derivation (LALR) parser generator, generating a LALR parser (the part of a co ...
. Lucasfilm employee
Chip Morningstar Chip Morningstar is an American software architect, mainly for online entertainment and communication. Morningstar held many jobs throughout his career in the research and development of technology and programs. Most notably was Morningstar's r ...
contributed the base code for the engine, which Gilbert then built on. Gilbert hoped to create a "system that could be used on many adventure games, cutting down the time it took to make them". ''Maniac Mansion''s first six-to-nine months of production were dedicated largely to engine development. The game was developed around the
Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness ...
home computer, an 8-bit system with only 64 KB of memory. The team wanted to include
scrolling In computer displays, filmmaking, television production, and other kinetic displays, scrolling is sliding text, images or video across a monitor or display, vertically or horizontally. "Scrolling," as such, does not change the layout of the text ...
screens, but as it was normally impossible to scroll bitmap graphics on the Commodore 64, they had to use lower-detail tile graphics. Winnick gave each character a large head made of three stacked sprites to make them recognizable. Although Gilbert wrote much of the foundational code for ''Maniac Mansion'', the majority of the game's events were programmed by Lucasfilm employee David Fox. Fox was between projects and planned to work on the game only for a month, but he remained with the team for six months. With Gilbert, he wrote the characters' dialog and choreographed the action. Winnick's concept art inspired him to add new elements to the game: for example, Fox allowed the player to place a hamster inside the kitchen's microwave. The team wanted to avoid punishing the player for applying everyday logic in ''Maniac Mansion''. Fox noted that one Sierra game features a scene in which the player, without prior warning, may encounter a game over screen simply by picking up a shard of glass. He characterized such game design as "sadistic", and he commented: "I know that in the real world I can successfully pick up a broken piece of mirror without dying". Because of the project's nonlinear puzzle design, the team struggled to prevent no-win scenarios, in which the player unexpectedly became unable to complete the game. As a result of this problem, Gilbert later explained: "We were constantly fighting against the desire just to rip out all the endings and just go with three characters, or even sometimes just one character". Lucasfilm Games had only one
playtest A playtest is the process by which a game designer tests a new game for bugs and design flaws before releasing it to market. Playtests can be run "open", "closed", "beta", or otherwise, and are very common with board games, collectible card games, ...
er, and many dead-ends went undetected as a result. Further playtesting was provided by Gilbert's uncle, to whom Gilbert mailed a floppy disk of the game's latest version each week. The ''Maniac Mansion'' team wanted to retain the structure of a text-based adventure game, but without the standard
command-line interface A command-line interpreter or command-line processor uses a command-line interface (CLI) to receive commands from a user in the form of lines of text. This provides a means of setting parameters for the environment, invoking executables and pro ...
. Gilbert and Winnick were frustrated by the genre's
text parser {{Refimprove, date=August 2007 In adventure games, a text parser takes typed input (a command) from the player and simplifies it to something the game can understand. Usually, words with the same meaning are turned into the same word (e.g. "take" ...
s and frequent game over screens. While in college, Gilbert had enjoyed ''
Colossal Cave Adventure ''Colossal Cave Adventure'' (also known as ''Adventure'' or ''ADVENT'') is a text-based adventure game, released in 1976 by developer Will Crowther for the PDP-10 mainframe computer. It was expanded upon in 1977 by Don Woods. In the game, the ...
'' and the games of
Infocom Infocom was an American software company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of interactive fiction. They also produced a business application, a relational database called ''Cornerstone (software), Cornerstone''. ...
, but he disliked their lack of visuals. He found the inclusion of graphics in Sierra On-Line games, such as ''King's Quest'', to be a step in the right direction, but these games still require the player to type, and to guess which commands must be input. In response, Gilbert programmed a point-and-click
graphical user interface The GUI ( "UI" by itself is still usually pronounced . or ), graphical user interface, is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicator such as primary notation, inste ...
that displays every possible command. Fox had made a similar attempt to streamline Lucasfilm's earlier '' Labyrinth: The Computer Game'' and he conceived the entirety of ''Maniac Mansion''s interface, according to Gilbert. Forty input commands were planned at first, but the number was gradually reduced to 12. Gilbert finished the ''Maniac Mansion'' engine—which he later named "Script Creation Utility for Maniac Mansion" ( SCUMM)—after roughly one year of work. Although the game was designed for the Commodore 64, the SCUMM engine allowed it to be
ported In software engineering, porting is the process of adapting software for the purpose of achieving some form of execution in a computing environment that is different from the one that a given program (meant for such execution) was originally desi ...
easily to other platforms. After 18 to 24 months of development, ''Maniac Mansion'' debuted at the 1987 Consumer Electronics Show in
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...
. The game was released for the Commodore 64 and Apple II in October 1987. While previous Lucasfilm Games products had been published by outside companies, ''Maniac Mansion'' was self-published. This became a trend at Lucasfilm. The company hired Ken Macklin, an acquaintance of Winnick's, to design the game's packaging artwork. Gilbert and Winnick collaborated with the marketing department to design the back cover. The two also created an insert that includes hints, a backstory, and jokes. An MS-DOS port was released in early 1988, developed in part by Lucasfilm employees Aric Wilmunder and Brad Taylor. Ports for the Amiga, Atari ST and Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) followed, with the Amiga and Atari ST ports in 1989 and the NES port in 1990. The 16-bit versions of Maniac Mansion featured a copy protection system requiring the user to enter graphical symbols out of a code book included with the game. This was not present in the Commodore 64 and Apple versions due to lack of disk space, so those instead used an on-disk copy protection.


Nintendo Entertainment System version

There were two separate versions of the game developed for the NES. The first port was handled and published by Jaleco only in Japan. Released on June 23, 1988, it featured characters redrawn in a cute art style and generally shrunken rooms. No scrolling is present, leading to rooms larger than a single screen to be displayed via flip-screens. Many of the background details are missing, and instead of a save feature a password, over 100 characters long, is required to save progress. In September 1990 Jaleco released an American version of ''Maniac Mansion'' as the first NES title developed by Lucasfilm Games in cooperation with Realtime Associates. Generally, this port is regarded as being far closer to the original game than the Japanese effort. Company management was occupied with other projects, and so the port received little attention until employee
Douglas Crockford Douglas Crockford is an American computer programmer who is involved in the development of the JavaScript language. He specified the data format JSON (JavaScript Object Notation), and has developed various JavaScript related tools such as the st ...
volunteered to direct it. The team used a modified version of the SCUMM engine called "NES SCUMM" for the port. According to Crockford, " neof the main differences between the NES and PCs is that the NES can do certain things much faster". The graphics had to be entirely redrawn to match the NES's
display resolution The display resolution or display modes of a digital television, computer monitor or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution ...
.
Tim Schafer Timothy John Schafer (born July 26, 1967) is an American video game designer. He founded Double Fine Productions in July 2000, after having spent over a decade at LucasArts. Schafer is best known as the designer of critically acclaimed games '' ...
, who later designed ''Maniac Mansion''s sequel ''
Day of the Tentacle ''Day of the Tentacle'', also known as ''Maniac Mansion II: Day of the Tentacle'', is a 1993 graphic adventure game developed and published by LucasArts. It is the sequel to the 1987 game ''Maniac Mansion''. The plot follows Bernard Bernoulli a ...
'', received his first professional credit as a playtester for the NES version of ''Maniac Mansion''. During ''Maniac Mansion''s development for the Commodore 64, Lucasfilm had censored profanity in the script: for instance, the early line of dialogue "Don't be a shit head" became "Don't be a tuna head". Additional content was removed from the NES version to make it suitable for a younger audience, and to conform with Nintendo's policies. Jaleco USA president Howie Rubin warned Crockford about content to which Nintendo might object, such as the word "kill". After reading the NES Game Standards Policy for himself, Crockford suspected that further elements of ''Maniac Mansion'' could be problematic, and he sent a list of questionable content to Jaleco. When the company replied that the content was reasonable, Lucasfilm Games submitted ''Maniac Mansion'' for approval. One month later, Nintendo of America was concerned that its content was objectionable, believing it was inappropriate for children, and contacted Lucasfilm Games to request they tone down the inappropriate content, particularly profanity and nudity. Crockford censored this content but attempted to leave the game's essence intact. For example, Nintendo wanted graffiti in one room, which provided an important hint to players, removed from the game. Unable to comply without simultaneously removing the hint, the team simply shortened it. Sexually suggestive and otherwise "graphic" dialogue was edited, including a remark from Dr. Fred about "pretty brains eingsucked out". The nudity described by Nintendo encompassed a swimsuit calendar, a
classical sculpture Classical sculpture (usually with a lower case "c") refers generally to sculpture from Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome, as well as the Hellenized and Romanized civilizations under their rule or influence, from about 500 BC to around 200 AD. It ma ...
and a poster of a mummy in a
Playmate A Playmate is a female model featured in the centerfold/gatefold of ''Playboy'' magazine as Playmate of the Month (PMOTM). The PMOTM's pictorial includes nude photographs and a centerfold poster, along with a pictorial biography and the "Playm ...
pose. After a brief fight to keep the sculpture, the team ultimately removed all three. The phrase "NES SCUMM System" in the credits sequence was censored as well. Lucasfilm Games re-submitted the edited version of ''Maniac Mansion'' to Nintendo, which then manufactured 250,000 cartridges. Each cartridge was fitted with a battery-powered back-up to save data. Nintendo announced the port through its official magazine in early 1990, and it provided further coverage later that year. The ability to microwave a hamster remained in the game, which Crockford cited as an example of the censors' contradictory criteria. Nintendo later noticed it, and after the first batch of cartridges was sold, Jaleco was forced to remove the content from future shipments. Late in development, Jaleco commissioned
Realtime Associates Realtime Associates is an American video game developer and publisher. The company was founded in 1986 by David Warhol and a group of ex-Mattel Electronics employees originally to create games for the Intellivision system. Since then, the compa ...
to provide background music, which no previous version of ''Maniac Mansion'' had featured. Realtime Associates' founder and president David Warhol noted that "video games at that time had to have 'wall to wall' music". He brought in George "The Fat Man" Sanger and his band, along with David Hayes, to compose the score. Their goal was to create songs that suited each character, such as a punk rock theme for Razor, an
electronic rock Electronic rock is a music genre that involves a combination of rock music and electronic music, featuring instruments typically found within both genres. It originates from the late 1960s, when rock bands began incorporating electronic instrum ...
theme for Bernard and a version of
Thin Lizzy Thin Lizzy are an Irish hard rock band formed in Dublin in 1969. Their music reflects a wide range of influences, including blues, soul music, psychedelic rock and traditional Irish folk music, but is generally classified as hard rock or som ...
's "
The Boys Are Back in Town "The Boys Are Back in Town" is a song by Irish hard rock band Thin Lizzy. The song was originally released in 1976 as the first single from their album ''Jailbreak''. It is considered by ''Rolling Stone'' to be the band's best song, placing it a ...
" for Dave Miller. Warhol translated their work into NES chiptune music.


Reception

According to Stuart Hunt of ''
Retro Gamer ''Retro Gamer'' is a British magazine, published worldwide, covering retro video games. It was the first commercial magazine to be devoted entirely to the subject. Launched in January 2004 as a quarterly publication, ''Retro Gamer'' soon became ...
'', ''Maniac Mansion'' received highly positive reviews from critics. Nevertheless, Ron Gilbert noted that "it wasn't a huge hit" commercially. In 2011, Hunt wrote that "as so often tends to be the way with cult classics, the popularity it saw was slow in coming". Keith Farrell of ''
Compute!'s Gazette ''Compute!'s Gazette'' (), stylized as ''COMPUTE!'s Gazette'', was a computer magazine of the 1980s, directed at users of Commodore's 8-bit home computers. Announced as ''The Commodore Gazette'', it was a Commodore-only daughter magazine of the ...
'' was struck by ''Maniac Mansion''s similarity to film, particularly in its use of cutscenes to impart "information or urgency". He lauded the game's graphics, animation and high level of detail. ''
Commodore User ''Commodore User'', known to the readers as the abbreviated ''CU'', was one of the oldest British Commodore magazines. With a publishing history spanning over 15 years, it mixed content with technical and video game features. Incorporating ''Vic ...
''s Bill Scolding and three reviewers from ''
Zzap!64 ''Zzap!64'' was a computer games magazine covering games on the Commodore International series of computers, especially the Commodore 64 (C64). It was published in the UK by Newsfield Publications Ltd and later by Europress Impact. The magazine ...
'' compared the game to ''
The Rocky Horror Picture Show ''The Rocky Horror Picture Show'' is a 1975 musical comedy horror film by 20th Century Fox, produced by Lou Adler and Michael White and directed by Jim Sharman. The screenplay was written by Sharman and actor Richard O'Brien, who is also ...
''. Further comparisons were drawn to '' Psycho'', '' Friday the 13th'', ''
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre ''The Texas Chain Saw Massacre'' is a 1974 American horror film produced and directed by Tobe Hooper from a story and screenplay by Hooper and Kim Henkel. It stars Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, Edwin Neal, Jim Siedow and Gunnar Hansen, w ...
'', ''
The Addams Family ''The Addams Family'' is a fictional family created by American cartoonist Charles Addams. They originally appeared in a series of 150 unrelated single-panel cartoons, about half of which were originally published in ''The New Yorker'' over ...
'' and ''
Scooby-Doo ''Scooby-Doo'' is an American animated media franchise based on an animated television series launched in 1969 and continued through several derivative media. Writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears created the original series, ''Scooby-Doo, Where Are ...
''. Russ Ceccola of ''Commodore Magazine'' found the cutscenes to be creative and well made, and he commented that the "characters are distinctively Lucasfilm's, bringing facial expressions and personality to each individual character". In ''Compute!'',
Orson Scott Card Orson Scott Card (born August 24, 1951) is an American writer known best for his science fiction works. He is the first and (as of 2022) only person to win both a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award in consecutive years, winning both awards for both ...
praised the game's humor, cinematic storytelling and lack of violence. He called it "compellingly good" and evidence of Lucasfilm's push "to make computer games a valid storytelling art". German magazine ''Happy-Computer'' commended the point-and-click interface and likened it to that of '' Uninvited'' by
ICOM Simulations ICOM Simulations, Inc. (later known as Rabid Entertainment) was a software company based in Wheeling, Illinois. It is best known for creating the MacVenture series of adventure games including ''Shadowgate''. Following the foundation in 1981 a ...
. The publication highlighted ''Maniac Mansion''s graphics, originality, and overall enjoyability: one of the writers called it the best adventure title yet released. ''Happy-Computer'' later reported that ''Maniac Mansion'' was the highest-selling video game in
West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...
for three consecutive months. The game's humor received praise from ''Zzap!64'', whose reviewers called the point-and-click controls "tremendous" and the total package "innovative and polished". Shay Addams of ''Questbusters: The Adventurer's Newsletter'' preferred ''Maniac Mansion''s interface to that of ''Labyrinth: The Computer Game''. He considered the game to be Lucasfilm's best, and he recommended it to Commodore 64 and Apple II users unable to run titles with better visuals, such as those from Sierra On-Line. A writer for ''
ACE An ace is a playing card, die or domino with a single pip. In the standard French deck, an ace has a single suit symbol (a heart, diamond, spade, or club) located in the middle of the card, sometimes large and decorated, especially in the c ...
'' enjoyed the game's animation and depth, but he noted that fans of text-based adventures would dislike the game's simplicity. ''
Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cul ...
'' picked the game as the #20 greatest game available in 1991: "The graphics are merely okay and the music is Nintendo at its tinniest, but Maniac Mansion's plot is enough to overcome these faults. In this command-driven game — adapted from the computer hit — three buddies venture into a sinister haunted mansion and wind up juggling a bunch of wacky story lines".


Ports

Reviewing the MS-DOS and
Atari ST The Atari ST is a line of personal computers from Atari Corporation and the successor to the Atari 8-bit family. The initial model, the Atari 520ST, had limited release in April–June 1985 and was widely available in July. It was the first pers ...
ports, a critic from ''
The Games Machine ''The Games Machine'' is a video game magazine that was published from 1987 until 1990 in the United Kingdom by Newsfield, which also published ''CRASH'', '' Zzap!64'', '' Amtix!'' and other magazines. History The magazine ran head to head wi ...
'' called ''Maniac Mansion'' "an enjoyable romp" that was structurally superior to later
LucasArts adventure games From the late 1980s to the early 2000s, LucasArts was well known for their point-and-click graphic adventure games, nearly all of which received high scoring reviews at the time of their release. Their style tended towards the humorous, often ir ...
. The writer noticed poor
pathfinding Pathfinding or pathing is the plotting, by a computer application, of the shortest route between two points. It is a more practical variant on solving mazes. This field of research is based heavily on Dijkstra's algorithm for finding the sh ...
and disliked the limited audio. Reviewers for ''
The Deseret News The ''Deseret News'' () is the oldest continuously operating publication in the American west. Its multi-platform products feature journalism and commentary across the fields of politics, culture, family life, faith, sports, and entertainment. Th ...
'' lauded the audiovisuals and considered the product "wonderful fun". '' Computer Gaming World''s Charles Ardai praised the game for attaining "the necessary and precarious balance between laughs and suspense that so many comic horror films and novels lack". Although he faulted the control system's limited options, he hailed it as "one of the most comfortable ever devised". Writing for ''
VideoGames & Computer Entertainment ''VideoGames & Computer Entertainment'' (abbreviated as ''VG&CE'') was an American magazine dedicated to covering video games on computers, home consoles and arcades. It was published by LFP, Inc. from the late 1980s until the mid-1990s. Offe ...
'', Bill Kunkel and Joyce Worley stated that the game's plot and premise were typical of the horror genre, but they praised the interface and execution. Reviewing ''Maniac Mansion''s Amiga version four years after its release, Simon Byron of ''
The One Amiga ''The One'' was a video game magazine in the United Kingdom which covered 16-bit home gaming during the late 1980s and early 1990s. It was first published by EMAP in October 1988 and initially covered computer games aimed at the Atari ST, Am ...
'' praised the game for retaining "charm and humour", but suggested that its art direction had become "tacky" compared to more recent titles. Stephen Bradly of ''
Amiga Format ''Amiga Format'' was a British computer magazine for Amiga computers, published by Future plc. The magazine lasted 136 issues from 1989 to 2000. The magazine was formed when, in the wake of selling '' ACE'' to EMAP, Future split the dual-format ...
'' found the game derivative, but encountered "loads of visual humour" in it, adding: "Strangely, it's quite compelling after a while". Michael Labiner of Germany's ''Amiga Joker'' considered ''Maniac Mansion'' to be one of the best adventure games for the system. He noted minor graphical flaws, such as a limited color palette, but he argued that the gameplay made up for such shortcomings. Writing for ''Datormagazin'' in Sweden, Ingela Palmér commented that the Amiga and Commodore 64 versions of ''Maniac Mansion'' were nearly identical. She criticized the graphics and gameplay of both releases but felt the game to be highly enjoyable regardless. Reviewing the NES release, British magazine ''
Mean Machines ''Mean Machines'' was a multi-format video game journalism, video game magazine published between 1990 and 1992 in the United Kingdom. Origins In the late 1980s ''Computer and Video Games'' (''CVG'') was largely covering the outgoing generatio ...
'' commended the game's presentation, playability, and replay value. The publication also noted undetailed graphics and "ear-bashing tunes". The magazine's Julian Rignall compared ''Maniac Mansion'' to the title ''Shadowgate'', but he preferred the former's controls and lack of "death-without-warning situations". Writers for Germany's ''Video Games'' referred to the NES version as a "classic". Co-reviewer Heinrich Lenhardt stated that ''Maniac Mansion'' was unlike any other NES adventure game, and that it was no less enjoyable than its home computer releases. Co-reviewer Winnie Forster found it to be "one of the most original representatives of the dventure gamegenre". In retrospective features, ''Edge'' magazine called the NES version "somewhat neutered" and '' GamesTM'' referred to it as "infamous" and "heavily censored".


TV adaptation and game sequel

Lucasfilm conceived the idea for a television adaptation of ''Maniac Mansion'', the rights to which were purchased by The Family Channel in 1990. The two companies collaborated with Atlantis Films to produce a sitcom named after the game, which debuted in September of that year. It aired on YTV in Canada and The Family Channel in the United States. Based in part on the video game, the series focuses on the Edison family's life and stars Joe Flaherty as Dr. Fred. Its writing staff was led by Eugene Levy. Gilbert later said that the premise of the series changed during production until it differed heavily from the game's original plot. Upon its debut, the adaptation received positive reviews from ''
Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'', ''
Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cul ...
'' and the ''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
''. ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' named it one of the year's best new series. Ken Tucker of ''Entertainment Weekly'' questioned the decision to air the series on The Family Channel, given Flaherty's subversive humor. Discussing the series in retrospect, Richard Cobbett of ''
PC Gamer ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games ma ...
'' criticized its generic storylines and lack of relevance to the game. The series lasted for three seasons; sixty-six episodes were filmed. In the early 1990s, LucasArts tasked Dave Grossman and Tim Schafer, both of whom had worked on the ''Monkey Island'' series, with designing a sequel to ''Maniac Mansion''. Gilbert and Winnick initially assisted with the project's writing. The team included voice acting and more detailed graphics, which Gilbert had originally envisioned for ''Maniac Mansion''. The first game's nonlinear design was discarded, and the team implemented a
Chuck Jones Charles Martin Jones (September 21, 1912 – February 22, 2002) was an American animator, director, and painter, best known for his work with Warner Bros. Cartoons on the ''Looney Tunes'' and ''Merrie Melodies'' series of shorts. He wrote, produ ...
-inspired visual style, alongside numerous puzzles based on time travel. Bernard and the Edison family were retained. The sequel ''
Day of the Tentacle ''Day of the Tentacle'', also known as ''Maniac Mansion II: Day of the Tentacle'', is a 1993 graphic adventure game developed and published by LucasArts. It is the sequel to the 1987 game ''Maniac Mansion''. The plot follows Bernard Bernoulli a ...
'' was released in 1993, and came with a fully playable copy of ''Maniac Mansion'' hidden as an Easter egg within the game.


Impact and legacy

In 2010, the staff of ''GamesTM'' dubbed ''Maniac Mansion'' a "seminal" title that overhauled the gameplay of the graphic adventure genre. Removing the need to guess syntax allowed players to concentrate on the story and puzzles, which created a smoother and more enjoyable experience, according to the magazine. Eurogamer's Kristan Reed agreed: he believed that the design was "infinitely more elegant and intuitive" than its predecessors and that it freed players from "guessing-game frustration". Designer Dave Grossman, who worked on Lucasfilm Games' later ''Day of the Tentacle'' and '' The Secret of Monkey Island'', felt that ''Maniac Mansion'' had revolutionized the adventure game genre. Although 1985's ''Uninvited'' had featured a point-and-click interface, it was not influential. ''Maniac Mansion''s implementation of the concept was widely imitated in other adventure titles. Writing in the
game studies Game studies, also known as ludology (from ''ludus'', "game", and ''-logia'', "study", "research"), is the study of games, the act of playing them, and the players and cultures surrounding them. It is a field of cultural studies that deals with a ...
journal ''Kinephanos'', Jonathan Lessard argued that ''Maniac Mansion'' led a " Casual Revolution" in the late 1980s, which opened the adventure genre to a wider audience. Similarly, Christopher Buecheler of GameSpy called the game a contributor to its genre's subsequent critical adoration and commercial success. Reed highlighted the "wonderfully ambitious" design of ''Maniac Mansion'', in reference to its writing, interface, and cast of characters. Game designer
Sheri Graner Ray Sheri Graner Ray is an American computer game designer. Active since 1990, she has worked for such companies as Electronic Arts, Origin Systems, Sony Online Entertainment, and Cartoon Network, and has worked on such licenses as '' Star Wars Galax ...
believed the game to challenge " damsel in distress" stereotypes through its inclusion of female protagonists. Conversely, writer
Mark Dery Mark Dery (born December 24, 1959)''Contemporary Authors Online'', s.v. "Mark Dery" (accessed February 12, 2008). is an American author, lecturer and cultural critic. An early observer and critic of online culture, he helped to popularize the ter ...
argued that the goal of rescuing a kidnapped cheerleader reinforced negative
gender role A gender role, also known as a sex role, is a social role encompassing a range of behaviors and attitudes that are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on that person's sex. Gender roles are usually cent ...
s. The Lucasfilm team built on their experiences from ''Maniac Mansion'' and became increasingly ambitious in subsequent titles. Gilbert admitted to making mistakes—such as the inclusion of
no-win situation A no-win situation, also called a lose-lose situation, is one where a person has choices, but no choice leads to a net gain. For example, if an executioner offers the condemned the choice of death by being hanged, shot, or poisoned, all choices lea ...
s—in ''Maniac Mansion'', and he applied these lessons to future projects. For example, the game relies on
timers A timer is a specialized type of clock used for measuring specific time intervals. Timers can be categorized into two main types. The word "timer" is usually reserved for devices that counts down from a specified time interval, while devices th ...
rather than
events Event may refer to: Gatherings of people * Ceremony, an event of ritual significance, performed on a special occasion * Convention (meeting), a gathering of individuals engaged in some common interest * Event management, the organization of ev ...
to trigger cutscenes, which occasionally results in awkward transitions: Gilbert worked to avoid this flaw with the ''Monkey Island'' series. Because of ''Maniac Mansion''s imperfections, Gilbert considers it his favorite among the games he made. According to writers Mike and Sandie Morrison, Lucasfilm Games became "serious competition" in the adventure genre after the release of ''Maniac Mansion''. The game's success solidified Lucasfilm as one of the leading producers of adventure games: authors Rusel DeMaria and Johnny Wilson described it as a "landmark title" for the company. In their view, ''Maniac Mansion''—along with '' Space Quest: The Sarien Encounter'' and ''
Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards Leisure has often been defined as a quality of experience or as free time. Free time is time spent away from business, work, job hunting, domestic chores, and education, as well as necessary activities such as eating and sleeping. Leisure ...
''—inaugurated a "new era of humor-based adventure games". This belief was shared by Reed, who wrote that ''Maniac Mansion'' "set in motion a captivating chapter in the history of gaming" that encompassed wit, invention, and style. The SCUMM engine was reused by Lucasfilm in eleven later titles; improvements were made to its code with each game. Over time, rival adventure game developers adopted this paradigm in their own software. ''GamesTM'' attributed the change to a desire to streamline production and create enjoyable games. Following his 1992 departure from LucasArts—a conglomeration of Lucasfilm Games,
ILM Ilm or ILM may refer to: Acronyms * Identity Lifecycle Manager, a Microsoft Server Product * '' I Love Money,'' a TV show on VH1 * Independent Loading Mechanism, a mounting system for CPU sockets * Industrial Light & Magic, an American motion ...
and
Skywalker Sound Skywalker Sound is the sound effects, sound editing, sound design, sound mixing and music recording division of Lucasfilm. Founded in 1975, the company's main facilities are located at George Lucas's Skywalker Ranch in Lucas Valley, near Nicas ...
formed in 1990—Gilbert used SCUMM to create adventure games and ''
Backyard Sports ''Backyard Sports'' (originally branded as ''Junior Sports'') is a video game series released for consoles, computers and mobile devices. The series is best known for starring kid-sized versions of popular professional sports stars, such as Alb ...
'' titles for
Humongous Entertainment Humongous Entertainment, Inc. was an American video game developer based in Bothell, Washington. Founded in 1992, the company is best known for developing multiple edutainment franchises, most prominently ''Putt-Putt (series), Putt-Putt'', ''Fred ...
. In 2011, Richard Cobbett summarized ''Maniac Mansion'' as "one of the most intricate and important adventure games ever made". ''
Retro Gamer ''Retro Gamer'' is a British magazine, published worldwide, covering retro video games. It was the first commercial magazine to be devoted entirely to the subject. Launched in January 2004 as a quarterly publication, ''Retro Gamer'' soon became ...
'' ranked it as one of the ten best Commodore 64 games in 2006, and
IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
later named it one of the ten best
LucasArts adventure games From the late 1980s to the early 2000s, LucasArts was well known for their point-and-click graphic adventure games, nearly all of which received high scoring reviews at the time of their release. Their style tended towards the humorous, often ir ...
. Seven years after the NES version's debut, ''Nintendo Power'' named it the 61st best game ever. The publication dubbed it the 16th best NES title in 2008. The game's uniqueness and clever writing were praised by ''Nintendo Power'': in 2010, the magazine's Chris Hoffman stated that the game is "unlike anything else out there — a point-and-click adventure with an awesome sense of humor and multiple solutions to almost every puzzle". In its retrospective coverage, ''Nintendo Power'' several times noted the ability to microwave a hamster, which the staff considered to be an iconic scene. In March 2012, ''
Retro Gamer ''Retro Gamer'' is a British magazine, published worldwide, covering retro video games. It was the first commercial magazine to be devoted entirely to the subject. Launched in January 2004 as a quarterly publication, ''Retro Gamer'' soon became ...
'' listed the hamster incident as one of the "100 Classic Gaming Moments". ''Maniac Mansion'' enthusiasts have drawn
fan art Fan art or fanart is artwork created by fans of a work of fiction and derived from a series character or other aspect of that work. They are usually done by amateur artists, semi-professionals or professionals. As fan labor, fan art refers t ...
of its characters, participated in tentacle-themed cosplay and produced a trailer for a fictitious film adaptation of the game. German fan Sascha Borisow created a
fan game A fangame is a video game that is created by fans. They are usually based on one, or in some cases several, video game entries or franchises. Many fangames attempt to clone or remake the original game's design, gameplay, and characters, but i ...
remake, titled ''Maniac Mansion Deluxe'', with enhanced audio and visuals. He used the
Adventure Game Studio Adventure Game Studio (AGS) is an open source development tool primarily used to create graphic adventure games. It is aimed at intermediate-level game designers, and combines an integrated development environment (IDE) with a scripting language b ...
engine to develop the project, which he distributed free of charge on the Internet. By the end of 2004, the remake had over 200,000 downloads. A remake with three-dimensional graphics called ''Meteor Mess'' was created by the German developer Vampyr Games, and, as of 2011, another group in Germany produced one with art direction similar to that of ''Day of the Tentacle''. Fans have created an episodic series of games based on ''Maniac Mansion'' as well. Gilbert has said that he would like to see an official remake, similar in its graphics and gameplay to ''The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition'' and ''Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: LeChuck's Revenge''. He also expressed doubts about its potential quality, in light of
George Lucas George Walton Lucas Jr. (born May 14, 1944) is an American filmmaker. Lucas is best known for creating the ''Star Wars'' and ''Indiana Jones'' franchises and founding Lucasfilm, LucasArts, Industrial Light & Magic and THX. He served as chairm ...
's enhanced remakes of the original ''
Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...
'' trilogy. In December 2017,
Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...
, which gained rights to the LucasArts games following its acquisition of Lucasfilm, published ''Maniac Mansion'' running atop the
ScummVM Script Creation Utility for Maniac Mansion Virtual Machine (ScummVM) is a set of game engine recreations. Originally designed to play LucasArts adventure games that use the SCUMM system, it also supports a variety of non-SCUMM games by companies ...
virtual machine to various digital storefronts.


References


External links

*
''Maniac Mansion''
at Classicgaming.cc
''Maniac Mansion'' at c64-wiki.com


at C64Sets.com * * {{Authority control 1987 video games Adventure games Amiga games Fiction about animal cruelty Apple II games Atari ST games Commodore 64 games DOS games Video games about impact events Jaleco games LucasArts games LucasArts franchises Nintendo Entertainment System games Parody video games Point-and-click adventure games Realtime Associates games ScummVM-supported games SCUMM games Video games scored by George Sanger Video games developed in the United States Video games featuring female protagonists Censored video games Video games adapted into television shows Video games with alternate endings Video games scored by Tsukasa Tawada Works set in country houses Single-player video games