Are there any surviving early builds that could be included as GoG or Steam goodies? I’d LOVE to see the early drafts of the game, especially the pre-Ferarri wireframe builds, or any early dialog versions. The early Monkey Island betas and MM demos are quite a legacy amongst us die-hands and I was wondering if any rough .exes had been considered for inclusion in a Goodies folder as a bonus?
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What early MI betas? We never released any. Or are you talking about the demo?
Ahh yeah, I meant the demos, there were a couple, one with the famous ‘Charles Altas’ reference and another with a totally different mini-game that starts on the pier. It’s been a couple of years since I played them so I need to really check which is which.
You mey be interested in this demo-trailer released by Lucasfilm back then, it’s about Zak McKracken.
The one thing we currently have is the built-in demo mode which was available in the original release:
You can download a lot of the demos at ScummVM:
The “games” on this site are links to the corresponding archive with the demo. If you click on one of the plus symbols you’ll find more systems. For example to get the DOS Demo for MI 1, click on the plus symbol next to “The Secret of Monkey Island (Amiga demo)” and then on " The Secret of Monkey Island (DOS EGA demo)"
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I think the one of the “mini game” you refer to, is “Passport to Adventure”. You can find it at the first URL given by @Someone
Regarding the Charles Atlas reference… maybe you refer to the statue in the voodoo lady house? I have definitely in my mind that reference, so it must be either in the final game or in Passport to Adventure, since I have no other demos.
Are there other demos around? @Someone maybe the one you posted in the second URL?
Yeah, I think it was Passport to Adventure or maybe the Amiga demo? Whichever one it was, it definitely has the Charles Atlas reference in it.
I remember one demo version of Monkey Island EGA where Guybrush could walk on the wall around the clock tower by entering those random doors. It was very similar to the passport version, but not exactly the same. I’ve never seen it again. The versions I found for download don’t seem to have that particular feature. Must have been an English or a German version.
If someone happens to have it, I suggest providing it to ScummVM’s demo section.
That one was still present in every floppy version.
Yes, the Charles Atlas reference definitely made it into the EGA version (and if my memory doesn’t fail me, in the early VGA version also). I believe it was removed in the version with icons in the inventory.
The Charles Atlas reference was in the first EGA release, then Lucasfilm received a cease and desist letter from the company that owned the TM to Charles Atlas and we had to remove it from future release. Not all the EGA version have it, only the first pressing.
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How did the Atlas estate find out about it? Did Lucasfilm scan the game text, send out any and all possible infringements, released it then heard back eventually from them?
@RonGilbert Back to my original question though, will there be any Atlas-edition TP builds released to owners of the game at any point? Not thinking DLC or anything, just some fun goodies for the Extras section of GoG, or something. I know a game that’s actually put some early builds in a /goodies folder in the game folder, something like that would be amazing to us die-hard ThimbleFans™.
I don’t know. Lucasfilm didn’t know about it until they got the letter. Companies typically don’t send out notices letting they might be infringing. Usually what happens is the company Lawyers will review the text, etc for possible infringement and tell you to change it. Ot they say “yeah, it’s risky, but probably OK”. Lucasfilm never reviewed any of our text.
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The only new releases I have planned is for the Italian fan translation. All of the team (me included) is on to new stuff. Back at Lucasfilm (and at other companies) there are people that can handle stuff this, but not us, We’re too small. Going back to the pre-Mark days and pulling a build from Git and compiling it might be fun. But, even that will take me at least a week to do.
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And this is really appreciated. 
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I think we would all definitely appreciate a pre-Mark build as a bonus goody! I understand you’re all on to new projects, but us ThimbleFans™ are still here with the rest of the characters in the endless game-loop, we’ve been waiting 20+ years to make this our new favourite PnC adventure game!
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