Mi primera experiencia con una Aventura Gráfica, Point and Clic y me revoló los sesos, en serio, los invito a pasarse esta cosa sin guía. El juego completo es un puzzle, con un despliegue soberbio de creatividad y encanto, una vez que descubrí como enviar Ítems por el "wáter" a las distintas épocas, el juego hizo clic conmigo y de ahí no lo solté más. Aquí te esperan risas y sonrisas espontáneas, tanto por la satisfacción de la resolución de los acertijos, los cuales están muy bien pensados y tienen su lógica. Como también por los chistes, referencias y salidas de tono, todo con un humor y un estilo inspirado en los Lonney Tunes, y todos amamos a los Lonney Tunes 🥕.

El juego es una continuación de Maníac Mansión, pero aparte de algunas referencias, no es necesario para disfrutar DOTT, aunque se puede jugar completo desde un ordenador in game. Pese a no haber probado estos juegos antes, se nota el cariño por el trabajo por la obra original, ya que en cualquier momento puedes cambiar a los gráficos, música e interfaz antigua e ir combinándolas a gusto. Todos los elementos del juego de 1993 fueron conservados y se pueden disfrutar en este Remaster, junto con todas las mejoras.

2 Tentáculos, experimentos el Dr. Freed, están paseando por fuera del Laboratorio, hasta que uno de ellos, entra en contacto con una sustancia tóxica que le provoca una mutación (le salen brazos xd) lo que le motiva a querer conquistar el mundo, lo gracioso es que lo consigue a través de la política, siendo presidente y obtienendo cada vez más poder. Los 3 protagonistas son enviados por el Dr. Freed al pasado para detener al Tentaculo, antes de que empiece a poner en marcha su plan, pero la máquina del tiempo resulta ser una puta mierda y al final 1 de los personajes queda atascado en el presente, otro, doscientos años atrás en el pasado y mi querida Laverne ♥️, doscientos años en el futuro, cuando los Tentáculos ya tenían todo el mundo bajo su control y a los humanos esclavizados.
Para progresar, los personajes tendrán que colaborar, enviándose items que no se pueden obtener en otra época, alterando eventos del pasado para afectar sucesos del futuro.
No dejare spoilers, porque entre menos sepas, más se disfruta el desparpajo de los acontecimientos y esa sensación de superar los acertijos, aunque es recomendable pasárselo en compañía de alguien que tampoco lo haya jugado, porque dos cabezas piensan mejor, y de alguna forma, reforzando el sentido de colaboración que está presente entre los protagonistas.
En fin, Day of the Tentacle es una propuesta muy armónica, creativa, con puzzles muy bien ejecutados. Hay gaming en Double Fine! 🚬.

A charming, fun little relic of early 90s Lucasarts. I was in a mood for an easy platinum I could feel fairly guiltless about using a walkthrough for, and this offered to scratch that itch exactly. I didn't deviate from the walkthrough much at all, functionally making this a low-stress speed run, so I may redownload it sometime down the line to just enjoy poking around some more. I'm a sucker for 2D point-and-clicks like this, and it has such a distinctive identity about itself that it's hard not to think of fondly. Truly humbling to imagine having to solve these puzzles on my own, though.

¡Muy divertido! Iba un poco con la espectativa baja por el evidente tiempo que ha pasado desde su estreno pero no, ¡ha sido super agradable de jugar! Solo hemos dicho que los puzzles no tenían sentido un par de veces, un número mucho menor del que esperábamos
La clave ha sido que los tres protagonistas que llevan estaban muy bien diferenciados y era muy divertido manejarlos: Bernard era un buen chico (en parte), Hoagie iba de tranquis y Laverne es el mejor personaje.

Recomendadísimo si queréis experimentar aventuras gráficas de los 90

This is a game I got ages ago for free via Twitch Prime, and it's just been languishing in my Twitch game library ever since (like so many other games :b). But this month's TR being point and click stuff gave me the perfect excuse to try it out (after Ack gave me the go-ahead that it counted as a horror game enough for the TR, at least X3). I've never played many point and clicks, let alone LucasArts ones, but I've watched a few be played. I got sorta stuck a few times, but only had to look up one thing (and I felt a bit silly once I had, since I really should've realized what I had to do there XP), and it took me around six and a half hours to beat the game.

Day of the Tentacle is a sequel to Maniac Mansion, with Bernard from that game getting a letter in the mail from Green Tentacle that Purple Tentacle has mutated and is trying to take over the world. Bernard and is friends Hoagie and Laverne journey from their college dorm back to Dr. Fred's mansion to try and help Green Tentacle, but all they do is let Purple Tentacle loose. Dr. Fred tries to use his time machine to go back in time to the previous day to keep Purple Tentacle from turning evil, but the cheap diamond in his time machine breaks, throwing Hoagie 200 years into the past, Laverne 200 years into the future, and Bernard is stuck in the present with Dr. Fred. Even for a LucasArts game, this is a pretty darn strange game, but it's also quite a funny one. There were plenty of times I got a really good laugh out of just how funny the dialogue is. There's some humor that's aged fairly poorly (an instance of homophobia here and there and a fair amount of ableist jokes as well), but it's a far more tolerable amount than in something like Sam & Max: Hit the Road, for example. As far as comedy games from the 90's go, I think Day of the Tentacle is probably about as well-aged as you're gonna possibly get XD

The mechanics of the game are a point and click adventure game, and there's really nothing too special about it in that regard. The main gimmick of the game is the three characters being stuck in the three time periods, and you can send small (or rather, whatever the game decides is "small" enough) inanimate objects between the time machines between each person to help someone out in a different time period. It's a bit of a pain to go back to the time machine constantly if you're stuck and just throwing items back and forth, but it isn't the worst thing in the world. The game also has a lot of cases where you'll use an item for the last time, but that item doesn't get consumed, so you just have a seemingly still useful item in your inventory (and there are a few items that are entirely useless red herrings, so far as I could tell). All that said, out of all the 90's point'n'clicks I've played or watched, this easily has the least moon logic out of all of them. This is a game that is very completable without using a guide, and that's honestly one of the best things about it aside from the good writing.

The remaster has the original graphics/UI and the new remastered graphics/UI that you can switch between at any time via the settings menu. In the remastered UI, you don't have all the commands on the lower screen, but instead if you right click on an object, the possible interactions you can do with it appear on a scroll wheel that you can choose from. The item list will also automatically hide below the screen and it'll pop up by mousing over the lower left corner. It's a really nice way to improve the UI and make the whole game just that much more convenient to play. The music and VA is also all great and sounds nice in the remastered stuff. The music is very fun, and has a happy vibe to it that really reminds me of something like Banjo Kazooie.

What is NOT nice about the remaster is that it runs like absolute trash (and while my PC isn't a behemoth, it ain't no slouch in terms of power). It almost feels like they old engine is simply making the new parts work on my Windows 10 PC, because there was a ton of mouse lag and even lagging audio clips. It seemed to get better if I shut down the game and booted it back up again, but it still felt baffling that a remaster of a game this old still runs this badly.

Edit: A lot of the gameplay lagging (although I'm not so sure about the audio lagging, as I think that's just the emulation) was due to faulty drivers on my end. Definitely sucks to find that out so much later, but good to know it wasn't the game's fault~

Verdict: Highly Recommended. While I haven't played that many old point and clicks, I think this one has aged fantastically. From the humor that is still for the most part palatable to modern sensibilities to the almost complete lack of moon logic, this is an excellent game to pick up if you want a taste of that old 90's point'n'click fun without all the bull crap frustration that goes along with them (at least if you can get past how it runs).

The remaster does a great job at upgrading the game, while still remaining faithful to its aesthetical style. But looking back at the original, it's no slouch either. Day of the Tentacle's cartoony bouncy art held up really well, leaning into weird twisty abstract rooms that ensure you won't get bored exploring the areas. Taking a look at the concept art gallery sometime is highly recommended, Peter Chan did not fuck around, that man has some serious chops.

On the topic of areas, there are three major ones, as you'll be switching between the past, present, and future in order to influence the events in each time period. As with most point 'n clicks, the game can be seen as a couple dozen locks that require their own particular key to unlock, and after taking some time to familiarize yourself with the layouts, you get into a flow of solving one puzzle only to realize "ah-ha, now I can do that other puzzle", and that loop goes on for a couple hours amongst all the little jokes sprawled about.

The remaster also does something similar to Monkey Island 2's remaster by simplifying the UI into being more context-sensitive, and provides you with a developer's commentary, which gave me some interesting insight into the seemingly pretty free-form development of this game, where the devs kinda just did what they felt like. I can respect that.

Unfortunately, there is no hint system like with the Monkey Island remasters, and so you're gonna have to go back to the old method of trying to figure out what the hell was the mindset of a 1993 developer creating a puzzle that utilizes cartoon moon logic for its solutions, and I don't think you're gonna guess correctly a lot of the time, let alone come to a definitive solution without some amount of trial 'n error, or a "fuck-it" reaction preceded by a Google search. Not every puzzle is like that, but there's enough to offset my enjoyment of a 1st playthrough into caring less and less about engaging my brain into genuinely considering ways to progress.

On the other hand, I've found out that an immediate 2nd playthrough of Day of the Tentacle actually felt more intended than anything I've done in the 1st one. Because now that I've familiarized myself with the solutions, the fun part of Day of the Tentacle becomes optimizing your run into solving as many puzzles as possible before needing to switch between time periods. The open nature of the game's progression means that there's plenty of routes to tackle in plenty of orders, although most likely only one "ultimate" route that is the fastest. But, you can quickly see just how speedrunnable the game becomes, and being able to master a particular route that works for you becomes a very satisfying part of Day of the Tentacle, and the one I enjoyed the most.

Probably the most controversial part of my opinion would be that I don't particularly care for the writing, or especially the voice acting. This is a problem I've voiced for the Monkey 1 remaster, and it is one that I also hold for Sam & Max Hit the Road, and a couple other Tim Schafer games pre-Psychonauts: The voice direction is dull. Extremely dry and monotone.

Aside from Laverne, which I think did a decent job at selling her crazy aspect, barely anybody here is trying anything else but one tone of talking for the whole adventure. This is especially weird for a game that feels very influenced by Looney Tunes, yet lacks any energy required to convey that. All instances where the characters clearly should be yelling, in the very least raising their voice, don't do that. And this has an effect on the jokes themselves, when every character delivers a punchline with the same energy as them talking about the weather. There should be an infectious energy here, I should hear the actors having fun with this writing, and because I don't hear it, I'm not having fun with it myself.

Overall, I think Day of the Tentacle holds up as a classic point 'n click with some serious thought put behind its art, and game design, and the remaster seems like the best way to experience it. However, I think it lacks some pieces that would be required to hook new players in. The lack of a hint system makes it less accessible than the Monkey remasters, and the voice acting, though surely impressive back in 1993 for just being there at all, fails to match the looney aesthetic of the game and causes the otherwise clever writing sound pretty boring. I think every adventure game enthusiast should play this game at least once, as it's always possible it'll click with you more than me, but I viewed it alright at best.

As a player who bumbled around aimlessly in point-and-click adventures when I was young but has found more enjoyment in them now that I’m (much) older, I was really looking forward to this one. A game from the creators of Psychonauts and The Secret of Monkey Island? Sign me up! Yet in games, as in life, not all great expectations are fulfilled, and unfortunately that proved to be the case here.

But hey, let’s start with the positives. The visual design in the remaster is absolutely top notch. I vehemently disagree with the complaints that it looks like a cheap Flash game. The new art is thoroughly modern while remaining faithful to the original, and this is true of both the characters and the backgrounds, all of which meld together in an organic way. Considering I’ve seen other remasters that look like they were slapped together from spare parts, I feel this game’s clean and coherent art design is a major win.

I’m also a big fan of the time travel concept. The puzzles that have you manipulate an object in one time so that you can pick up a modified version in another time are generally well-considered and clever.

It wasn’t all blue water and clear skies, however – the sludge and rain soon became hard to ignore. The biggest letdown for me was the writing, which boils down to “90s Slacker Comedy: The Game.” The farts, burps, and weird characters didn’t hold much appeal to me, though I must admit that I enjoyed my interactions with George Washington and Co. Who knew the Founding Fathers had a suggestion box for the Constitution? The ups and downs in the comedy make me wonder if each part of the game had a different writer.

The story is also notably weak, even by LucasArts standards. After the opening in the mansion, the three characters split up, and the plot stagnates until the end of the game when they reunite. Can a point-and-click adventure get away with a weak story? Well, The Secret of Monkey Island isn’t going to win any accolades for its plot, but at least it has a feeling of forward progression. I would’ve appreciated more of that feeling here.

The dearth of story beats is a side effect of the non-linear puzzle progression. (Or am I confusing cause for effect?) In any case, the fact that you can do many puzzles in any order is both a blessing and a curse. In the early game it feels inviting to have so much to explore and so many puzzles to grind away at. But the converse of this is that when you get stuck, the number of potential solutions to a given puzzle is extremely vast. Making matters worse is that passing objects between eras is cumbersome and can only be done in one specific location (with a few exceptions). These factors result in puzzles that can take hours to crack if you try to brute force them, and I must admit that I turned to the game’s guide on The Universal Hint System towards the end because my patience was growing thin.

[Edit: I later learned that you can move objects between characters by clicking and dragging within the UI. Knowing this would've lessened my frustrations, I'm sure. Maybe next life!]

As the product of two first-time directors in Tim Schafer and Dave Grossman, Day of the Tentacle is competent. But it matches neither the Ron Gilbert-led games that came before it, nor the later games of its own creators. Is it still worth a play today? Most definitely! Just be sure to approach it with tempered expectations.