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| While players were interfacing with
early adventure games through a text parser, Ron Gilbert
was at work planning the next step. The fruits of his
labor became known as the SCUMM engine - with no
disrespect to its achievement toward affecting computer
adventure gaming - and was used in LucasArts' (then
Lucasfilm Games) premiere adventure, Maniac Mansion. The
SCUMM engine allowed one to construct commands elegantly
with the mouse, without the need for typing. Over the
years, SCUMM has been refined and now uses fewer words
and more icons. It has been used in all LucasArts
adventure games since Maniac Mansion.
Gilbert took his creative prowess and helped found the edutainment company Humongous Entertainment. He recently formed a new division at Humongous called Cavedog Entertainment, where he will return his focus to non-educational gaming. The debut product is the real-time strategy game Total Annihilation. |
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In addition to the SCUMM engine,
Gilbert introduced other elements in adventure game
design - like never letting the player be killed, which
eliminated the need to repeatedly restore their game in
order to continue. Gilbert is also credited with
inventing cutscenes, the noninteractive movies or
animations that are used to break up the action and
propel the plot and story forward. (Almost all games soon
began to incorporate them into their designs). Finally,
Gilbert is known for his classic Monkey Island series
because it melded humor with adventure gaming, getting
away from staid medieval themes of good vs. evil.
