Episode 049 – Maniac Mansion (1987, 1990)

This week in Your Parents Basement, we are pointing and clicking our way through a creepy house as we try to save our girlfriend with plastic fruit, exploding hamsters and a Weird Edsel! From 1987 and 1990, we’re playing Maniac Mansion by Lucasfilm Games (the predecessor to LucasArts) for the PC and NES.

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TIMESTAMPS

• 0:00 – Intro, which is tentacle and Edison family theme from Maniac Mansion. You can find a full soundtrack on YouTube here. And also, for today’s show, we’re joined by special guest DJ!
• 44:45 – Emails! What’s our favorite Tetris piece? Who would write our theme songs? What about games based on TV game shows? Altavista???
• 1:11:30 – A snifferoo from next week’s show, which is another LucasArts game! Huzzah!

SHOW NOTES

– According to Price Charting, Maniac Mansion has held its value well, as a cult classic. Loose carts of the NES version go for about $19, with the price swelling to $80 for the box and manual, to $222 for “new” copies. The PC version starts at around $30, although it’s also available in digital-only formats for much cheaper.

– Also, as mentioned on the show, the sequel, Day of the Tentacle, has been re-released. It’s going for about $15 on the PS4 and PC. The game does have a really neat Easter egg though – The original Maniac Mansion is playable in full on a computer in the game.

– Also also as mentioned on the show, the Japanese Maniac Mansion looks like a weird tech demo for the NES. Check it out here. And, the TV show is viewable here.

– Wanna read one of the oldest things on the internet, kind of? Wired has an article from Douglas Crockford, who worked on Maniac Mansion for LucasArts. It’s the longform article DJ was talking about, and you can find it here. It’s a really interesting read on what they had to take out of the game.