Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert's next game is 'classic Zelda meets Diablo meets Thimbleweed Park'

In-progress image of Ron Gilbert's next game: classic Zelda meets Diablo meets Thimbleweed Park
(Image credit: Ron Gilbert (Mastodon))

Ron Gilbert, famed for his work on classic adventures including Monkey Island, Maniac Mansion, Zak McKracken, and more recently Thimbleweed Park, is getting up to something new and that looks to be quite different from his past work. It doesn't have a name yet, but it's described on Gilbert's Terrible Toybox website as "classic Zelda meets Diablo meets Thimbleweed Park."

Gilbert's been posting about his new game on Mastodon (via Time Extension) since early 2024, but it's gone largely unnoticed until just recently. In February, he shared an image of a whiteboard rough-out of the opening area and quests, and a little bit of stats work; from there, he's posted a few more in-progress images, along with some brief thoughts about his process.

"I have been working on it for a year or so," Gilbert told PC Gamer. "Like a lot of early prototypes, the game has slowly morphed into what it is now. I recently hired an artist and that really got things moving. I suck at art. It's the game I always wanted to play and I got tired of waiting so I decided to build it."

He also announced last week that Elissa Black, co-founder of Objects in Space studio Flat Earth Games, has joined the project as a quest designer. "This ups the chance by 37% that I'll finish the game before becoming bored and disillusioned," Gilbert wrote.

(Image credit: Ron Gilbert (Mastodon))

Despite that pessimistic note, Gilbert's new game appears to be coming along well, although there's no sign of a release date at this point: The Terrible Toybox website says the new game will be out in late 2024, "or maybe early 2025, this is gamedev after all."

Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.

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