Sure, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, but when it comes to classic adventure games there's no question that the greatest strengths sometimes lie in certain individual traits. Some may cite the humor as the primary selling point of a game like Sam & Max Hit the Road, or the writing as Grim Fandango's, or the striking artwork as The Curse of Monkey Island's. Even when said feature is hardly the only attraction to the game, sometimes it's nonetheless so strong that it can't not be mentioned whenever the game is brought up. For how many games is that noteworthy feature its design? Even when a game is expertly designed, the average gamer, or even the critical reviewer, will not necessarily single this out, because as important to the game as it is, it's not the sort of element that's supposed to draw attention to itself. But if any game merits special mention of its design the way others may of their graphics or story, Day of the Tentacle is it.

Coming off of Monkey Island 2, Dave Grossman and Tim Schafer were looking for a new project. After their work as designers/writers/programmers on the first two entries of the cherished pirate series, they'd been elevated to the status of "project leaders," meaning that their next game would be the first on which they would be given the reigns. Both lovers of the even then-classic Maniac Mansion, the future adventure game gods were given what Schafer has described as "kind of an idea for a sequel" that Ron Gilbert, the original game's co-conceiver, had in mind. With this as a basis, Grossman and Schafer collaborated to make what would become Day of the Tentacle (sometimes lengthened to Maniac Mansion 2: Day of the Tentacle or Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle), released in 1993 in both floppy disk and speech-enabled CD-ROM versions.

One of the most interesting observations to be made about the final result of Grossman and Schafer's labors is its position as a sequel – it's a pretty loose one. Scratch the "pretty." This is a completely standalone game, self-contained to the point that many of the people who've played it have done so without knowing that it was a second installment. It was newcomers, and not devotees of the world's first SCUMM game, that Grossman and Schafer were striving to win over when constructing their game, and the result is something accessible to everyone. The decision was sensible given the five year gap between the two games, but that doesn't make the enormous creative success it yielded any less noteworthy.

The main reason Day of the Tentacle sets itself apart so greatly despite sharing a handful of elements with its predecessor is the fact that it draws from completely different inspirations. With Maniac Mansion, Ron Gilbert and Gary Winnick sought to tribute the horror/scifi B-movie genre. With Day of the Tentacle, that influence was replaced by the work of Chuck Jones. If Maniac Mansion is like playing through a cheesy horror movie, Day of the Tentacle is like playing through a Saturday morning cartoon, and everything from the brand of humor to the puzzle design reflects this. Knowledge of the previous game is not assumed, and there's definitely a "reboot" feel to the whole project - this game is in a completely different spirit than the original, sporting a new style and tone. Not that this change was an unwelcome one. In fact, that Day of the Tentacle is very much Maniac Mansion's equal in terms of quality is probably the mildest praise one will see bestowed on the game, which tends to be considered among the best ever produced.

Day of the Tentacle begins with Green Tentacle and Purple Tentacle, the bizarre Edison family's homemade, mutated pets, coming upon a pair of drainage pipes outside of the house regurgitating toxic sludge (waste from Dr. Fred's secret laboratory) into the river. A parched Purple drinks the sludge, giving him a pair of arms and a personality bent on world domination. When Dr. Fred plans to kill both of the tentacles as a result of Purple's mutation (which includes the innocent and rock music loving Green), Weird Ed Edison's pet hamster sends for nerdy college student Bernard Bernoulli to save them. Bernard and his two roommates Hoagie (a pudgy heavy metal roadie) and Laverne (a zoned out med student) head to the Edison mansion, which has since Bernard's last adventure there been renovated into a cheap motel, to free the tied up tentacles from Dr. Fed's basement.

When he succeeds, inadvertently allowing the evil Purple Tentacle to set out to take over the world, Dr. Fred sends the undergrad trio semi-voluntarily twenty-four hours into the past in his homemade time machine via three "Chron-O-Johns" (essentially glorified, time-traveling outhouses) so that they can turn off the Sludge-O-Matic machine, thus preventing Purple from ever drinking the mutagen and becoming evil. Unfortunately, during their journey through time and space the imitation diamond that powers the time machine shatters, causing each of the three kids to wind up in a time period different than the intended destination of Yesterday. Bernard simply returns to the present, but Hoagie winds up two hundred years in the past, and Laverne two hundred years in the future. In order to get his friends home, Bernard must find a way to find a replacement diamond for the time machine, while Hoagie and Laverne must find a way to plug in their respective Chron-O-Johns (a challenge for Hoagie since he is in colonial times, and for Laverne because she is in an era where tentacles have taken over the world and humans have become enslaved). Once they've accomplished all that, there's still the matter of saving the world from a future of enslavement at the hands of living cones with suction cups.

That storyline may sound every bit as wacky as Maniac Mansion, but the real similarities that the game has with its predecessor are few and far between. What Grossman and Schafer did was take some of the cast and basic gameplay ideas of the original game and go totally their own way with it, and it totally works. The notion of three playable kids who must think their way out of a "single" location by way of their individual abilities (in the original game represented by the characters' personal talents, and here by the different time periods that the characters occupy) has returned in the sequel, with the team having to work together to achieve both their common and unique ends. Other than that, and the reprisal of a few of Maniac Mansion's faces (mainly the Edison family and side character turned leading man Bernard), there's little connection between this game and the original, and even the returning characters aren't all that true to their previous incarnations. Sure, Dr. Fred's benevolence can be explained away by the fact that he was under the influence of an evil meteor in the first game, but Nurse Edna's extreme lust and the murderous inclination of Weird Ed and the tentacles all evaporate, or are at least heavily toned down, in the sequel's more morning cartoon spin on the universe. The layout of the mansion (which has been modified into a cheap motel to make ends meet for the financially struggling household) is totally different, and the characters even mention the original game as a video game based on their lives five years ago, essentially placing Maniac Mansion in a different reality altogether. As its independent name suggests, Day of the Tentacle isn't just a continuation of its franchise; it's a reinvention of the first game's universe, and one that is thoroughly successful.

Being a time travel story, much entertainment value is derived from exploiting the concept as much as possible. Grossman and Schafer, who are also the games writers, simultaneously parody and celebrate just about every time travel yarn they know while sending up the genre in fresh ways as well. The writing is superb, and although conversation trees (Hoagie's flag suggestions and one-sided Ted banter are my favorites) seem a bit more sparse, the dialogue is always top notch, and the humor is sharp, poking fun at everything that dares to show up on screen. The different time periods allows our kooky main characters to interact with the mansion's rather improbable inhabitants, ranging from the Edison's ancestors (including the perpetually mummified Dead Cousin Ted) and the Founding Fathers (though not quite the versions your elementary school teacher taught you), to the present day Edisons and their sleazy motel's guests, and finally the futuristic tentacle overlords and their human pets. The exaggerated personalities of all of the above (Ben Franklin, for example, is depicted as a self-important buffoon who steals all his ideas) make for fun lines and hilarious situations, and despite the endless potential of the game's zany premise one never gets the sense that opportunities were missed.

The story's use of three timelines also encourages constant interaction between the three playable characters, all of whom are running around in the same building hundreds of years apart. In the original game, the kids had a handful of very specific abilities and limitations but were otherwise only different in looks, and as such team work was often a case of convenience moreso than necessity. Here, however, with each character occupying a different version of the mansion with exclusive access to items needed by their friends, there is the constant need for inventory items to be traded (sometimes through more creative channels than the Chron-o-John) and for history to be rewritten as needed, such as when Hoagie provides a perpetually agitated Betsy Ross with a national flag design that isn't quite the one we know of today. The puzzles that evolve from out of these situations are funny, fun, and clever. In fact, if there's any one word most apt to describe Day of the Tentacle, clever is the one I'd select.

"With the game as funny, charming, and engaging as it is, you'd think surely you'd find a weak spot somewhere, but you'd be wrong."

That description extends to the remarkable puzzle design, which, in the opinion of this humble gamer, is the standard by which all other adventure games puzzles should be judged. Although coming out in a time where such a level of care was neither customary nor expected, Day of the Tentacle's puzzles tend to follow a line of logic (albeit a warped and cartoon-inspired one) that almost always makes a satisfying degree of sense. The worst thing that could ever be said of an adventure game puzzle once it's solved with the last ditch resort, the walkthrough, is something along the lines of, "Man, I could never have figured that out!" In a good adventure game, like Day of the Tentacle, the expression is more along the lines of, "That makes perfect sense! I can't believe I didn't think of that!" That's not to say that the game can't be difficult – it is, but the challenge lies directly in puzzles that are fair, creative and intelligently constructed.

But really, praising the puzzles as logical isn't giving them enough credit, even if in 1993 that was darned innovative. "Brilliant" might be a better start in the development of a truly appropriate description of DOTT's puzzle design. Each puzzle solution doesn't just advance the story or unlock a new path - it's a satisfying sense of accomplishment, a punch line for a joke, and a rewarding payoff for the player's troubles. Structurally, the game feels tight and meticulously architected, with literally every element working together in a way that catches you off guard when the complete idea finally reveals itself to you.

Day of the Tentacle is a game that even a person who isn't looking to analyze will be impressed with for its design, and I can't think of too many games of any given genre where that's true. Everything falls together perfectly, and it's difficult not to appreciate the craftsmanship behind the game, to say nothing of the witty writing or the utterly charming presentation. Even while celebrating its fifteen year anniversary, Day of the Tentacle has a thing or two to teach modern adventure games, as well as any game that endeavors to incorporate puzzles that work in the story's favor rather than stand out as annoying distractions. And while the game is incredibly complex, it's deceptively so, with an overall goal that's always completely clear and which never feels oppressive, which could easily have been the case considering how much is going on. And, since just about everything in the game can be solved in any order, there's always another puzzle you can toil away at while wrapping your noggin around one you might be stumped on. In a game where pacing would seem so out of the designers' control, DOTT's feels spot on.

The SCUMM interface used here is pretty much exactly the same as one featured in Monkey Island 2 and Fate of Atlantis, but DOTT does streamline things in simple but incredibly effective ways, such as by allowing inventory items to be selected as an applied cursor just by clicking on them. It's most useful when it comes to exchanging items between the playable characters, because inventory items can simply be clicked and dropped onto a character's icon rather than the player needing to walk all the way back to the Chron-o-John. DOTT seems acutely aware of the little things that cause unnecessary time and work on the player's part, and eliminates them. Like any good interface, this game's is simple and intuitive, and sometimes that's all you really want from it.

The art style, like most other aspects of this game, is a huge departure from the original's take, but absolutely stunning and in fitting with the new direction. The lengthy gap between the two games and the leaps in technology made in the interim made it possible for DOTT to employ a more stylized approach to its characters and backgrounds, an accomplishment which artists Peter Chan, Larry Ahern and the rest of the skilled team carry out with flair and attention to subtleties. The backgrounds have the kind of disproportionate, warped look one might expect from an irreverent animated series, and the game's consistently funny sight gags all follow in that tradition as well. The animation (often accompanied by sound effects right out of a cartoon) is easily the best LEC adventure games had to offer at the time of release, with the talents of the artists and the latest tech being showcased at the same time. In short, the characters and backgrounds have more personality, expression, and detail than Maniac Mansion was allowed to, all adding up to a visual presentation that holds up remarkably well.

The second "Talkie" LEC adventure game, Day of the Tentacle's voicework is splendid, and a marked improvement over the strong first attempt that was Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis. Part of this is undoubtedly due to the fact that the game was planned to be voiced from the beginning, unlike Fate of Atlantis, and so the writers were able to pen their dialog knowing that they would eventually be coming out of an actor's mouths. The performers (which include the brilliantly cast Richard Sanders of WKRP in Cincinnati fame in the role of Bernard, and LEC regulars Nick Jameson and Denny Delk) all do great jobs, and match their characters' personalities perfectly. All in all, the voice acting is as exemplary as the available technology allowed it to be, and it is has aged as well as any other aspect of the game, and although a floppy version of the game existed (in which only the opening sequenced is voiced), I can't imagine ever playing this game without the feature. The iMUSE-enabled score, once again composed by the Holy Trinity of LEC musicians (McConnell, Land, and Bajakian), is enjoyable, offbeat, and often humorous, from the Bernard Hermann-like opening credits theme to the tongue-in-cheek renditions of colonial ditties. In other words, it's a soundtrack that perfectly matches the game.

Finally, the game features what can only be described as the greatest video game Easter egg ever. Maniac Mansion is featured as a "game within a game," playable on Weird Ed's computer. In addition to giving the game an incredibly value, it's just a plain great idea. (Note: Although in ScummVM it isn't possible to play Maniac Mansion from within DOTT, players can still run it through the emulator by locating the Maniac Mansion resource files which are in the DOTT data folder.)

With the game as funny, charming, and engaging as it is, you'd think surely you'd find a weak spot somewhere, but you'd be wrong. Even in the area where DOTT has every right to fail, its incomparable nonlinearity, it is relentlessly successful. I've previously praised Monkey Island 2 and Fate of Atlantis as examples of necessarily linear games that feature an impressive amount of nonlinearity, particularly in the second act of the former and the "Three Paths" feature of the latter, but DOTT easily take the cake as the most nonlinear LucasArts adventure game ever made. Adventure games don't normally lend themselves to this level of nonlinearity, because in order to tell a reasonably cohesive narrative, a goal of any story game, as well as give the player the information that they need, the player has to lack some degree of control over the events, but its rather unique setup allows DOTT to buck convention.

Perhaps the tradeoff for the nonlinearity is that DOTT has no grand, epic story to tell, nor does it feature dozens of vast, exotic locations in which to transport the player. A more confined and puzzle-oriented experience takes the place of breathtakingly huge environments to lose yourself in. DOTT's length is as generous and its content is as rich as any of its competition, yet it forfeits a certain degree of scope and narrative complexity for heavily focused, sophisticated and player-dictated gameplay. This is not a criticism, but rather an observation of the game's different aspirations than some of the other titles to be developed under the same roof. DOTT can never provide that sense of a gigantic world that LeChuck's Revenge or Fate of Atlantis do, but neither can those games boast the impeccable, tightly crafted feel of gamers' second trip to the Edison mansion. It's really just a matter of personal preference as to which is the superior approach. The game can certainly be nitpicked, but it takes effort. I may have an issue with a few of the puzzles, and maybe the game's opening sequence, which comprises nearly all of the non-interactivity of a game otherwise low on cutscenes, drags a bit. …Yeah. When it comes to finding glaring flaws in DOTT you have your work cut out for you.

I suppose there's also is a part of me that wouldn't have minded seeing a more faithful continuation of the style Maniac Mansion introduced gamers to along with its revolutionary gameplay, but the sheer brilliance of DOTT, a character seemingly present in every one of its elements, speaks for itself. The game earns the right to go its own way. In fact, the approach has made the series the most ripe for further sequels, because it eliminates any baggage that usually comes with a franchise. There's literally no story-related obligations that a hypothetical third Maniac Mansion game would have to fulfill. Obviously, there's no reason to ever expect LucasArts to revisit the series, but if they had the inclination, there's really no limit to what they could do.

Day of the Tentacle is one of those games that always seems to occupy a place near the peak of Top Ten lists (though, to be fair, so do so many LEC adventure games), and it's really not hard to see why. Everything you think of when you think of an LEC adventure game – humor, originality, fantastic artwork, extreme polish – is present here. It's a game that perfectly represents the Golden Era of LucasArts, both because it was released at a time when the company's output and success with the genre was at its peak, and because the quality of the game doesn't really seem capable of being surpassed. Objectively speaking, Day of the Tentacle is as good as any game the company put out, and I couldn't think of a better example of the sort of lofty heights of entertainment a superb adventure game can reach.