Sam & Max The Devil’s Playhouse - Review

The Final Season of the Skunkape’s remasters of the Telltale Sam & Max series, The Devil’s Playhouse is finally here. It might have taken a little longer than normal, but the super humorous, quick and snappy, witty adventure is finally here, and what a note to go out on.

The Devil’s Playhouse takes place sometime after the events of the first two seasons. There is lore dropped that Max was re-elected as President of the US at some point, so The Devil’s Playhouse may actually be a fair few years after the first two seasons. Sybil and the Stone Head of Abraham Lincoln have married and are on their honeymoon. Bosco has closed up shop and headed to Vegas, and Mama Bosco is a damn ghost! There are intergalactic space gorillas, psychic power activated toys of universe changing power. Old gods, tomb robbing and way too many mole people sweating. The Devil’s Playhouse is far more ambitious than the previous two seasons and as a result is by the best of the three.

Sam & Max is iconic for its relevant humour, pop culture observations and witty conversations between the characters. The Devil’s Playhouse relies less on the pop culture jokes of the time, and instead focuses on making in-universe jokes, or self-referential points that as a result make the comedy in the game feel less outdated than previous entries. Whilst we get moments from characters that the first two seasons had been very reliant on, such as Sybil, Giant Stone Head of Abe Lincoln and Bosco, The Devil’s Playhouse gives us a mostly fresh feeling cast of characters. Stinky is a main stay, and plays an even bigger roll, but the introduction of General Skun-Ka’pe (or Skunkape as Sam and Max constantly call him, despite every other character saying it right). The C.O.P.S play a more gameplay intrinsic role this time around as well.

This pivot to a fresher feeling cast, in world jokes and a heavier focus on gameplay elements such as the psychic toys you use as Max, makes for a much more well-rounded experience. The comedy beats feel fresher, the characters don’t feel overplayed. The heavier focus on gameplay elements also means that it feels less like a visual novel with light puzzle elements, but a more well-rounded adventure game, in the same realms as Monkey Island and Grim Fandango. It’s easy to see whilst playing the game as to why this one took a significant amount more time to get it released to the public, than the previous entries did. On top of just the general gameplay additions, every episode has a different style than the others. The first episode introduces the new psychic powers, whilst future chapters give you the ability to investigate and interrogate people as you move from area to area. Others have you jumping through different periods of time playing as ancestors of Sam and Max, Sameth and Maximus. You even get to make Mole people sweat.

An interesting choice was the decision to make all five episodes of The Devil’s Playhouse available to be played from the word go. This small change does mean for those who may pick up multiple copies of the game, one for PC and one for Switch, you can jump between them no problem and pick up from wherever you left it. Obviously assuming you finish an entire episode, the save files themselves aren’t cross platform, but being able to play through the season any way you like is a nice change. It is unlikely that you’ll want to play the season out of order, as The Devil’s Playhouse is probably the most coherent in a single storyline between the games. The episodes themselves linking into each other from beginning to end, into the next beginning.

This story coherency also makes The Devil’s Playhouse feel the most connected from episode to episode. The first two seasons whilst having an overarching storyline, do at times feel like they are heavily disconnected from episode to episode. The Devil’s Playhouse doesn’t have this same issue, and it makes a far more enjoyable time. Each episode is around about four hours in length (much shorter if you know the optimal path and solutions of course). Twenty odd hours of strong story, with brand new characters and locales. It doesn’t overstay its welcome, the in-game verbal hints come when you need them but aren’t too revealing or quick, and as a result you get to really explore the world, interact with everyone and take your time figuring things out. The episodes being so interconnected, also means that you’ll be unlikely to forget things due to wildly disjointed story beats.

I appreciate the pivot to using new characters in this season, but there is something to be said about the choices of returning characters. The Devil makes a momentary cameo, Sybil and Abe have their moment. We get a voice over from Bosco. These were super important and funny characters throughout the entirety of the first two seasons, that are dropped off in place of General Skun-Ka’pe, Grandpa Stinky, more of Harry Moleman and other slightly less noteworthy mole people. We get new rats during one of the episodes, but Jimmy Two-Teeth is gone permanently. The new characters are fine for the most part. Mama Bosco is… interesting if not kind of only relevant because of her story involvement. Grandpa Stinky is ornery and has his moments but is not a good enough addition to justify the loss of the most important characters in previous entries.

The Devil’s Playhouse also suffers from the same obscenely obtuse puzzle solutions that the first two seasons also did. This is a problem across a lot of Adventure games, but The Devil’s Playhouse may actually be the most egregious because of a specific gameplay element. One of the psychic powers allows you to see a solution to a puzzle, or how it will play out in the future, when you do the correct thing. Some puzzles can only be solved by using this power, whereas others become unintentionally more obtuse because of how vague the visions can be. There’s no guide on whether it is doable at the time, and because of how often something will get mentioned before it can actually be found and used, these visions can make solving things even more difficult than they normally would be. The Devil’s Playhouse may have the best comedy, story and gameplay, but if suffers from some of the most aggravating and non-sensical puzzle solutions in the series.

Sam & Max The Devil’s Playhouse is a fantastic capstone to the remastered Telltale series. Easily the most enjoyable in terms of gameplay and story, it is also the one that because of the change in comedy direction, will continue to stand up and be perpetually relevant in the future. Being self-referential and keeping comedy within the world and its own canon, makes for jokes that don’t require you to be acutely aware of pop culture of the time they were originally released. The new cast are interesting enough, but not to adequately cover the iconic characters that are only momentarily featured or completely absent. The ending is possibly one of the most emotional pieces from the entirety of the series, with a lovely little bait and switch to renew your smile. With such care and love involved in these remasters, and particularly with how polished and poignant The Devil’s Playground is, one can only hope that this is not the end for Sam & Max, but the start of something brand new.

The Score

9.0

Review code provided by Skunkape Games

The Pros

Still incredibly funny but without needing dated knowledge

Gameplay is enhanced and more fleshed out

Ability to play any episode from the word go gives freedom of choice

The Cons

Iconic characters not used enough or at all at times

Some of the most lacklustre locales in the series

Painfully obtuse puzzles