The impossible inventory

Look past the chicken. Notice what is in the middle.

In Secret, Guybrush uses the pulley on the cable between Mêlée and Hook Island. The chicken becomes a means of transport: the ridiculous part and the useful part were one object all along.

If you carried it before, perhaps you can carry it now.

On the harbour floor, pick up the idol instead of reaching for a weapon to cut the rope. Guybrush puts it in his inventory and can surface. Waiting too long, however, can drown him.

An enormous head may have perfectly ordinary needs.

Return the banana picker to Herman to obtain the key. Use it in the giant monkey head’s ear to open its mouth.

The ingredient matters. So does knowing who can prepare it.

Guybrush retrieves the root from the ghost ship and gives it to the cannibals. They turn it into a potion against ghosts. The plant on its own is not yet a ready-to-use remedy.

In the maze, watch where it looks. And remember to talk.

In the catacombs, the head points the way to LeChuck’s ship. Its necklace has a separate purpose: making Guybrush invisible to ghosts. Obtaining it requires a conversation with the Navigator.

Not just any ingredients will do: they must be connected to Largo.

The Voodoo Lady makes the doll from dandruff, spit, an item of Largo’s clothing and an ancestor’s bone. Guybrush uses pins with it to drive him off Scabb. Gathering the ingredients differs between Lite and full modes.

To a superstitious captain, an object’s value is not just practical.

The monocle taken from Wally’s table becomes Captain Dread’s lucky charm, helping arrange passage. Later Wally needs a replacement lens: the one in the model lighthouse at Phatt Island’s library.

Diamonds may look alike. Curses are another matter.

The ring found aboard LeChuck’s ship turns Elaine into gold when Guybrush gives it to her. Breaking the curse means removing it and replacing it with an uncursed diamond of equal or greater value.

A bubble can do more than you think. On the harder setting, lightness matters too.

Guybrush bursts Blondebeard’s gum bubble with a pin and picks up the fallen tooth. In Mega Monkey mode, he gets it out of the restaurant inside a bubble blown after inhaling helium.

A short blade can still make a very good lever.

In Lucre’s bank, use the old sword on the vault door’s lower hinge: the blade breaks. Wedge the broken sword into the door’s gap; three sponges expanded with grog complete the escape. Later, the broken blade also lifts the manhole cover beside the bank.

A voodoo recipe is not the best place for ingredient substitutions.

The prologue’s recipe calls for fizzy enchanted root beer. Mints restore the first bottle’s fizz, but it breaks before the cutlass can be treated. On Elaine’s ship, Guybrush tries again with Chuck plant roots, grog and mints, dips the blade in the mixture and confronts LeChuck—with disastrous consequences.

A good handle is not sold everywhere. A cartographer may help you find one.

To join LeChuck’s crew, build your own mop. Cut a sample from the cook’s mop and take it to Wally: his map leads to the tree where the knife supplies a handle. For the head, choose tangled string, a shrunken head, a sea sponge or a stuffed animal. These are alternatives, not ingredients to combine together.

Someone wants to see a helmet.

Show it to the Fettuccini Brothers before the cannon act. Another pot protects Guybrush's head when he fires himself onto Monkey Island.

One mug will not survive the journey.

Fill a mug at the SCUMM Bar and transfer the grog between fresh mugs before they dissolve. Pour it onto Otis's cell lock.

Do not expect a chest of gold.

Digging at the X produces the T-shirt. Show it to the pirate leaders as proof that you completed the treasure-hunting trial.

Finding the spot is only half the job.

Buy the shovel from the shopkeeper and use it on the large forest X to recover the trial's treasure.

Consider magnetism rather than north.

Use the magnetic compass to attract the key in LeChuck's cabin aboard the ghost ship, without getting too close to him.

Inspect Otis's carrot cake.

Eat the cake to obtain the file. Return to the mansion and supply it during the scene behind the wall to continue stealing the idol.

Fresh breath starts the exchange.

Give Otis the breath mints, then eat the cake he gives you to discover the hidden file.

Steps can describe a route.

Read the dance instructions as directions through Mêlée's forest. Use the shovel at the X to finish the treasure trial.

Read before choosing a course.

Examine the book in the captain's cabin drawer. Its account of the previous Monkey Island voyage helps direct the search for the voodoo recipe.

Check your aim from the high ground.

Use the spyglass near the catapult to check its alignment with the banana tree before pushing the boulder.

The sleeping pirate is holding something.

Tickle the sleeping ghost's feet with the feather. He drops the bottle of ghost grog he is clutching.

The glowing crate requires more than politeness.

Grease the squeaking door and collect the tools beyond it. Use them on the glowing hold crate to recover the voodoo root.

Someone wants his property back.

Recover it from the cannibals' hut once you can enter freely. Return it to Herman for the giant monkey head's key.

Persuading its owner is part of the puzzle.

Talk to the head until it lends you the necklace. Wear it before boarding LeChuck's ship to remain invisible to its ghosts.

Yellow flowers change the menu.

Combine the yellow flower petals with the SCUMM Bar's meat and feed it to the piranha poodles. They fall asleep rather than die.

It is more than a glass decoration.

Use it with the green drink before the spitting contest. It also helps when Guybrush is immobilised in LeChuck's trap.

Two basic colours make a third.

Mix the blue and yellow drinks, then sip through the crazy straw to thicken your spit. The contest also requires attention to wind and the flags.

Think of the term «monkey wrench».

Stop Jojo with a banana on the metronome and pick him up. Use him on Phatt's pump to shut off the waterfall.

The swamp supplies the filling.

Fill it with mud, close Largo's room door and balance the bucket above it. His dirty clothes will end up at the laundry.

Build a trap before applying for work.

Catch it using the box, stick, string and cheese snacks. Put it in the Bloody Lip's stew: the cook is fired and Guybrush can take the job.

A box can become a trap.

Put them beneath the box held up by the stick. When the rat enters, pull the string to trap it.

A carpenter can repair the damage.

After the tree fall, have Scabb's carpenter repair it. Alternate the strengthened oar and plank between the tree's holes to climb up.

A wooden leg may need repairs.

Saw the laundry pirate's wooden leg. The carpenter leaves his shop to fix it, letting you collect the hammer and nails.

You need a hammer too.

Close the demonstration coffin while Stan is inside and nail it shut. You can then take the crypt key.

An antiques dealer may value its history.

After winning, sell the plaque to the antiques dealer for 6,000 pieces of eight, enough to hire Kate's ship.

You need not drink the original contents.

Take the near-grog from Kate's belongings. During Rum Rogers's challenge, empty his grog into the plant and replace it with near-grog to stay conscious.

Light can be redirected.

Replace the parrot's mirror with the illustrated feed bag. Put the mirror in Rum Rogers's empty frame to reflect the spyglass beam.

The statue outside the cottage can hold it.

Place it on Phatt's statue and open the cottage shutters. With the mirror in its frame, the beam identifies the secret passage's brick.

A cartographer is missing his glasses.

Open Phatt library's lighthouse model and take its lens. Give it to Wally as a replacement so he can read the map pieces.

First establish the right scent.

After the dog smells Elaine's map piece near the mansion, take him to the tree-house paper pile to locate it.

Your target is on a cliff, not swimming.

Win the wager with the fish from Elaine's mansion kitchen. Use the pole from Booty's cliff to try to recover the map piece.

A cook still has an earthly worry.

Have the Voodoo Lady prepare it using Rapp Scallion's ashes and the required recipe book. Apply it to his ashes in the coffin to discuss the gas.

Not everything you can cut is edible.

Cut a plug from the rubber tree. Together with paste, it repairs the hole in the Danjer Cove boat.

A small valuable object has landed in mud.

After floating the gold tooth out with gum and helium, use the pan in the mud puddle outside the restaurant to recover it.

A cut can prepare a collapse.

Cut the caber-toss barrel's support to prepare Haggis's trial. The knife also weakens the plank aboard the Danjer Cove ship.

The restaurant chicken hides something.

Eat the biscuit to discover the maggots, then put them on the rotten chicken. They expose the Cabana membership card beneath it.

Show it to the entrance attendant.

Present the card found beneath Blondebeard's chicken to the Cabana Boy to enter the club.

The recipe concerns the cutlass.

Read the recipe in the prologue: finishing the cutlass’s enchantment requires fizzy enchanted root beer. Mints are a workaround for the flat bottle, rather than an ingredient specified by the recipe. After losing that bottle, improvise a replacement on Elaine’s ship with Chuck plant roots, grog and mints.

Open it; appearances are incomplete.

Examine the Monkey Casket of Kauai in your inventory to find a bottle of flat root beer. Mints make it fizzy again. This is the prologue’s first preparation; the bottle will be lost before the cutlass’s treatment is completed.

Wally only needs a wooden sample.

Buy the ceremonial knife from the Voodoo Lady. While the cook is distracted, cut a sample of his mop’s wood for Wally, then cut a handle from the tree marked by the map. On Hard, the knife also harvests the Bite of a Thousand Needles from the carnivorous plant, needed to enchant the eyepatch.

Find the display case lock's number.

Take Wally’s free monocle, leave and return for a second one. Combine them to read the tiny serial number on the museum display case’s lock; Locke Smith can make a key from it. This works on both difficulty settings.

The best apologies are personal.

On Hard, use the pen on the forgiveness frog to write Carla an apology. Her campaign poster and the statue’s plaque supply the right details, which vary between playthroughs: there is no universal apology to copy. On Casual, simply give her the frog without writing an apology.

On Hard, watch the plants at the junctions; on Casual, read the map’s directions.

Wally draws this map after receiving a sample of the cook’s mop. On Hard, match the plants on the map to those at the forest junctions; on Casual, follow the directions shown. The route can vary between playthroughs. Later, this map can replace LeChuck’s on his desk.

Not every object conceals a puzzle.

This joke item comes from the preorder bonus, so it is not necessarily present in every copy or playthrough. It is not required for any puzzle and does not indicate an unfinished mandatory task.

A mop needs something on its handle.

Collect the tangled string on the jetty behind the SCUMM Bar’s kitchen and attach it to the handle. It is one of four possible mop heads; a shrunken head, a sea sponge or a stuffed animal also works.

The feathered guard is hungry.

On Hard, take the cracker mix from the museum storeroom to Locke Smith to obtain permission to take her crackers. On Casual, take them directly from her shop without this exchange. In either mode, give one to the museum parrot to distract it while you open the display case.

Try paying before planning a theft.

Adult Guybrush carries this purse to pay for purchases. It also has a specific use late in Hard mode: one real coin supplements the five stone pieces in the statue puzzle, allowing weights equivalent to one, two and three coins to be distributed.

The museum holds it; the Voodoo Lady understands it.

Distract the parrot with a cracker and unlock the display case with Locke Smith’s key. Take the eyepatch to the Voodoo Lady: on Casual she enchants it immediately; on Hard she also needs the Bite of a Thousand Needles, cut from the forest’s carnivorous plant. The enchanted patch disguises Guybrush for boarding. The image shows this enchanted state, with its greenish glow.

A library can tell you where the wreck lies.

Read the shipwreck book for the coordinates, hire Kate’s ship and dive. Take the figurehead’s head, return using the anchor and trade it to the antiques dealer for a map piece.

The mansion kitchen holds a convincing catch.

Distract Elaine’s cook by getting him to chase you, then return to the kitchen and take the fish. Show it to Phatt’s fisherman to win his fishing pole.

Look down the ravine and count your ropes.

Use two ropes to descend into the ravine and collect the oars. Fit them to the beach boat to reach the island’s northern shore.

The bridge keeper accepts an unusual payment.

Behind the SCUMM Bar kitchen, rock the jetty plank to drive the seagull away and take the fish. Give it to the troll to cross the bridge.

The meat can take a special seasoning.

Collect the yellow petals and combine them with the SCUMM Bar kitchen’s meat. Feed it to the mansion’s piranha poodles to put them to sleep without killing them.

The villagers recognise their own belongings.

Take it from the monkey-head enclosure and offer it to the cannibals. They become friendly, allowing you to retrieve the banana picker from their hut.

The monkey can become a travelling companion.

Collect the island’s bananas and feed the monkey until it follows you. Pull the enclosure totem’s nose: the monkey copies you and keeps the gate open.

Take the ingredient to someone who knows the recipe.

Give the voodoo root to the cannibals for the preparation. Spray the ghost pirates back on Mêlée; the bottle is later broken during the confrontation with LeChuck.

After hitting the machine, check the ground.

In the finale, when LeChuck throws Guybrush into Stan’s shipyard, quickly take the bottle dropped by the machine and use it on LeChuck before his next punch.

On board, choose your next destination.

After chartering Dread’s ship, use his map to travel between Scabb, Booty and Phatt Island as you pursue the different leads.

Once assembled, someone must read them.

Recover the four pieces connected to Rapp Scallion, Young Lindy, Rum Rogers and Elaine Marley. Give them to Wally, with a replacement lens, so he can reconstruct the map.