In this past week, I ruined a popular sitcom, took down a ring of cuddly mobsters, ran for President against a reanimated Abraham Lincon (and won!), destroyed the internet, and travelled to the moon in a beat-up 1960 DeSoto. Thank the heavens Sam and Max are back.

Is this double dipping? Maybe… we have spotlit Steve Purcell’s webcomic before on the site. But this entry is all about the related adventure games by Telltale, whose awesome-ocity deserves special attention.

This is, of course, the follow-up to one of the most beloved point-and-click adventures games of yesteryear: Sam & Max Hit the Road. Which is, of course, based on the comic book created by Purcell, which very much inspired me to get into this whole comic-making thing. And while the new games are a different flavor of Sam & Max than the old LucasArts title and even the short-lived TV show, they’re just as surreal and funny. The new game is delivered in episodic format, meaning you’ll get a single “case” per episode rather than a giant, 40-hour epic all at once. This way we get our content at a regular pace, rather than waiting years and years for the next dose of canine-and-rabbity-thing comedy.

Just now picked up the first season on disc, and it’s great. The comedy is top-notch, and the puzzles are much more enjoyable to solve thanks to a simplified interface (no more “look at” or “grab” or “walk to” commands… just click on stuff and the duo will know what to do.) Sam and Max also have some new characters to interact with in their seedy neighborhood: the paranoid convenience clerk Bosco, the career-fickle Sybil Pandemick, the low-life rat Jimmy Two-Teeth, and the magical, shrill-voiced founder of Prismatology, Hugh Bliss. These guys (and gal) add a lot to the new series, and are actually becoming just as funny as the headlining characters.

Want to give it a shot, but are a total cheapskate? Telltale’s offering the episode Abe Lincoln Must Die! for free. Download it and give it a shot… the game I mean, not Lincoln.