Return To Zork: A Review

There are six Zork games for PC worth knowing.  Three of them are text adventures, followed by three more standard adventure games for PC.  The text adventures are hilarious though all but impossible to get very far into.  They are ridiculously difficult, mostly due to quirky inventories and how they are used. First released in 1977, Zork 1 became the father figure for most adventure games that followed.  Return to Zork, the game under discussion here, was released by Activision in 1993, in the same month that Myst was released.  Two more different games could not be imagined.  Though I love both of them, at least Myst was playable without having an IQ of 160 and a completely warped sense of what to do next in a game.  When I originally played RTZ (March 2000) I found the game impossible to get very far without hints and a newly available walk through guide, and never managed to finish it.  People would congregate on forums trading ideas as to how to progress.  Hardly anyone ever finished the game back then, and I daresay no one ever did without the solutions in front of them.

 

So this review is really of a 2026 walk through, which took us about 5 hours.  Without a walk through in hand frustration will quickly erase any humourous moments the game provides.  And it provides plenty of humour.   The game follows the lead of the text adventures in its absurdity and unabashed use of very confusing mazes.  Yes, there are several mazes and none of them are the least bit fun.  While the humour helps support the game (in walk through mode), the graphics are a complete let down.  After playing Myst and trying this game, I was hugely disappointed back in the day to see what had been done with Zork.  I might have preferred the text games at the time.

 

The game opens at the white house as the man that lives there goes out to check for mail.  Soon he, and we, are sucked into the land of Zork, and our adventure begins on a hilltop overlooking a wide valley with a road leading down towards adventure land.   It all seems so exciting and fun.

 

We arrive in Zork, greeted by a buzzard and then a wizard.  We will soon descend the road into chaos.

   

Somewhere near the beginning this place is encountered.

 

Things I really like about the game are the different characters one encounters, including a cow that eats carrots and will only give milk if your hands are warm enough.  We meet a wood fairy, a bowman, a mayor, a blacksmith, a guy with a boat to take us across to the witch, a schoolteacher, some dwarves, a drunkard who wants to share his rye, a lighthouse keeper, a comedy club manager and a waif.  Now we come to a few of the puzzles.  How about trying to figure out that one must capture several rats to power an outboard motor on a boat?  Or lighting hay on fire in a barn, after feeding carrots to a cow, so you can warm your hands and milk her using a thermos?  How about burning a bra in an incinerator to retrieve a wire in which to pick a lock?  These all very funny, but damned near impossible to figure out.

 

Be prepared to die often, get robbed, and even get turned into a bog rat a few times by a witch who needs to be appeased.  You can be killed by grues at the hotel and booed out of the comedy club (that hurts).  And don't get me started on the bat guano, or the duck Canuk, or the joke book method.  Turning to the game's music for a moment, much of it is midi fun time.  I especially liked the Fools Monument theme.  However, if stuck on a puzzle, the music anywhere can be extremely annoying.

 

Don't expect to go this game alone.  Come prepared with a very good hint system, which will get you places, though not all places, and a walk through guide.  Even with both it still took us five hours to get  through the game.  Expect to spent eternity without help.  The game ran fine on Steam though the graphics are very pixelated.  Funny and enjoyable with help.  Frustrating and maddening without. 

 

East or West Shanbar, the only towns in the game.  You will meet some fun people there.

 

The witch's cave.  Do her a favour and she will do one for you.

 

You are live at Chuckles Comedy Club.  Bring your joke book and tape recorder when you meet people in the game.

 

Looks like we are at the lighthouse.

Up top at the lighthouse, if you get that far.

 

The famous control dam #3.

  

This is one of the most difficult puzzles in the game, lowering the bad bridge and raising the good one.

 

Outside the evil wizard's palace. 

 

There is also one movie to report, another World Cinema Project film, again introduced by Martin Scorcese.  Yam daabo (The Choice) is a film from Burkina Faso and directed by Idrissa Ouedraogo.  When was the last time you watched a film from Burkina Faso?  If like me, then likely never.  Do you even know where Burkina Faso is?  I didn't (but I do now).  Before watching this incredible film I knew nothing about this country.  But I think I know something about it now.  It is a simple story using mostly non-professional actors and limited dialogue.  The opening scene and final scene are nearly identical:  a village of desperate looking people await the coming of a regular food truck.  After the opening scene we watch as a family breaks away from the group and sets out on their own to try and seek a place where they can grow their own food and raise a family.  The story follows the family into the wilderness until they finally reach a river.  They begin to prepare the land for crops and to build huts in which to dwell.  A side story about a jealous bad guy isn't really needed to hold our interest, as the family itself is fascinating to watch, both through tragedy (the youngest boy is killed by a car en route to their paradise) and triumph (their crops grow and a son is born to the daughter of the patriarch).  The film is rich in human endeavour and hardship, and not even the bleak and mostly flat  landscape can keep us from hoping for their success.  A recommended film now showing on Criterion, along with a whole host of other treasured films from the World Cinema Project.  As usual, there is a short but very good documentary about the making of the film.

 

Now showing on Criterion.

 

 

Some Good News

After a nearly two year battle with various health issues, Deb is finally back to her old self.  Her check up yesterday indicated that she is on a good path.   This opens up the world of travel for us, so watch this space in the next month or so to see where we might be headed (Europe or UK), if there is enough jet fuel to take us there and back.  We are excited to be able to have choices again, though sadly New Mexico will still have to wait until at least the next president of the US comes on board.

 

We have had so much rain of late that outdoor walking has not been feasible.  More rain is the way tomorrow, but then it should dry out enough for us to walk the local trail again.  We've had some decent if warm walks so far, with two segments left to tackle of the seven segment trail.  Wildflowers are beginning to appear and we came across several impressive stands of trout lilies.

 

A lovely bunch of trout lilies, from our walk earlier in the week. 

 

In PC gaming news we are currently working on two games.  Return To Zork is a very old game, and almost impossible to figure out.  We are doing this oldie but goodie with a walkthru, enjoying the jokes and the primitive scenery.  "Want some rye? 'Course ya do."  

 

Scene from Return to Zork, which we are playing with a walkthru guide. 

 

The other game is the much more dark and serious Zork Nemesis, one of my all-time favourite PC games from yesteryear.  We are attempting this one on our own, though my notes from my last time (year 2000) are coming in handy.  It's amazing that these old games can still run on new machines and Win 11, thanks to Steam and other platforms.  They are also very inexpensive.  More on these as we go along.

 

Scene from the library in the main temple building from Zork: Nemesis, a much more serious game. 

 

In movie news there are a few to report, including a short film. First the features.  Guilty Bystander is a 1950 b & w film directed by Joseph Lerner.  This is a great little B noir starring Zachary Scott as a washed up former police detective, Max Thursday, living in a seedy flophouse and drinking himself into oblivion.  The story about a kidnapped little boy (his son) is almost an aside compared to the characters and locations (NYC) in the film.  This is an amazing film with many unforgettable moments, including the gangster boss with a bad ticker who shouldn't be getting too excited over anything.  This one is worth another viewing, but it's leaving Criterion for now.  Hopefully it will return.

 

A terrific noir film leaving Criterion this month. 

 

An unforgettable film can work two ways.  The above film is unforgettable in a good way, while the next film would rather be forgotten but likely cannot.  The World's Greatest Sinner is pretty much a one man effort, directed by and starring Timothy Carey.  It is a b & w film from 1962 and features one of the creepiest leading men ever put on film.  Carey quits his job as an insurance salesman (I don't blame him there) and becomes a sort of populist preacher.  His mantra is that every man is a god, especially himself.  He begins by shouting his message at gathering places and eventually gets a small following of fellow wackos.  He leaves his wife and kids and becomes more and more popular until he has achieved full cult status.  He uses women, some as young as 14, and becomes so full of himself that there can be no turning back.  His life becomes one big parade of sleaze and lies, until its ultimate conclusion.  The film was fully restored and can be seen better than it ever was when new.  The music is by a young man calling himself Zappa (!).  Carey also wrote for Kubrick (The Killing and Paths of Glory).  Highly not recommended, it is still a film one should see (Does that make sense?).

 

Leaving Criterion in a few days.  Be thankful. 

 

King of the Night is from 1975 and is a Brazilian film directed by Hector Babenco.  Here is the Criterion blurb:

 

Héctor Babenco’s first feature traces the descent of Tertuliano (Paulo José), a once-promising aspiring lawyer, into a life of decadence and amorality on the bohemian fringes of São Paulo as he falls into tempestuous relationships with several women, including a sex worker (Marília Pêra). Tracing both Tertuliano’s slide into self-destructive hedonism and São Paulo’s changing social landscape from the 1920s to the 1970s, KING OF THE NIGHT is a striking first expression of Babenco’s career-long concern with life on the margins. 

 

Tertuliano is as sleazy and low as the character from the above film, Sinner.  He chews through women, making demands of them while he lives a more carefree life.  He is particularly harsh on his favourite girlfriend, a singer and prostitute whom he lives with for a time.  But he spares no mercy for three sisters his mother wants him to meet.  He drives the youngest insane, marries the middle one and eventually murders her after tormenting her for far too long, then has sex with the eldest at his wife's funeral, taking her in the kitchen while guests wait in the living room for coffee.  He ends up paying for his sins, spending 15 years in prison and then working jobs such as carrying advertising signs up and down the street and handing out pamphlets.  At the end he is in a retirement home when who should come marching in but the first love of his life.  They then live happily ever after at the home together.  If you enjoy watching despicable characters parade through a film, this one has your name on it.  Enjoy.

 

Now showing on Criterion. 

 

The final feature is from our DVD collection "Chilling Classics" and is called I Bury The Living.  From 1958 it sounds as if it might be a trope-filled horror, but it's actually a neat little noir starring Richard Boone.  As an influential town business man he must take over directorship of a cemetery for a year, a job that is passed around among town leaders.  The film centers around a wall map of the cemetery and plots.  It is filled with pins, black for people already buried and white for those who bought plots but haven't needed them yet.  When he mistakenly sticks two black pins into plots that should have white ones, the two people are killed in an accident.  He wonders if it was chance, and sticks another black pin into a white plot.  Same result.  The film has been compared to a longer Twilight Zone episode.  Up until the very stupid (and impossible) ending, this is a very effective and well directed film.  With a much better ending this could have truly become a cult classic.  As it is it's still worth a view.

 

From our 50 movie pack "Chilling Classics." 

 

Lastly comes a nifty short film that I wish had been made into a feature.  The Hedonists is a 2016 film from China with a running time of 26 minutes.  Three miners are laid off from their job when their mine closes down.  Being eternal optimists they try out for some new jobs.  This very funny look at job searching makes for a gem of a film.  First they try out as bodyguards for a big crime boss.  That doesn't go so well, especially as their middle ages seem to define them.  Next they try out for actors in a pageant in a new complex that will welcome tourists for historical reenactments.  As it turns out they aren't quite in tune with their boss.  A lovely film, and the three characters are welcome heroes of this short film.

 

A short Chinese film leaving Criterion April 30th. 

 

Mapman Mike