When Is A Zero Not A Zero?

Infocom's "Zork Zero"

Dave Arneson

WARNING! This article contains spoilers. Avert your eyes!

More than 90 years have passed since the great wizard Megaboz cast the curse which destroyed Lord Dimwit Flathead "The Excessive" along with the ruling family, the Twelve Flatheads. Now, the curse threatens to bring down the Great Underground Empire itself!

Wurb Flathead, the current occupant of the throne, has sent a clarion call to the most remote corners of the Empire: half the riches of the kingdom to the person who can allay the curse. From every province of Quendor, courageous adventurers, scheming charlatans, and wildeyed crackpots have streamed into the Imperial Capitol of Flatheadia.

In Zork Zero, the player's character is a peasant from One Hut Village in Nowhere Province. He is special. In times past, an ancestor, who happened to have been a servant in the castle, observed Megaboz casting the curse. This ancestor "just happened" to obtain a scrap of wizardly parchment from the mage's pocket during the creating of the curse. Passed down through the generations, it conveniently contains the clue needed to end the curse.

Be forewarned, however, that upon your character's arrival in Flatheadia, the other treasure hunters will have gone home. Those in authority, as well as the population in general, have departed for parts unknown. Now, the quest begins. All have left and the player's character is practically alone in the castle on CURSE DAY. (Insert evil sounding music here).

Only King Wurb's court jester accompanies the character. The jester is, unfortunately, as full of deadly tricks as he is of riddles and games. Players should watch out for him as he gives helpful nudges in the right direction and pops in and out of the quest at his own whim.

Getting Zorked

So, you don't like text games and don't like puzzles? I don't either. I like watching the critters bash each other. Puzzles I can't figure out become humiliating when the "All too obvious" solution is revealed. Well, Zork Zero might just change all that for you, just like it has for me.

This game is well thought out, thorough, and covers a large area. Really large! It is not only fun to play, but is also neither too difficult nor a piece of cake.

Zork Zero has no animation. The few pictures are all static pictures. Hence, it is strictly a text game with only a few graphics. The manual is very complete and does a good job of presenting the vocabulary used in the game. This is important because the game uses a large library of words. Even better news, though, is that when a command is refused, the program explains why it does not like the command. This reduces guessing quite a bit.

In addition, the game comes complete with two "clues" and a calendar. The first clue is a parchment piece which is necessary for solving the last puzzle and the other is a blueprint that is vital for the later stages of the game. The calendar is a compendium of clues. The illustrations of the twelve Flatheads contain, at least, one good hint on each page and players will find themselves consulting it on several occasions during the game.

The game program contains almost twenty screens of hints. These are quite useful in keeping the game moving. This is quite helpful when one considers that there are over twenty items that must be found and returned to their proper places in order to complete the quest. For those that have trouble, the game's extensive on-line hints will provide a list of the items, including a designation indicating which of the Twelve Flatheads originally owned it and where the item can now be found in the game. For example, a listing might read, "Silk Tie (J. Pierpont): in the nest in the Aerie." The tie is the same one being worn by Pierpont in his picture on the calendar for the month of "Mage."

Points are scored in several ways. The list of points in the on-line hints section comes in four parts. The hints tell players what actions will increase their scores and the number of points to be received. For example, a player can earn twelve points for finding a Flathead item and five more points when that item is placed in the right place. Five points can be lost if the player puts the wrong item in a given location.

As one would expect, problem solving also scores points. For example, solving the "walnut riddle" nets twenty points for a player while simply winning the game only nets thirty points. There is certainly more to the game than simply "winning," since there are one thousand possible points to be earned and one can win with less.

A turn plays quite easily! Players who are familiar with text games will have no problems with Zork Zero. Even inexperienced players will be swept right into the flow of the game via the opening sequence. One of the extremely nice features of this text game is that players can have their computers print out a "script" of their adventure. This provides not only a nice reference, but it can also be used to impress friends or compare notes.

To Map or Not to Map

The mapping system in Zork Zero is easy to use and well illustrated. Each location has its own special icon to show where characters have been and where they can go. The map can be called up at any time and may keep the player from getting repeatedly lost. (Note: If the game is not saved prior to calling up the map, any information currently on the screen can be lost.)

Hints or Hindrance?

For denser players, such as myself, there is a useful system of hints. Because of the hierarchical nature of the hint system, the first hint does not automatically reveal all information. In fact, there may be as many as a dozen hints for a given situation. Not that I would ever need to use hints! ha! Since the player only gets the information needed to help him solve the puzzle, players can utilize some of the hints and still have the satisfaction of solving a puzzle themselves. It is also possible for those players with absolutely no willpower to toggle off the game's hint feature so that it is unavailable unless one restarts or restores.

Itemized Deductions (Strategy Notes)

Players should not be too quick to discard items they find or too eager to utilize an item's magic. The temptation, for example, is to throw the "Lobster" away or not even take it in the first place. Keep it! It's necessary! Again, the "Magic Wand" is found early in the game, but needs to be used judiciously since it is needed to open areas of the maze during the latter portions of the game.

There is much to do in the game and there are, of course, a few red herrings. Players should keep that final goal in mind and success will follow. It is fun, however, to do some silly things as well. Since the game is both non-linear and has no time limit, there is no reason not to save the game and go nosing about having a good time.

Puzzled Looks

Some of the puzzles are good. Some are strange. Some are dumb!

In the strange category, one finds the rebus puzzle. This shows six "flattened" animals on it. It is one of the few pictures encountered in the game. (Warning: Hint to follow) Players solve it by figuring out that pressing the button that makes strange animal noises is the key to the puzzle. Until the animals are removed, the puzzle cannot be read.

Another weird puzzle is reading the writing on the "magic" glove. (Hint follows:) We found a way to "Read Glove on Glove," but that seems extremely odd.

On the "dumb" side is the puzzle about the stack of six disks. Some of it seems obvious, but part of it will make players thankful for the hints. On the "plus" side, the card game is rather neat.

One recurring problem is that the hints often make references to the rulebook when they actually mean the calendar. Failure to provide the correct response will result in the game insulting the players and calling them pirates.

Jester Closer Walk (Problems)

The continuous presence of Pester, the court jester, is a nuisance! He can be a helpful companion, but there are many times when players will have the urge to "Dispense with his services." Players are urged to restrain themselves because his presence is ultimately useful to the quest and it is impossible to get rid of him permanently, anyway. Admittedly, the puzzle where the player's character is transformed into an alligator (and must eat a worm as the antidote) only costs time and does no harm to the final quest, but really! This is a matter of personal taste, but I must protest that the court jester seems simply too much at times.

Of more significance is the fact that the program only requires one megabyte of memory on the Macintosh. However, players who only have 1 MB of RAM in their computers need to realize that the game plays much slower than on 2 MB machines. Those who use the slower machines won't have time to get a cup of coffee while waiting for a move to be processed, but there is plenty of time to reflect.

Another nagging detail is that the game is set up to use only a half-screen window with no provision for anything else. This is odd, since the manual refers to full-screen illustrations. All of mine came up on partial screens. Hopefully, other versions will use larger windows since a partial screen on the average Macintosh is pretty small.

What Do You Really Think?

Zork Zero is a very well documented and user friendly game. Overall, it is a worthy addition to the Zork series and is, by far, the best one to date. Players who like text games will definitely love this game. Even those who don't usually like text games or are "not sure" about them will probably be pleasantly surprised with Zork Zero.

Frankly, Zork Zero is probably the best text adventure out there. It is a lot better than many animated ones. Few animated games have Zork Zero's size and depth.

"When is a zero not a zero?" asks the jester.

'When it is Zork Zero!" you answer.

"Right!" says the jester as he turns you into a rutabaga.

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