The year is 1997 and the fiendishly ridiculous Caponians (one of them is an Elvis
fan) are poised to invade Earth. They have taken over the phone company and are
using the telephone system to make everyone down here more stupid than they
otherwise would be without the benefit of alien intervention.

Enter Zak McKracken, reporter (or should that be story writer?) for the National
Inquisitor. Not that Zak has much of a clue about what is going on, but
fortunately he gets to link up with Annie, Melissa and Leslie who at least have
some inkling of what needs to be done to foil the aliens' evil, if ludicrous,
machinations.

Zak is a thoroughly amusing game so don't be put off by the name. This one is not
just for kids, in fact the puzzles get quite complicated at times and the
solutions are often quite zany but strangely logical within the context of the
game.

Like the stories he writes for his newspaper Zak's adventures involve strange
artefacts and paranormal phenomena like the Bermuda Triangle and multiple lottery
wins and lead him to visit ancient sites such as the pyramids of Egypt, Stonehenge
and Incan temples. And speaking of Zak's newspaper, your copy of the National
Inquisitor that comes with the game is packed full of hints for solving the
puzzles and, whilst a few of the clues are fairly obvious, others are wonderfully
obscure so that reading the paper is an adventure in itself.

At many stages throughout the game you must direct the actions of all four
characters to solve the puzzles which makes me wonder just why Zak was chosen for
star billing, unless, of course, LucasArts were planning a sequel which never
eventuated. (except the unofficcial part two, the nice THE NEW ADVENTURE OF ZAK
MCKRACKEN by the LUCASFAN crew.)

Zak, Annie, Melissa and Leslie are linked telepathically by their dreams so that
what one discovers is shared by all. Which is indeed fortunate since some clues to
solve problems on Mars can only be found on Earth and vice versa. An awful lot of
globe trotting needs to be done to complete this game and each character must be
moved individually which can become a little tiresome, especially when the copy-
protection security access codes interrupt the game whenever your character wants
to travel internationally (but not when playing ZAK with ScummVM!). However, you
will get used to this inconvenience after a while and look up the codes
automatically. And because the game is so much fun, you may even find it in your
heart to forgive LucasArts for this annoyance.

This game was first released in 1988, and although it is showing its age in both
the graphics and sound departments the puzzles are as challenging and engrossing
as ever.

And it is interesting in Zak McKracken to see the development of that renowned
LucasArts humour which culminated in Monkey Island 2 and Day of the Tentacle. If
you have played and enjoyed those games then Zak is well worth a look. Even if you
played it when it was first released I bet there are still puzzles which you have
forgotten and which will stump you a second time as they did with me.

WALKTHROUGH

And don't forget to check the nice unofficial sequel THE NEW ADVENTURE OF ZAK
MCKRACKEN by LUCASFAN GAMES! Should you get stuck, HERE is the walkthrough.

HOW TO PLAY LUCASFILM GAMES >>>>