History VideoGame / ReturnToZork

''Return to Zork'' was the first graphical game in the ''VideoGame/{{Zork}}'' series.

''Return to Zork'' was the first graphical game in the ''VideoGame/{{Zork}}'' series. The player character is a sweepstakes winner who won a trip to the Valley of the Sparrows, which turns out to be a rather depressing place. The PC enters the town of West Shanbar and hears from the townspeople that East Shanbar mysteriously disappeared. Naturally, the PC has to be the one to check it out, and ends up on a magical quest to stop the evil Morpheus from taking over. Notable that this is the first Zork game to incorporate full graphics and even full-motion video, featuring a number of well-known actors, including Jason Hervey of ''Series/TheWonderYears'', Sam Jones, who played the title role in the 1980 ''Film/{{Flash Gordon|1980}}'' movie, A.J. Langer, who went on to co-star in ''Series/MySoCalledLife'', and Robyn Lively, from ''Film/TeenWitch'' and ''Film/TheKarateKidPartIII'', plus a few of her family members to boot.

* RealityEnsues: Contrary to other adventure games, such as VideoGame/ManiacMansion, putting a rodent in your pocket can have lethal results, as it will chew into your pocket and bite you.

* TheAlcoholic: Boos Myller. Every meeting you have with him, he offers you rye. If you can figure out how to get him drinking without drinking yourself (one shot of rye will knock you out), he will always drink until he passes out. [[spoiler: It's implied that he drinks to block out the bad dreams caused by the BigBad.]]

* AngryGuardDog: Rebecca Snoot has one named [[VideoGame/{{Wishbringer}} Alexis]], although it never attacks, despite being called a hellhound. Although it's still intimidating enough to where [[spoiler: a recording of its bark to get you past the Orc Leader later in the game.]]

** The bog maze is set only once per playthrough; if you have to go back, whatever marks you left before will still be there, and the path will not change.

* BalefulPolymorph: Canuk is a duck by the time you meet him. Being an immediate threat to him is a good way to get yourself turned into one.
** Witch Itah can turn you into a rodent if you manage to anger her.

* InnOfNoReturn: You will die in Molly's hotel unless you find a way to keep your bedroom illuminated when you go to sleep, as apparently, Grues (adventurer-eating beings who live within pitch-black darkness) live inside the hotel. For some reason, sleeping with the lights on simply isn't an option.

** Triggering a trap in the forest will turn the game 180 degrees, and will remain as such in the game over screen.

* LostInTransmission: When the Tele-Orb battery runs out, the Wizard will be telling you about the wild boar in the Forest of Despair. Once you put in a new battery, he comes back on, saying "I hope you remember that when the time comes."

** Most of the deaths involve Morpheus laughing at you after you die, and some don't. Usually, the one's that don't are deaths that there wouldn't be much to leave behind, like death by explosion.

* NonStandardGameOver: Opening both doors of the incinerator skips the EvilLaugh that normally plays during death sequences because Morpheus just went boom.

* SmugSnake: Morpheus, who will give an nightmare-inducing EvilLaugh at your demise. He has Canuk under his influence and doesn't bother hiding this fact from you, but that doesn't stop him from charging you with a very dangerous quest, with a small possibility of success. He is also very proficient at survivor, and decides to test your intelligence by playing that with you, knowing he'll win. [[spoiler: When he loses, he goes through a VillainousBreakdown of epic proportions.]]

** VideogameCrueltyPunishment: Don't even ''threaten'' Canuk or Witch Itah. [[BalefulPolymorph They don't take kindly to it.]]

* TheLostWoods: The forest you visit is very difficult to navigate without the guide.

* TheAlcoholic: Boos Myller. Every meeting you have with him, he offers you rye. And if you stick around to drink with him, he'll always drink until he passes out.

* NonStandardGameOver: Downplayed. Opening both doors of the incinerator kills the player in regular fashion, but the EvilLaugh that normally plays during death sequences is skipped. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]], in that, while most other means of death ([[EatenAlive eaten by a grue,]] [[BalefulPolymorph turned into a duck,]] drowning, [[TakenForGranite petrified,]] [[DisproportionateRetribution dying for failing a test,]] and depression, [[TheManyDeathsOfYou to name a few]]) allow for some amount of time for [[BigBad Morpheus]] to gloat, the explosion would kill them instantly. This also applies for when you light the Old Mill on fire, which [[FridgeLogic is not as instantaneous.]]

!!Want some tropes? Course 'ya do!

!!This game provides examples of:

''Return to Zork'' was the first graphical game in the ''VideoGame/{{Zork}}'' series. The player character is a sweepstakes winner who won a trip to the Valley of the Sparrows, which turns out to be a rather depressing place. The PC enters the West Shanbar and hears from the townspeople that the East Shanbar mysteriously disappeared. As in many video games, the PC has to be the one to check it out, and ends up on a magical quest to stop the evil Morpheus from taking over. This game differed from past ''Zork'' games as it incorporated full-motion video featuring a number of well-known actors ranging from Jason Hervey of ''Series/TheWonderYears'', to Sam Jones, who played the title role in the 1980 ''Film/{{Flash Gordon|1980}}'' movie, to A.J. Langer who went on to co-star in ''Series/MySoCalledLife''.

* UnwinnableByDesign: Being a Sierra adventure game, it should come as no surprise that there are several ways to render the game unwinnable.

* ShoutOut: If you look in a certain area in the bottled ship, you can find a skeleton dressed up like [[TheSecretOfMonkeyIsland Guybrush Threepwood]]. Examining the skeleton gives you the message, "[[TakeThat Looks like his ten minutes are up.]]"[[note]]This is a reference to Guybrush's ability to hold his breath for ten minutes, and not a second more.[[/note]]

* TheAlcoholic: Boos Myller. No, not Booze. Boos. Yes, you read that right.

* AntiFrustrationFeature: If the frozen meat turned rotten and cannot be used, you can always go back to Rebecca's freezer to grab another.
** Ran out of zork-mids? You can find a money tree in the forest. Smacking it tends to drop some zork-mids.
** Lost your chance to get the keys from Boos? You can challenge him at drinking at any time for another shot.
** If you have to go through the bogs again, whatever marks you left before will still be there, and the path will not change for that playthrough.

* LostInTransmission: When the Tele-Orb battery runs out.

* MeaningfulName: Rebecca Snoot.

* TheRunaway: The Waif.

* StupidityIsTheOnlyOption: If you attempt to use the front door to Rebecca's house, all you get is an unanswered knock. Even when Rebecca is perfectly fine with you using said door retrospectively, you must invade her home via the window, and be mistaken for a burglar.

* UnwinnableByDesign: All you have to do is:
** Visit Witch Itah without Ben's love note and without Pet Vulture Transit.
** Put the rats into the box with the mice.
** Kill someone with your knife or sword. When this happens, [[spoiler:the Guardian will appear on screen and wipe items from your inventory as punishment, which of course renders the game a dead end as everything has a use]].
** Take the bra box from Pugney before he says you can have it. [[spoiler:See the example above for what happens when you do that.]]

** Perform tasks too far out of order.
** Accidentally destroying or killing the bonding plant can make the game nearly unwinnable. There is a GuideDangIt way around this but few people know about it.

*** Not getting the joke is recoverable, since you only need 4, and you can actually play the joke the Wizard told you at the very beginning of the game for number 4.
** In order to reach the final battle, you're required to sacrifice all your inventory items into the pit of fire to raise the bridge to Morpheus' inner sanctum. This is calculated to require every collectible item you can pick up in your quest. If you happen to be missing one of them, you're pretty much screwed.

** If you have to go through the bogs again, the good news is that whatever marks you left before will still be there and the path will not change for that playthrough.
** Did you forget to pick up the mirror back at Rebecca's home? You can still reflect Canuk's spell by finding a dirty plate, and wiping it with a rag to turn it shiny. Shiny enough to reflect the spell.

* DrinkingGame: "Want some rye, course ya do!" [[spoiler: The solution to the drinking game against Boos is to toast him, [[DiscreetDrinkDisposal pour out the rye into the]] [[ThatPoorPlant plant]], then "drink" the empty cup.]]

* ExpositionFairy: The teleorb.
* FinalExamBoss: About 1/4 of the way into the game, you play "Survivor" with Moodock, the one-armed man in the inn. You play Canuk, who can move to any square. He plays the wizard Trembyle, who has to move like a knight in chess, and makes a square into a "pit" every time he moves off of it. Canuk's objective is to stop Trembyle from moving, while Trembyle's is to make every square but two into pits. [[spoiler:At the end of the game, you play Survivor again, except this time it's against Morphius, and the roles are reversed.]]
* GuideDangIt: A trend of Zork games and adventure games in general. Perhaps the worst of these is learning that the wizard Trembyle can opt to pass a turn in Survivor, learned by talking to an NPC you had probably forgotten about by the time you need to learn it. [[spoiler:This is crucial to winning the final game of Survivor against Morphius. Good luck trying to win the game without passing your turn every once in a while.[[labelnote:*]]It ''is'' possible, and can be done relatively easily as long as you remember to never make a move that will only have one possible following move, but it's difficult[[/labelnote]]]]
** Probably the most frustrating GuideDangIt part of RTZ is the slide puzzle.
* HopeSpot: If you opt to swim to West Shanbar, you do make it to the bridge. Too bad it's out of your reach and the currents are too strong.
** Seemingly invoked by Canuk, who tells you of a piece of a disc inside the bottle ship (which is used to discover Morpheus' location). There's a shark in there (if you hang at a certain spot long enough), you can drown if you take too long, and even when you do complete your quest, he's waiting for you to come out just so he can turn you into a duck.[[labelnote:Solution]]You can reflect the spell back by finding a shiny metal plate within the ship.[[/labelnote]]

* InnOfNoReturn: You will die in Molly's hotel unless you find a way to keep your bedroom illuminated when you go to sleep, as apparently, Grues (adventurer-eating beings who live within the dark) live inside it. For some reason, sleeping with the lights on simply isn't an option.

** Triggering a trap in the forest will turn the game 180*, and will remain as such in the game over screen.

* MagicalIncantation: "Yozozzo!"
* TheManyDeathsOfYou: All equally gruesome and disturbing.

* NonStandardGameOver: Downplayed. Opening both doors of the incinerator kills the player in regular fashion, but the EvilLaugh that normally plays during death sequences is skipped. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]], in that, while most other means of death ([[EatenAlive eaten by a grue,]] [[BalefulPolymorph turned into a duck,]] drowning, [[TakenForGranite petrified,]] [[DisproportionateRetribution dying for failing a test,]] and depression, [[TheManyDeathsOfYou to name a few]]) allow for some amount of time for [[BigBad Morphius]] to gloat (and the adventurer to still hear him), the explosion would kill them instantly. This also applies for when you light the Old Mill on fire, which [[FridgeLogic is not as instantaneous.]]

* RealityEnsues: Contrary to other adventure games, such as [[VideoGame/ManiacMansion Maniac Mansion]], putting a rodent in your pocket can have lethal results.

* NonStandardGameOver: Downplayed. Opening both doors of the incinerator kills the player in regular fashion, but the EvilLaugh that normally plays during death sequences is skipped. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]], in that, while most other means of death ([[EatenAlive eaten by a grue,]] [[BalefulPolymorph turned into a duck,]] drowning, [[TakenForGranite petrified,]] [[DisproportionateRetribution dying for failing a test,]] and depression, [[TheManyDeathsOfYou to name a few]]) allow for some amount of time for [[BigBad Morphius]] to gloat (and the adventurer to still hear him), the explosion would kill them instantly. This also applies for when you light the forest or barn on fire, which [[FridgeLogic is not as instantaneous.]]

** Witch Idah can turn you into a rodent if you manage to anger her.

* AngryGuardDog: Rebecca Snoot has one named Alexis, although it never attacks, despite being called a hellhound. Although it's still intimidating enough to where [[spoiler: a recording of its bark to get you past the Orc Leader later in the game.]]

* MadeOfEvil: Morpheus is the accumulated Evil Magic of the Great Underground Empire; while magic was thought to have been erased from existence during the events of ''Spellbreaker'' and ''Beyond Zork'', small amounts of evil magic actually accumulated underground over centuries, eventually gaining sentience and becoming Morpheus.

* MadeOfEvil: Morpheus is the accumulated Evil Magic of the Great Underground Empire; while magic was thought to have been erased from existence during the events of ''Spellbreaker'' and ''Beyond Zork'', small amounts of evil magic actually accumulated underground over centuries, eventually gaining sentience and becoming Morpheus.
* TheManyDeathsOfYou: Assaulted by a vulture, falling into the river, failing a pop quiz, putting a rodent in your pocket, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking being too depressing for comedy]], you name it, it probably has it.

* AngryGuardDog: Rebecca Snoot has one. In fact, you [[spoiler: make a recording of his bark to get you past guards later in the game.]]

* CopyProtection: Two parts in the game (an optional one where you meet the Teacher, and one where you encounter Rebecca Snoot) requires you to take a pop-quiz where the answer can be found in the hint book included with the game. Fail to answer three times, and it's game over.

* DrinkingGame: "Want some rye, course ya do!" The trick is to get Boos drunker than you are so you can get his keys and go to East Shanbar. The problem is he's so good at drinking he can take four to your ''one''.
* DiscreetDrinkDisposal: [[spoiler:Part of the secret to winning the drinking game against Boos. Toast him, pour out the rye into the [[ThatPoorPlant plant]], then "drink" the empty cup.]]
* DungeonBypass: Get a whistle and a magnet and you'll never have to wander around any of the mazelike maps looking for an exit again.

* NonStandardGameOver: Downplayed. Opening both doors of the incinerator kills the player in regular fashion, but the EvilLaugh that normally plays during death sequences is skipped. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]], in that, while most other means of death ([[EatenAlive eaten by a grue,]] [[BalefulPolymorph turned into a duck,]] drowning, [[TakenForGranite petrified,]] [[DisproportionateRetribution dying for failing a test,]] and depression, [[TheManyDeathsOfYou to name a few]]) allow for some amount of time for [[BigBad Morphius]] to gloat (and the adventurer to still hear him), the explosion would kill them instantly.
* PickedFlowersAreDead: It features this with the appropriately-titled "bonding plant." If you pull the plant straight out of the ground, it instantly dies. The correct solution is to dig it up by the roots so that it likes you.
* PressXToDie: When the fast travel feature is unlocked, you can go straight to that valley you're advised against going. [[SchmuckBait Take a guess as to what happens when you go there.]]

* ShmuckBait: As inviting as that skull and crossbones on the map looks, you don't wanna fly there.

* SmugSnake: Morpheus, who will give an nightmare-inducing EvilLaugh at your demise. He also possesses Canuk and doesn't bother hiding this fact from you, and sends you into a very dangerous quest, expecting you to fail. He is also very proficient at survivor, and decides to test your intelligence by playing that with you, knowing he'll win. [[spoiler: When he loses, he goes through a VillainousBreakdown of epic proportions.]]

* TheManyDeathsOfYou: Assaulted by a vulture, falling into the river, failing a pop quiz, putting a rodent in your pocket, being too depressing for comedy, you name it, it probably has it.

* DemonicPossession: The Wizard Canuk is possessed by Morpheus, who barely tries to hid this fact.

* SadistTeacher: Failing a pop quiz with Ms. Peepers is punishable by death. A pop quiz on [[DisproportionateRetribution things like the names of the days of the week, or lore]]. While it is somewhat justified, as this was a form of CopyProtection, it still makes Ms. Peepers very unnerving, especially since she shows absolutely no other signs of her sadistic behavior.

* HeelFaceTurn: Rebecca Snoot punches you in the face and gives you a riddle to solve. She will KILL YOU if you get the riddle wrong, but if you get it right she becomes the nicest lady ever and allows you to steal anything you want from her house. [[FridgeBrilliance Understandably]], she's threatening to kill you because ''[[WhatTheHellPlayer you broke into her house]]''. [[StupidityIsTheOnlyOption You]] [[YouBastard bastard]].