Indiana Jones® and the Last Crusade™
Indiana Jones® and the Last Crusade™
Game
Game2018
Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders
Developer Lucasfilm Games
Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders is a graphic adventure game by Lucasfilm Games released in 1988 for the Commodore 64 and MS-DOS, then for the Amiga and Atari ST in 1989. It was the second game to use the SCUMM engine, after Maniac Mansion. The project was led by David Fox, with Matthew Alan Kane as the co-designer and co-programmer. From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
164 reactions from 4 sources (Bluesky, Steam reviews, Lemmy, Mastodon) · newest Nov 2, 2026 · last updated Nov 2, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
81
LovedLoved
56 positive · 13 negative
95% range 70–89%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bluesky * | 19 | 3 | 64 |
| Steam reviews | 56 | 13 | 0 |
| Lemmy * | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| Mastodon * | 0 | 0 | 4 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
Steam's own rating
Very Positive
68 of 82 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What players are saying
80% recommend · 56 yes, 14 no
Counted from the reviewers’ own thumbs up/down on the 70 English Steam reviews we collected, not by the AI. Valve’s all-language rating: Very Positive (133 of 150 positive).
Some reviewers find the game frustrating due to dead ends and difficult puzzles. [1][2][3] A few players criticize the Steam version for lacking updates. [4]
Liked
Representative posts
- [2]
Apparently this game came with a newspaper full of hints to make the experience a little less displeasing than it already is, so definitely get that newspaper or follow a guide. This is probably my least favorite Lucasarts game. Classics of the genre like pixel hunting and moon logic are present. As for "puzzles", I hope you really love mazes because Zak is full of them, and it's clear they were added to pad out the …
- [5]
30 years later I saved the world from stupidity again! Can't say I'm doing nothing useful with my life.
- [1]
Let me be clear, if you don't go into this game knowing that there are multiple dead ends and you can easily do the wrong thing - you're going to have a bad time. You will need to have a lot of saved games as you will make mistakes and you'll need to go back and try again. It could be using in an object in a way you weren't meant to, someone dying, or as simple as running out of money. However, if you accept this …
- [6]
Possibly one of the best old skool point'n'click games. Damn glad I finally found it.
- [7]
A wonderful blast from the past, I first played this game on my father's computer (Windows 3.0 i think. It was a walk down memory lane. You play as Zak McKracken, a reporter for a tabloid that is hired for a story about a two-headed squirrel in Seatlle. You have a dream about aliens in hats and Groucho Marx glasses as well as Ankes. That is it, that is all you are given. You retrieve your cash card and can set out …
Summarised from 34 of the 169 public posts collected about this game; every point cites the posts behind it ([n] opens the post) and the split is counted from the posts’ own ratings. Updated Oct 13, 2026. How summaries are made
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
80% of the 70 Steam reviewers we collected recommend Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders. The complaint that keeps coming up: game has many dead ends and can be frustrating. Deal-breaker or nitpick?
Critics, per Wikipedia
Discussing Zak McKracken's commercial performance, David Fox later wrote, "I think Zak was far more popular in Germany and Europe than in the States. I'm not sure why ... maybe my humor was more European in nature?" Many reviews, both online and in print, rate Zak McKracken as among the best adventure games ever made, but others disagree. Charles Ardai in Computer Gaming World described Zak McKracken as a good game, but said that it could have been better. He described the game's central flaw in the game's environments, limited to a relatively small number of screens per location, giving each town a movie-set feel compared to the size and detail of Maniac Mansion. PC Computing wrote that…
From the “Reception” section of Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Critic context only — not part of the audience score.
Reactions
60 of 164 · most liked first30 years later I saved the world from stupidity again! Can't say I'm doing nothing useful with my life.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →YES!!!!! The Enhanced "FM Towns" edition with CD Audio Soundtrack is INCLUDED!!!! (Right click on game to select enhanced edition.) Localizations are available on the internet as Patch files in most languages. A true classic! ***
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Spaceship from Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (Lucasfilm Games, 1988)
neutral · AI labelView post →Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (1988) In this point and click adventure from Lucasfilm Games, a group of aliens are using a mind bending machine to cause a stupidity epidemic on Earth. Little did they know that they could have just waited a few decades for us to cause one ourselves. 1/4
neutral · AI labelView post →Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (1990) #FMTowns #LucasFilm
neutral · AI labelView post →Game dev quote post! Hiya #gamedev people. I'm David Fox, game designer/programmer since the late 1970s. Early Lucasfilm Games/LucasArts member (10 years), worked mostly on adventure games (Labyrinth, Maniac Mansion, Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
neutral · AI labelView post →When we created "Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders" at #LucasfilmGames in 1988 I expected it's lifetime would be about 2-3 years, until the target home computers ended up in the junk heap.❤️ 🥸 👽 🐿️ youtu.be/s22G366tQPg?... #ZakMcKracken
neutral · AI labelView post →One of my favourite Childhood memories. This game is for me in the long line of great adventures along Monkey Island, Maniac Mansion, Loom and Fate of Atlantis. If you want something along those lines and save the world from stupidity, GET THIS ZLORFIK!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Possibly one of the best old skool point'n'click games. Damn glad I finally found it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →#LogLoads64 Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders A #C64 game, as I may have just alluded to in another post, that I have never played. I know it, of course I do, but I have never fully geared up the gumption to invest the time to play it. I know I must. I surely must and I will. I surely will.
neutral · AI labelView post →This week on Quest Quest: @bvigeant.bsky.social and I break down Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (1988). Can two hack podcast hosts and a stale loaf of French bread save the world from mazes and moon logic puzzles? Not without your help! Listen here (or wherever): zencastr.com/z/I14XZNSr
neutral · AI labelView post →Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders looks amazing on the Amiga.
positive · AI labelView post →A wonderful blast from the past, I first played this game on my father's computer (Windows 3.0 i think. It was a walk down memory lane. You play as Zak McKracken, a reporter for a tabloid that is hired for a story about a two-headed squirrel in Seatlle. You have a dream about aliens in hats and Groucho Marx glasses as well as Ankes. That is it, that is all you are given. You retrieve your cash card and can set out to wherever. The story itself is just plain silly. Aliens are out to make…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →_I’ve_ never beat _Maniac Manson_, but I did beat _Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders_. Not in four hours, though. It took months playing (when it was new) after school and bouncing ideas off my father and his best friend. All three of us were playing the game separately and sharing tips. I could probably beat it in around 2 hours if I tried today? I still remember the path but there are also the random mazes where you just try and hope for the best. Peru, the Sphinx, Mars, maybe another…
positive · AI labelView post →My favourite Lucasfilm Games Adventure, not because it's the best, far from it, not because it's the craziest (though it comes pretty close). Just because it's the first I played and owned, the box from 1988 was fantastic, still get fuzzy feelings when thinking of the newspaper. But even though it is part of the first wave of Lucasfilm adventures, the second game released, the follow up to Maniac Mansion and has problems like the possibility to put yourself in a dead end, it still is one of…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →ʕ•ᴥ•ʔﾉ☆ Sushi says henlo! If you don't know what any of this even means, let this be your sign to play LucasArts Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders.
neutral · AI labelView post →One thing that really terrified me as a kid in Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders was the Guardian of the Sphinx. Even the doorway already looks like threatening. 👀 #game #adventure #adventuregame
neutral · AI labelView post →The Japanese FM Towns box art for Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders re-imagines the game's visual style under a totally different cultural tradition. Painted by Hikaru Yuzuki.
neutral · AI labelView post →Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (1988) Another classic adventure from Lucasfilm Games. This is a personal favourite of mine, as the Amiga version was how I got properly introduced to the genre. The Commodore 64 one was the original, though, and quite impressive considering the hardware. 1/4
positive · AI labelView post →Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (1988) The third (and last) adventure game Lucasfilm Games released on the Commodore 64. Earth is under threat from aliens, who are using a mind bending machine to make us dumb enough that we can be easily conquered, and you have to thwart their plans. 1/4
neutral · AI labelView post →Apparently this game came with a newspaper full of hints to make the experience a little less displeasing than it already is, so definitely get that newspaper or follow a guide. This is probably my least favorite Lucasarts game. Classics of the genre like pixel hunting and moon logic are present. As for "puzzles", I hope you really love mazes because Zak is full of them, and it's clear they were added to pad out the length of the game. The charm of the subsequent Lucasarts games like the…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I had played this game sometime back in the 1990s and had very fond memories of it. So when it went on sale, I bought it based on pure nostalgia. What a mistake. This kind of point and click adventure did not age well, and probably neither did I, because at this day and age I can't stand clicking on every little spot on the screen just to figure out which objects are interactive or not. Played for less than two hours. Couldn't stomach it anymore, and ended up ruining the rosy idea that I had…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I was never able to finish this game in the 90's because Disk 3 of 3 was corrupted. I'm so happy I finally saw the ending :) Walktrough recommended though. It's a game from the "good" old times where you can cause a dead end without even knowing you did so. And the game will never tell you; you just get stuck without having a clue what to do.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →What to say...I was waiting forever for this game to appear on Steam. One of the Lucasarts classics. It is my favorite one from the bunch of old Lucasarts point and clicks. It even has two-headed squirrel.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Today in Mojo History—38 years ago today: Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders released sometime in October.
neutral · AI labelView post →in "Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders," you can buy a religious text from a man at the airport: "How To Raise Your Consciousness And Lower Your Golf Scores," by Swami Hollawanda. The Swami is said to have a score of 19 strokes at Pebble Beach - that'd be a hole-in-one on every hole except one.
neutral · AI labelView post →*Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders*, LucasArts, 1988. It's a computer game though. It was never on the NES. Deus Ex (2000) was popular for mashing together tabloid stories to make a story, but Zak did it first. And it was way cornier. You play a tabloid reporter who is sent to Seattle to investigate a two-headed squirrel when he learns of an alien invasion (whose leader is an Elvis impersonator). The game is awesome and IIRC you almost can't lose at it, at least not *now*. The game came…
neutral · AI labelView post →Today (Friday) at noon PT/3pm ET join us as we continue our Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders playthrough. Will we uncover another 37 year old bug like we did in our last session?? Will the original devs get lost in their own game? #ZakMcKracken @lucasartsmemory.bsky.social @mixnmojo.com
neutral · AI labelView post →Let me be clear, if you don't go into this game knowing that there are multiple dead ends and you can easily do the wrong thing - you're going to have a bad time. You will need to have a lot of saved games as you will make mistakes and you'll need to go back and try again. It could be using in an object in a way you weren't meant to, someone dying, or as simple as running out of money. However, if you accept this and take that as an additional difficulty layer, what is left is a fun, quirky…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A silly nostalgic game from the 90s. If you played this game on your old DOS computer you're probably going to have a good time. If this is your first time through I honestly have no idea how you found out about this.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's so unnecessarily difficult and confusing that it just becomes not fun anymore. And I'm not trying to say that if a game is difficult then it's automatically bad, I'm just saying that if a game is TOO difficult then it becomes not fun to play.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →In Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (1988), aliens reduce human intelligence by using phones. Minus the involvement of the aliens (maybe???), the game seems prophetic. Can we get a good ending like in the game where the world is saved from stupidity?
neutral · AI labelView post →For 6 dollars, I expect the smallest amount of work to be put into a game. But nope, this is just an emulator of Zak McKracken shamelessly slapped onto the steam store. One of the worst adaptations I've ever played, they did absolutely no work to update this game (a menu at the very least would have been nice). If you want my opinion, find an emulator yourself, don't pay 6 dollars for a free copy of ScummVM.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders - Featured in our book - Commodore 64: a visual compendium Reprints coming soon 📚 Check out our Collection of Commodore books: www.bitmapbooks.com/collections/... #bitmapbooks
neutral · AI labelView post →I'm playing more Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders tonight for Retro Adventure Wednesday. Join me on Twitch at 9:30 p.m. EST for LucasArts' wild follow-up to Maniac Mansion! twitch.tv/decafjedi
neutral · AI labelView post →Checking my Steam 2023 review ʕ•ᴥ•ʔﾉ☆ Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders, along with Maniac Mansion shenanigans. My LucasArts love is timeless ❤️
positive · AI labelView post →Played this game when I was a kid. Saw it on Steam and decided to try playing it with my son. After the first 10min he loved it. We both enjoyed the retro graphics and music along with the simple game play and fun puzzles.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Mojo screenshot of the day: “Zak McKracken and The Alien Mindbenders” (PC EGA)
neutral · AI labelView post →Today in Mojo History—37 years ago today: Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders released sometime in October.
neutral · AI labelView post →1988 was a very cool year, with stylish music and fashion, and cool computers like the Amiga that could commandeer all the powers of multimedia. Scumm games were the state of the art back then and felt like real interactive cartoons, unlike any game of the time, and the novelty effect would help you cope with the tiring Lucasart "humour" and the nonsensical puzzles of which even the game's coverart makes fun of. In order to really demonstrate the engine capabilities, the game uses a lot of…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Scene of the Day: “Zak McKracken and The Alien Mindbenders” (PC EGA)
neutral · AI labelView post →#365Games Day 31: Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders. Lucasfilm's Maniac Mansion follow-up was ambitious & wonderfully strange! A cinematic, tabloid-fueled comedy conspiracy adventure that sees you hopping the globe & beyond. Never beat it as a kid but still found it surprising and delightful.
positive · AI labelView post →Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (1988)
neutral · AI labelView post →this is the reason i play video games
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →My all time favorite adventure game. The first time I've played Zak was on my dad's 286 laptop from work (of course) on MS-DOS in monochrome, from a floppy. This should have been around 1991. A few years later I managed to beat it, playing it again on a Pentium 1 system I believe, this time in color. Zak McKracken will always have a special place in my heart. It's a great mix of well written, funny characters, a solid story with references to "New Age" beliefs and "Ancient Alien" theories and…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →YAARR...! Shiver me tentacles! it zak me kraken! Zak McKraken is a game by Lucasfilm games, which also made some star wars games and a series of pirate games called Monky Island, which do not have the kraken. This one has you play something to do with journalism I think, haven't played much, but the first minute looks way past cool. It runs in the SCUMM system which was also used in the tentacle game(I don't like the tentacle anime so it doesnt look quite as cool, though kraken also have…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One more box that I think I need to unplug from Bluesky for a while. Being in the spotlight has not been fun. Box #9 is Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (1988). It's less well-known and then it's younger brother maniac mansion, and a more sprawling and confusing game. But still a classic.
neutral · AI labelView post →It could have been worse, they could have picked Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders 🤷🏻♀️ But yeah, they could have picked something a smidge friendlier, tbh.
negative · AI labelView post →Zak McKracken And The Alien Mindbenders.
neutral · AI labelView post →Boulderdash (all), Lode Runner, Impossible Mission (1+2), Bruce Lee, H.E.R.O., Jouste, Ghostbusters, Hacker (1+2), Defender of the Crown, Maniac Mansion + Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders, Raid over Moscow, Spy vs Spy, Beach Head, Agent USA, Airborne Ranger, Bagitman, Dino-Eggs, Fire-Ant, Fort Apocalypse, Gateway to Apshai. I'll probably add some more of my favs later on ;)
neutral · AI labelView post →Side Quests is back and this episode's host is podcaster, writer, and reporter for the National Inquisitor, Jonathan Holmes! The game he is talking about today is Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders by Lucasfilm Games! funandgames.libsyn.com/side-quests-...
neutral · AI labelView post →As a youngster I fell in love with maniac mansion on the commodore 64. Then came along Zak McKraken. Now, I never even came close to beating it. And I recall it came with an annoying code system you needed to use to fly (the papers were dark dark dark burgundy / brown and wouldn't photocopy with any sort of ease). Anyways. Hours upon hours were spent - and I never even came close to beating this. I am thankful this product is available now. I am playing through and will finally get to see…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It can be a fun game and elements are awesome, but the gameplay is rock hard. I got horrendously stuck.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →From the Archives (09 Mar, 2008): LucasArts' Secret History #2: Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders — “Remember when LucasArts liked adventure games? Jason does, and so he took a trip back in time.”
neutral · AI labelView post →Happy #PointNClickFriday and thanks for hosting! I just updated a free game I made a couple years ago. This one is in the style of 9 verb games by LucasArts. There are a couple of nods to Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders. Hope you play and enjoy it! succulentbacon.itch.io/martian-ment...
neutral · AI labelView post →Thats probably the bread from the Bakery in "Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders"...
neutral · AI labelView post →📅 Happy 36th anniversary to Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders! 💾 Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders was released in October 1988!
neutral · AI labelView post →Tell me some good reasons to replay Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders. 🥸 #LucasArts #LucasFilmGames #Adventure #AdventureGames
neutral · AI labelView post →I'm playing LucasArts' Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders for the first time ever tonight on Twitch. Drop by and join me around 9:30 p.m. Eastern! twitch.tv/decafjedi
neutral · AI labelView post →zack mackcrakcin is a super epic mystery narrative who dunnit platformer point-and-click mystery adventure. i like it becuase the characters are relatable. zac mckrackin is in a dead end job with a lousy boss and he takes it out on his wife and kids. good to play with the whole family
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →
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