Is what you think is real, really real?
If you are sensitive to that type of philosophical reflection, you'll almost certainly enjoy The Zone. If you're not, well, then probably not. Because The Zone is an extremely focused game. Every conversation or action deals with the question whether it's possible to understand the nature of reality. And it succeeds in a very uncompromising but effective way. There are no puzzles to solve, just places to explore and people (and other things) to converse with. The strength of the game is in the dialogs and other texts; they are interesting and draw you into The Zone despite it's blurry graphics and general low budget feel.
The Zone is completely point & click. There is a help option in the main menu, explaining the controls and possible actions, but if you have played a P&C game before everything is as you'll expect.
There is an inventory but you make very little use of it, and only in the most obvious ways. What you do is visit the different locations on your map, try to understand where you are and try to find a way to leave The Zone.
With the exception of a radio signal, there are no voices so you will be reading all the conversations. Fortunately, as said, they are a fun read even if the ongoing questioning of your senses became a bit repetitive in the end. Therefore I'm still undecided whether the fact that the game is very short is a bad thing or not. It took me less than 3 hours to reach the inescapable conclusion. But on the screenshot pages I see screens that I don't remember from the game, so maybe I've found a shortcut.
I'm glad not all adventuregames are like The Zone. But I'm also glad The Zone is. And for 5 Euro's it's almost freeware and you even get a disc.
