For
years I wondered why this game was never released in the United States. It was,
after all, based on a hit television show that is still very popular in syndication.
It does feature superb voice acting by Tim Curry, Dweezil Zappa, and E.G. Daly,
among others, and the animation is top-notch and true to the spirit of the series.
Maybe this is a clue: the game’s subtitle is “The Graphic Adventures of a
Private Dick,” and they ain’t just whistling Dixie. For Duckman is
without a doubt the most sexually suggestive, and funniest, game I have ever played.
The back of the box claims that Duckman is appropriate for children ages
11-14. Quite simply, Playmates Interactive marketing department did not have a
freakin’ clue as to Duckman’s true identity.

On the animated television
series, Duckman is a fowl-tempered, crude actor who plays a tough-talking, Mickey
Spillane-type detective on a hit television show. His distinctive facial features
bear more than a passing resemblance to Groucho Marx, as do his lewd suggestions
and sexual innuendos. Try to picture Donald Duck on Viagra lusting after Daisy
in a halter-top and you’ll get the picture.

I would have loved to be a fly
on the wall at the corporate board meeting of Playmate Interactive Entertainment
when they voted on their clueless decision to release Duckman: The Graphic
Adventures of a Private Dick as a children’s computer game. Having been privy
to numerous board meetings in my “real life” jobs, I can almost guarantee
it went like this:

Suit #1: Hey, he’s a talking duck. Ducks
are funny!
Suit #2: Donald, Howard, Huey, Dewey and Louie … They’re all a
gold mine!
Suit #3: Plus he already has his own hit television series on the
USA network!

Now understand that probably not a single one
of them had ever seen the show. So imagine their surprise when the opening game
scene featured Duckman in a Jacuzzi surrounded by naked women, their long hair
covering their ta-tas. Duckman asks one of the beauties to massage the webbing
between his toes and then loudly sighs, “Ah, that’s enough to make the cock
crow.” Or how about Duckman’s comment after opening a mailbox, “It’s
a good thing it’s called a mailbox–if it were a female box, men would want to
stuff a lot more than mail in it.” Okay, anyone out there still not understand
why Playmates cried fowl and ducked out of distributing this game stateside?

As
this episode of Duckman begins, we find our intrepid hero vacationing in
a Jacuzzi full of bursting bubbles and bouncy babes. He is doing that thing that
men and talking ducks do best–channel-surfing with the remote control–when he
stumbles across an episode of his television show, only to discover that he has
been replaced by King Chicken as the star of his show. Now art imitates life–Duckman
must play a poor man’s Columbo as he investigates the shady reasons for his firing.
Not-so-subtle observations on marketing and merchandising are strewn about as
freely as jokes about condoms and sexually transmitted diseases. His inquiries
will lead to Chubby Dick’s Strip Club and Dante’s Infernally Good Pizzeria among
others, and the entire cast of characters from the animated series are all present
and accounted for: Bernice, Duckman’s deceased wife’s identical twin; Friday,
a cornfed pig who is Duckman’s right arm; and Fluffy and Uranus, a pair of insufferably
cute stuffed animals who are scared to death of Duckman, and for good reason,
as he has a habit of stuffing them into a microwave and setting the timer on high.

The
game is classic point-and-click, and though some of the inventory-based puzzles
are silly, like using a glow-in-the-dark Elvis poster to light up a room, they
are always logical and fun. Duckman himself has different “moods” available
that can be used in certain situations. In most adventure games, the option to
use different approaches–angry, sad, humorous–usually has no noticeable effect
on the reaction of other characters. Not so in Duckman, for certain puzzles
and conversations can only be solved if Duckman uses the correct mode. Most situations
call for the “Normal” mode, but the game really shines when Duckman
transforms into his “Spazzed-Out, Pissed-Off, Crazy” mode. He flutters
about like a duck attempting to escape the broiler, his face as red as the mercury
in a thermometer, and smoke rising from his head. Some of the humor is sick and
tasteless, but who are we to say what our feathered friends would be like if they
really could talk?

If you love ribald humor that is even more incongruous
in a cutesy Disney-like animated story, then Duckman is the game you have
yearned for. Probably what impresses most is that at first glance the game resembles
LucasArts classics like Day of the Tentacle and Maniac Mansion, but
looks can be deceiving, and Duckman is really a feathered Larry Flynt.

Attempts
to find anyone who had a hand developing or distributing this game have been futile,
and telephone calls to Playmates Interactive are what it must be like attempting
to communicate with Martians. It took me three years to find a boxed Duckman;
if you ever spot a copy, snatch it up immediately, for not only is this game
a collector’s item, but it will also quack you up.

Final Grade: A

If
you would like to read more about Duckman: The Graphic Adventures of a Private
Dick, then please visit Rob
Merritt’s Duckman site.

System Requirements:486-compatible
(Pentium preferred)
8 MB RAM
22 MB free hard drive space
SVGA video card
2x
CD-ROM drive
DOS 5.0 (will also run in Win 95)
Mouse
Keyboard