On Trial:
All Zombies Must Die
On this here website, I started my (semi) regular column 16 Bit Memories as a way to endear myself to you, the reading public. Now when deciding what SNES/Mega Drive era game to write about first, only one came to mind: Zombies Ate My Neighbours. It was an isometric shooter set in a B-Movie inspired cartoon universe. And it was fan-bloody-tastic fun. In my flashback, I extolled it’s virtues and told you all to download it on the Wii Store, leaving my fellow Xboxers sad that you could not enjoy the zombie-killing fun.
Well now you can, with All Zombies Must Die, a spiritual successor to Zombies Ate My Neighbours. It’s just as goofy, just as fun and most of all, just as filled with ker-azy zombies!
Sharing an isometric view with ZAMN, AZMD (keep up with these acronyms…) puts you in the shoes of slick-haired gamer Jack. Loving life in a zombie apocalypse, you control Jack as he runs around at first punching, then shotgunning the crap out of zombies, zombies and more zombies… Running into sentient gates giving you specific zombie-killing missions that make the core gameplay of the title, it’s that simple gameplay where most of the enjoyment comes. You’re in a map, filled with zombies, that you have to kill. Sorted.
There is a story, of course, with Jack’s self-awareness of living in a game, and eventually running into his sassy ex-girlfriend Rachel, with further hints in the trial to a bigger conspiracy at play. However, with this sort of game story is usually second. However some of the self-aware references (apparently, killing your co-op players will leave you… LEFT FOR DEAD! GEDDIT?) make for amusing moments, and it has a charm which makes you smile subtly to yourself during all the carnage.
Adding to this charm are the graphics and sound. As I said before, a cartoony feel that mirrors ZAMN B-movie feel with a more modern post-apocalyptic one. The characters, including the zombies themselves, have exaggerated looks to them which adds to this sense of wackiness. The sound though keeps it in the B-movie vein, all organs and funky riffs. In fact, there is almost a grindhouse feel, much like other wacky zombie game Dead Block, to the tunes, but unlike Dead Block there is no deep voiced narrator overwhelming you with his dulcet tones.
The key thing to All Zombies Must die is simplicity. They don’t try too hard with gimmicks in this trial and simply give you the option to kill some zombies in a variety of fun ways (mostly involving a shotgun). Adding to this is the now-must-have-for-games XP system. To be honest, it’s not really needed but gives a dimension to the game which doesn’t hurt it, mostly because it doesn’t influence how you play. Searching for items is something that comes natural with gaming curiosity, and some of the finds raise a chuckle (stained granny pants anyone?) but aside from some quest specific items and things like extra health, there is no real need to search them.
The only problem that comes with a game like this is that it does fall to repetitiveness. While the quests are varied in a way, they do tend to circle the theme of “Kill Zombies This Way”. However from a game called All Zombies Must Die, what else would you expect? The only other gripe I have personally is sometimes the quests aren’t as made clear as you would expect (and for the purposes of full disclosure here, I did purchase the full game and this does get worse in a way). However does all this hurt the game? Not really. You still get your zombie-killing adventure in a way that’s easy on the eye and ear. Therefore…
Verdict: Buy
