All Zombies Must Die! Review (PSN, XBLA)

Pretty self explanatory really

…it’s fairly hard to write an opening paragraph for a game when it lays its cards on the table from the title alone. All zombies certainly must die, there’s no denying that, but All Zombie Must Die! adds a little spice to executions with electrified shotgun shells, radioactive SMG’s and ray guns. Optional names consisted of ‘Pimp My Firearm’, but apparently that’s just too vague. The final zombie invasion on 2011 has begun, and it all feels rather familiar. Zombies have risen, and an intrepid foursome must use anything in their grasp to ensure they don’t become lunch. However, the group of misfits certainly don’t look like they want to be in each others company. An overly zealous gamer who has no grasp of reality, his ex-girlfriend, a scientist high in intelligence and low on friends…and an extra terrestrial. A solid dual stick shooter at heart, All Zombies Must Die! also juggles many an RPG element with it. Blasting away rotting hordes stacks up the XP to spend in traditional aspects of RPG survival. Stocking up on loot, however, allows you to craft your own improvised weapons and modify your standard zombie slaying arsenal with glorious status ailments. Shelling out in elemental upgrades saps the seriousness out of crafting systems generated by the likes of Dead Island, but I for one am thankful my guns won’t fall apart in my hands and am left in dominating hilarity as zombies become deafened by sonar magnums. Set a group of undead ablaze with a flaming shotgun and you’re laughing. With the amount of hordes we’ve blasted through in recent years, it’s nice to see new methods in head busting madness. Unfortunately, this doesn’t quite extend to the gameplay, and its focus on farming really can take its toll. Main quests consist of revisiting areas to gather an item before returning to base and setting off to revisit an area that had just been revisted to grab yet another item to return to base and thus repeating. Moving from area to area isn’t exactly a doddle, either, with gates blocking exits that won’t open until certain mission criteria are met. Nothing massively complex, just ‘Collect 5 cases of ammo’ or ‘Kill 20 zombies very quickly’. Frenzied slaying missions are all very good, as they balance the shooter and RPG elements well enough, but collecting supplies just comes down to luck and becomes all the duller for it.

Set a group of undead ablaze with a flaming shotgun and you’re laughing

Stubbornness in loneliness doesn’t compromise your enjoyment of the game, but you’ll easily be corralled and slaughtered from time to time as hordes overwhelm. The three allies that accompany you throughout flirt with the concept of multi-player, and bringing in a few pals will always guarantee some status ailment mayhem. As grind worthy the copious heaps of fetch quests are, they seem to be less monotonous when you have a pal to high five/punch in the face. I personally love couch based teamwork, but others will be befuddled by the fact that they can’t hook up with friends online. The peculiar lack of online multi-player options leaves you friendless if you have no spare controllers or if you live in an outhouse in nowhere. Though teamwork doesn’t heighten enjoyment of the title, it’s a shame and slightly questionable that you can’t exchange unpleasantries for poor survival abilities worldwide. Still, at leasts you can do it with pals over a pizza. Though you’ll be blasting skulls off many a backbone, barely any gore stains the streets, and the comical design of the characters all caters to the lighter side of this . Hell, if you were going to educate your young’uns in how to survive a zombie apocalypse, this is a wise investment. Nothing about All Zombies Must Die! should be taken seriously, from the gawky humour, the gargantuan chins and retro horror film music that sounds ripped from the likes of The Exorcist and Dawn Of The Dead. All Zombies Must Die! caters more to raising a smile than to deliver a genuinely new zombie based experience, but it really could’ve done with spreading out the effort. It’s fair to say the game is funny at times, it’s cliché and cross referencing sometimes delivering a giggle, but there is a time where the gags start to grate. Gamer of the group Jack just can’t let the one joke he has go, with practically all his quests involving him trying to prove to the others that they’re trapped in a video game (ho ho, they are) and no one believes him (ho ho, they’re wrong). I’d like to have a go at the gradually degrading writing quality, that it’s like watching a recent widow trying to make light of the situation by attempting stand-up, but it even makes has a self-depriving stab at that. All Zombies Must Die! certainly does enough to separate itself from copious amounts of twin stick shooters that dabble in the undead masses, but not so much from the undead masses themselves. Its inoffensive set-up and array of ill-inflicting weapons all give it its own rather charming approach to zombie extermination. It’s just in some aspects, the game takes a few missteps. Fetch quest after fetch quest after fetch quest in overly familiar areas begins to really grind after a short while and restricted multi-player that almost emphasises solo play doesn’t help in this regard. Nevertheless, although the gameplay may not spice things up with much variety, its tongue in cheek approach and stacks of different zombies to slay at least adds something to slaughtering the large amounts of living rotting flesh. It may not be extraordinary, but anyone not sick of the onslaught of zombie videogames who’s looking for a bite-size shooter and RPG will certainly find this little combo enjoyable.

3 / 5