Review: Age Of Zombies

Developer: Halfbrick Studios

Publisher: Halfbrick Studios

The best Zombie Slayers get the best names and the best rep: Chris Redfield, Ash Williams, Shaun, Bruce, and now: Barry Steakfries.  That’s right, Barry joins the long list of undead slaughterers with the PSN mini Age Of Zombies   (hmmm, Zombiekillers, that’s a great name for a band).

Halfbrick’s Zombie killin’ mini is chock full of action in the classic top-down shooter genre, and features a rugged, manly, gun-totin’, smart-ass Bruce Campbell-esque killin’ machine, Barry Steakfries (who looks suspiciously like Charlie Brooker).  He’s charged with defeating the nefariously evil Professor Brains, who sends zombies all the way through time to infect people the world over and dominate the world in the near future.

Barry jumps his way through time Quantum Leap style, taking out the hordes of undead as he does so.  There’s five themed missions: Stoneage, the 30s, Ancient Egypt, Feudal Japan and The Future, each separated into 3 sections with the last one being a boss fight.  You’ll fight a zombified T-Rex, tommy-gun wielding wiseguy zombies, a Giga-Samurai and a weird Zombie-robot thing along the way.

It’s a real blast to play, and runs along the same lines as a 2-stick shooter: you use the analog nubbin or the D-Pad to manouevre Barry, and the Face buttons to shoot in a particular direction: Triangle is North, Square is West, Circle East and X South, combining two together to shoot at a diagonal.  You can also press L to launch your secondary attack (a limited stock of Grenades, Mines or Bazookas, whichever you pick up) in the direction you’re currently facing to help clear out a mass-gathering of necrotics if they’re bearing down on your cigarette-chompin’ ass.

The action is quick, and the zombie waves often feel endless, but luckily, you have regenerative health, so if you’re touched maybe a couple of times, it’s not so bad, so long as you avoid their death-grip for a few seconds, all that happens is Barry lets out a few manly grunts and the screen goes a bit red.  However, if you are unlucky enough to be caught in the horde, and you do die, you have a stock of old-school ‘lives’ to carry you through the rest of the mission.  Thankfully, these are reset back to three at the start of each level, as it’s nearly impossible (for me anyway) to get through a level unscathed, and I’d end up Game Over every couple of minutes.

Weapons come in the form of guns.  Big, manly, tough-guy guns (for further expansion of tough guys and guns, see the film Shoot ‘Em Up, particularly the scene where Paul Giamatti is talking with his employer in the warehouse.  Warning: the film contains much swearing, gore, sexual innuendo, boobs, gore, swearing, violence, guns, guns and more guns, Clive Owen and Monica Bellucci.  In short, all the good stuff).  You have only a pistol to defend yourself with, which is more than adequate given the unlimited ammo, but pick up one of the regular pickups, and you have a positive death-machine in your 16-bit hands.  Mwahahahaha.

You have the choice of: Sub-Machine Gun, Flamethrower, Minigun, and the all-important Shotgun to blast through the army of the undead, as well as the aforementioned ‘splosive secondaries.  You can also pick up Lives in the form of 1ups (and by earning a certain number of points in a level), furthering the 16-bit thematic thing fused with modern-day technology and advancements  (hands up if you remeber those.  I dunno, the youth of today don’t know they’re born, what with regenerative health and infinite continues, there’s no skill involved anymore).  Oh, you can also pick up a shield occasionally, but it’s really unnecessary if you’re any good.

Okay, retro styling is making a comeback, so it’s good to see that it’s being infused into a fantastic little game (by the Antipodean Halfbrick no less), but I think it’s gone thusfar slightly under-hyped.  It was only until after it had been released for a few weeks that I saw the trailer for it, and immediately bought it off the store.  Fantastic little manly gem, not perfect, but it’s damn close, and the writing is incredibly humourous to boot (the Aussies are MENTAL!), Barry’s witty and manly one-liners are so tongue-in-cheek, it’s unreal.  Sexual innuendo is also rather blatant (overt rather than covert, shall we say?) throughout, which is good, as it helps to boost the comic violence: the zombies ‘splode when you shoot them, in a fountain of red zombie-juice, which leaves a puddle on the floor, lovely.

Did I say “manly” enough?  Is the manliness quotient sufficently satisfied by my manly ways?  I’m even growing a beard, I’ve got so much manly testosterone running through me, but not too much, because that produces estrogen, and we all know, boobs are not manly.  Homoeroticism here at StartGame?  What’s wrong with six guys sharing a roo…. oh.