Monster Madness: Grave Danger
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Monster Madness: Grave Danger
For some mysterious reason, everyone you’ve ever known in your suburban town has been turned into zombies. Only four people remain unchanged to help fight back this mass B-movie zombie insurgence: Zack the nerd, Carrie the goth, Andy the skater, and Jennifer the cheerleader. If this sounds a little familiar, that’s because it is, Monster Madness: Battle for Suburbia was released last year on Xbox 360 and PC. The game was plagued with problems such as a poor control system, bugs in the gameplay and graphics and a lack of online play. Ported to the PS3 and given a new title, we take a look at Monster Madness: Grave Danger. Have the problems that previously plagued earlier versions of the game been fixed?
Mostly.
Grave Danger makes use of the Unreal 3 engine to provide players with a top-down perspective as they hack-and-slash and shoot their way through twenty levels comprising of five levels with four chapters for each level. One of four characters can be chosen to play as in this unique spin on the genr. Just as before, all characters end up at Zack, the nerd’s house on a night that everyone within their quiet suburbia town is turned into zombies. It’s up to these four teens and their variety of weapons to find out what happened while beating back hoards of the undead.
One of the biggest improvements is Grave Danger’s control scheme. Using the same control scheme as seen in Geometry Wars, players move their character with the left-stick, then use the right-stick to fire a ranged weapon. The circle button provides easy access to the character’s melee weapon allowing players to button-mash as they whack back at their foes. No need to equip your weapon before you hack away (either ranged or melee), the right-control stick and circle melee button does that for you.
As the game progresses players can take what they’ve collected from toolboxes littered throughout the game to Larry Tools who can fashion new tools for their use and offer upgrades in exchange for Monster Tokens. Monster Tokens come from the zombies that players have been defeated, which confused me at first. There is nothing dropped on the ground for players to pick up or to walk over and automatically obtain. I found out they are automatically tallied with each zombie that is killed. It didn’t take long or much effort to figure this out but it left me confused a few zombie kills later after the game’s explaination wondering why I wasn’t seeing these Monster Tokens. Larry Tools is another improvement available at specific points in each level. This is one of the highlights of the game, as the upgrades available are different for each character and can offer a range of new and upgradable weapons including the dual-wield nail guns (my favorite) . However weapons aren’t the only things available here, items like different boots, nail polish, purses, and other items also varied from character to character offering bonuses that make your character stronger, faster and able to reload quicker. Ranged tools can run out of ammo, so if pressed for another viable solution, players can turn around and pick up most the objects within the game’s environment to throw at zombies.
Something new in Grave Danger is its online play. Now up to four players can work together through the game’s main storyline using its co-op adventure mode (three players in offline co-op). Other competitive online play includes Capture the Flag and Deathmatch; however, I think the co-op adventure mode has much more to offer for players looking to play together with friends. Deathmatch and Capture the Flag are fun, but they just didn’t seem to have a proper fit given the game’s feel. While these are definite improvements, I found that with my online adventure modes that the lag was a bit more than just frustrating.
Mini-games have also been added to Grave Danger. This is in the Challenges mode where players can unlock new costumes by attempting to complete a series of mini-games. Most however are simply ‘kill these monsters as fast as possible’ giving little to compel players to venture off the path of the adventure mode. The levels within the mini-games are the same ones from the game and the arena’s for the Versus mode seemed awfully small.
With all that said, Grave Danger is a huge improvement over Battle for Suburbia, but the game does have its flaws. The game’s repetitive nature as a hack-and-slash gives little challenge beyond a few frustrations. The vehicles you drive will get stuck on objects or in them, and death has absolutely no penalty. Simply pick up and keep plugging away. The game’s pacing also seems to drag in places, for a hack-and-slash, there was a lot of walking and driving where there’s nothing to do but look at the scenery. I also found it easy for monsters to get stuck on objects in the game, making it extremely easy for you to just sit back and fire away, adding to its lack of challenge. It appears that there are plenty of bugs that missed getting fixed in the port and some are very aggravating and frustrating.
Graphics & Sound
The game doesn’t have that “next-gen” feel, the graphics and video cut-scenes seem…dull. Some cut-scenes made use of comic-book story panels, which added a fantastic addition to the game and I wish the developers had included more of these. They looked polished and fit the game’s goofy tone. The top-down perspective lended a few problems with seeing where I was going during the tutorial, for example I broke a desk (at least I think it was a desk) that was along the wall near the bottom of my screen. This wall (along with others in the game) made maneuvering around the world a little difficult sometimes, specifically in the beginning when I didn’t know how to control much of anything. The game seems to open up more after leaving Zack’s house and making your way to the park but then too, objects in the environment made tasks difficult.
The wide varieties of monsters within the game are designed with great ingenuity but I did find that it was difficult at times to distinguish similar looking zombies from one another. The environments have just the right amount of “spooky” but not to the point where players will feel as if they’re going to be scared senseless every corner. Hardcore “survival-horror” fans might find this unfulfilling, but for those like me who don’t like being scared out of my seat while playing a game; I found this refreshing.
The voice-acting however was horribly bad, I would have preferred to read sentences printed on the screen or via extra comic book panels. This doesn’t detract too much from the game, luckily there is more game than voice-acting. The soundtrack is adequate but nothing about it really ‘jumped out at me’.
Value
Fans of classic shooters or hack-and-slash games like Galaga or Ninga Gaiden II will most likely enjoy the repetitive nature of the game, even if it’s a little too repetitive for its genre. But with only twenty levels and Challenges that fall flat, the game ends all too quickly with little enticement to replay the game.
Overall
I highly suggest playing the PS3 edition of Monster Madness: Grave Danger over the Xbox 360 or PC version (titled: Monster Madness: Battle for Suburbia), but I definitely think there’s not much here and this gives players a dull experience. If you just can’t wait for Resident Evil 5 or Bioshock, then go ahead and rent it. Otherwise, skip this one.
Pros
+ Huge improvement over previous release
+ Lots of new modes
+ Online co-op with up to four others
+ Classic online games like capture the flag, Deathmatch and versus games
+ Challenges in the form of mini-games
+ Comic Book panels used to tell some of the story progression
+ New and Upgradable weapons, unique to each character
+ Lots of creative monsters to hack-and-slash
Cons
- Challenges fall flat of being exciting and fun
- Pacing drags at times
- Overly repetitive, even for a hack-and-slash
- Seems buggy at times
- Terrible Voice Acting
- Some zombies look too similar to one another
- Little challenge to the overall game, too easy
- Doesn’t look like a next-gen game
- Very little replay value beyond online modes
Final Verdict
Here's a small guide to help you understand our evaluation of games.
PRESENTATION GRADE
Can be from the game's box to the contents of the booklet, and even the game introduction. (Intro, menus, options, etc)
GRAPHIC GRADE
Up to what point the graphics have been worked on my the developper. The design type, the effort used for textures and environments, as well as animations and framerate.
AUDIO GRADE
Is the soundtrack a good match to the game's style, he ambient sounds keeping with the gameplay and the sound effects clear and convincing?
GAMEPLAY GRADE
Placement of the controls and the inferface that the player with be using during the game.
REPLAY VALUE GRADE
The most important factor in the evaluation of a game. It identifies the lifespan of the game and the fun of coming back again and again.
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