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IGN Review of NeverDead
On the surface, NeverDead looks curiously interesting. Flaunting the garish appeal of a Suda 51 joint, and a potentially distinctive and cool hook – macabre dismemberment and decapitation mechanics – Konami's little-hyped new title has sleeper hit written all over it. Alas, all that potential quickly evaporates once the game begins, rapidly devolving into a bubbling mess of phoned-in generica infected with a shameful non-story and frustrating gameplay.
NeverDead attempts to tell a story like stoned people try to do chores, giving us precious little backstory regarding Bryce Boltzmann, the game's marquee anti-hero. An easily dismembered immortal who can tear off his own head to solve puzzles, Bryce's ultimate motivation for serving as a Demon Hunter remains mixed. Sure, we learn that his barely-discussed wife was killed in a fight against a demon king named Astaroth via a handful of graphically striking but badly dubbed cutscenes, but the Bryce we're presented with in-game seems far removed and totally disconnected from his past. He offers little to connect with, nothing to relate to and nothing for us to care about.
Bryce's partner, Arcadia Maximille, is a mortal agent who is as confounding as Bryce is unlikeable. She clearly has Daddy issues, preferring to do her top secret life-threatening demon hunting work in a deep cut, one-piece sweater blouse-dress that barely covers her privates. With choice lines like, "Eww, that was so gross," and a perpetually accentuated bust line, the developer casts her lovingly rendered bosom and derriere as the star more often than the character herself.
NeverDead wants to play like other gonzo third-person hack n' slash/shooter mash-ups (think Devil May Cry and Bayonetta), but chokes under the fun-killing noose of wonky controls and drab environments. The action takes place across eight poorly realized and lazily named chapters (Asylum, Sewers, Destroyed Streets… really?). Those looking to hack it up with friends will find 13 co-op challenges for up to four players on offer, which all play like extended combat sequences, sans story.
In terms of core gameplay, both the standard controls and the dismemberment mechanics are wanting. The camera has speed fits, starting slow then snapping quickly, movement feels ploddy, and jumping feels all wrong. You can switch between dual-wielding gunplay and an ultra-wonky sword system, but not effortlessly or artfully. It's not fast, it's not smooth, and the latter-mentioned melee controls harken back a few years when every developer put analog controls in everything from skating to hockey games. Those games actually benefitted from the control innovation.
Playing with limbs missing offers a few initial chuckles, but quickly becomes annoying, especially if your limb gets blown somewhere inconvenient. Playing as your own dismembered head (did I just write that?) presents its own set of problems. During combat, your body will often ragdoll into a position that blocks access to the neck- where you reattach your noggin - which makes for intense frustration when you're surrounded by Grandbabbies. Oh, Grandbabbies. These little globules will suck you up and cue a quick time event that can lead to a game over screen.
Whatever rudimentary rhythm manifests itself during combat feels one-noted, always opening with the same bad metal riffs and stream of enemies burped out from a Demon Womb (read: spawn point), and builds to the same crescendo of balancing between unexceptional combat and limb gathering, repeat ad nauseam. These poor beats get amplified during boss fights, especially the second-to-last encounter. Holy holy hell, this specific encounter will go down in history as one of most annoying fights in a video game. The final boss fight isn't much better, requiring a cruel mix of platforming and dodging made worse by the game's unsavory mechanics. All of this adds up to same assessment we made when we previously detailed NeverDead's combat in a preview last year: It's terrible.
The narrative eventually spins into a sloppy attempt at a sullen noire story and introduces a strange cast of characters, including Sangria, the self-appointed Duke of Hell, who sets the bar early in the year for worst (and weirdest) dressed video game character. This creep looks like a mix between a farm league He-Man character and a Max Rebo Band reject. Ghastly. Then there's Nikki Summerfield, an annoying singer who dresses like an understudy on the set of Fusion Frenzy. And Wolf, another immortal Demon Hunter, who makes his skulky entrance during the beginning of the game and doesn't reappear until the end. I'm sure you can guess why (wink wink). All of this gets punched up by Bryce's non-stop sexually-frustrated banter with Arcadia.
Instead of tasking its writers with scribbling bad dismemberment and decapitation puns ("Bryce, get your head in the game", and "Rollin, Rollin, Rollin"), Rebellion should've hired a writer who can tell a story, of which there is none to speak of here. What little story exists gets pushed almost entirely to the end, with a clumsy expositional monologue from Arcadia during a trip to her apartment. Things get creepy here, as you can rifle through Arcadia's underwear drawer, use the toilet and shower (fully clothed, by the way) and plop your head into laundry machine for a quick wash.
Bad controls and lazy design aside, here's NeverDead's real issue: this version of immortality sucks. Who wants to spend their life fighting the same bad guys, always falling apart at the seams, never going anywhere in life? You'd think that with an unlimited amount of time, Bryce would make something of himself. Yes, his wife has died, but there's no mourning. He's cursed, but there's no character arc, nothing cathartic, no real conflict and therefore no incentive for us to invest in him. He's a flat non-entity, a cliche-cracking womanizing boob, and he's the star. His co-star and ostensible frustrated love interest is kindling for feminist firebombing. Not only is Arcadia a classic helpless princess in need of constant rescuing, she's portrayed as stupid, ditsy, self-obsessed and objectified by her costumers and the game's peek-a-boo camera angles. Neverdead manages to reduce the cachet of immortality to upskirt jokes. Also, for the record, who named their children Bryce in the 14th century? No one.
©2012-01-31, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
NeverDead attempts to tell a story like stoned people try to do chores, giving us precious little backstory regarding Bryce Boltzmann, the game's marquee anti-hero. An easily dismembered immortal who can tear off his own head to solve puzzles, Bryce's ultimate motivation for serving as a Demon Hunter remains mixed. Sure, we learn that his barely-discussed wife was killed in a fight against a demon king named Astaroth via a handful of graphically striking but badly dubbed cutscenes, but the Bryce we're presented with in-game seems far removed and totally disconnected from his past. He offers little to connect with, nothing to relate to and nothing for us to care about.
Bryce's partner, Arcadia Maximille, is a mortal agent who is as confounding as Bryce is unlikeable. She clearly has Daddy issues, preferring to do her top secret life-threatening demon hunting work in a deep cut, one-piece sweater blouse-dress that barely covers her privates. With choice lines like, "Eww, that was so gross," and a perpetually accentuated bust line, the developer casts her lovingly rendered bosom and derriere as the star more often than the character herself.
NeverDead wants to play like other gonzo third-person hack n' slash/shooter mash-ups (think Devil May Cry and Bayonetta), but chokes under the fun-killing noose of wonky controls and drab environments. The action takes place across eight poorly realized and lazily named chapters (Asylum, Sewers, Destroyed Streets… really?). Those looking to hack it up with friends will find 13 co-op challenges for up to four players on offer, which all play like extended combat sequences, sans story.
Neverdead manages to reduce the cachet of immortality to upskirt jokes.
In terms of core gameplay, both the standard controls and the dismemberment mechanics are wanting. The camera has speed fits, starting slow then snapping quickly, movement feels ploddy, and jumping feels all wrong. You can switch between dual-wielding gunplay and an ultra-wonky sword system, but not effortlessly or artfully. It's not fast, it's not smooth, and the latter-mentioned melee controls harken back a few years when every developer put analog controls in everything from skating to hockey games. Those games actually benefitted from the control innovation.
Playing with limbs missing offers a few initial chuckles, but quickly becomes annoying, especially if your limb gets blown somewhere inconvenient. Playing as your own dismembered head (did I just write that?) presents its own set of problems. During combat, your body will often ragdoll into a position that blocks access to the neck- where you reattach your noggin - which makes for intense frustration when you're surrounded by Grandbabbies. Oh, Grandbabbies. These little globules will suck you up and cue a quick time event that can lead to a game over screen.
Whatever rudimentary rhythm manifests itself during combat feels one-noted, always opening with the same bad metal riffs and stream of enemies burped out from a Demon Womb (read: spawn point), and builds to the same crescendo of balancing between unexceptional combat and limb gathering, repeat ad nauseam. These poor beats get amplified during boss fights, especially the second-to-last encounter. Holy holy hell, this specific encounter will go down in history as one of most annoying fights in a video game. The final boss fight isn't much better, requiring a cruel mix of platforming and dodging made worse by the game's unsavory mechanics. All of this adds up to same assessment we made when we previously detailed NeverDead's combat in a preview last year: It's terrible.
The narrative eventually spins into a sloppy attempt at a sullen noire story and introduces a strange cast of characters, including Sangria, the self-appointed Duke of Hell, who sets the bar early in the year for worst (and weirdest) dressed video game character. This creep looks like a mix between a farm league He-Man character and a Max Rebo Band reject. Ghastly. Then there's Nikki Summerfield, an annoying singer who dresses like an understudy on the set of Fusion Frenzy. And Wolf, another immortal Demon Hunter, who makes his skulky entrance during the beginning of the game and doesn't reappear until the end. I'm sure you can guess why (wink wink). All of this gets punched up by Bryce's non-stop sexually-frustrated banter with Arcadia.
Instead of tasking its writers with scribbling bad dismemberment and decapitation puns ("Bryce, get your head in the game", and "Rollin, Rollin, Rollin"), Rebellion should've hired a writer who can tell a story, of which there is none to speak of here. What little story exists gets pushed almost entirely to the end, with a clumsy expositional monologue from Arcadia during a trip to her apartment. Things get creepy here, as you can rifle through Arcadia's underwear drawer, use the toilet and shower (fully clothed, by the way) and plop your head into laundry machine for a quick wash.
Bad controls and lazy design aside, here's NeverDead's real issue: this version of immortality sucks. Who wants to spend their life fighting the same bad guys, always falling apart at the seams, never going anywhere in life? You'd think that with an unlimited amount of time, Bryce would make something of himself. Yes, his wife has died, but there's no mourning. He's cursed, but there's no character arc, nothing cathartic, no real conflict and therefore no incentive for us to invest in him. He's a flat non-entity, a cliche-cracking womanizing boob, and he's the star. His co-star and ostensible frustrated love interest is kindling for feminist firebombing. Not only is Arcadia a classic helpless princess in need of constant rescuing, she's portrayed as stupid, ditsy, self-obsessed and objectified by her costumers and the game's peek-a-boo camera angles. Neverdead manages to reduce the cachet of immortality to upskirt jokes. Also, for the record, who named their children Bryce in the 14th century? No one.
©2012-01-31, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved