Burn Zombie Burn Review

by Robert Chang - June 26th, 2009

Burn Zombie Burn has all the flaws of a downloadable game, mostly just production value and polish, but the game makes up for what it lacks in the visual and audio department with pure and non-stop fun.Don't be fooled by the gameplay videos or the internet screenshots that has been floating around for quite some time now, Burn Zombie Burn is not just an assembly-line copy of Monster Madness or any other Smash TV style, dual analog top view shooter. When the game opens with a nostalgic nod to Duke Nukem with “I came here to kill zombies and chew bubble gum, and I'm all out of gum,” you immediately know that this game is all about the fun side of zombie massacre. Who said zombie games have to be all gloom and doom?Unfortunately, the controls suffer greatly from not mimicking the tried-and-true formula of 'left analog to move, and right analog to aim and shoot' because, now, L1 is your semi-lock on and strafe and R1 is your shoot, aka a modified first person shooter control scheme, making aiming really awkward since you rarely shoot in the exact direction that you intended. In the grand scheme of things though, it doesn't really matter. Before you even have the time to calculate the trigonometry required to accurately determine which is the logical zombie to focus your chainsaw at, you're already surrounded by a horde of zombies at least forty-something strong, in all shapes and sizes, which more than makes up for an inability to aim. I mean, who needs to aim when all the zombies are in your face?The name of the game is variety. Longevity in any zombie apocalypse takes some creative genius, as how many types of undead corpses have you come across that force the gamer to act in a more strategic and dynamic manner? Fortunately, this game has the enemy variety down to a tee. Even though there isn't a great variety in the zombie models, it's safe to say that each type of the foes has its unique characteristic that, when combined with those of its undead buddies, it's a real adreneline-pumping mess. For example, aside from the mindless animated corpses, there are football jocks that charge at you with great speed and accuracy, generating a challenging need to prioritise which undead creeps to pick off first. And for those times when you're stuck in a pickle with no hope of escape, fear not, because the wise player can use exploding zombies to their advantage.But we've all seen zombies get shot time and time again, and we want new ways of bringing these poor cretins to an end. So, in addition to the usual chainsaw and shooting affairs, Burn Zombie Burn includes a flame thrower that doesn't throw flames or damage the zombie. That may seem counter-productive now, but it's great fun. Every top view shooter has some sort of multiplier functionality, and this game is no different. But instead of collecting the usual kill streak within a certain amount of time, this game lets the player burn the zombies. Burning the zombie makes them more frantic, which means that they start to run faster and can light other zombies on fire. As stated above, burning the zombies won't kill them, but it rewards the player with a multiplier so that if you have thirty burning zombies scourging after you, you'll get a thirty multiplier per kill. It's this balance of reward and punishment that makes the game so dynamically strategic, so that the player doesn't feel stupid playing 'just another downloadable game' that is all braun and no brain.Variety continues on the weapons as well, and this game has it in spades. Again, it's not about the quantity of the weapons, it's the quality (except for the bat, as that thing is just plainly unnecessary and even detrimental to the game because the player might accidentally pick it up). Yes, there's the chainsaw and the shotgun for those that like to go old school – but there's also the TNT, which, in other games, is so mundane that it's almost not worth to mention, but in Burn Zombie Burn, the TNT is in another league. Carrying on the burning zombie mechanics, there's also drops (or loot to all you WoW fans). Regular, unburned, zombies will drop stuff like health, in the worst spots, and TNT. Burning zombies will drop things like speed boost and TNT upgrades, which is excellent. The ordinary TNT is a timed bomb, the upgraded TNT includes remote detonate and proxy detonation, which adds a whole new dynamic sending hordes of living dead back where they belong.With all the praise about the game so far, it's by no means perfect. The levels do suffer from being a bit too cramped for a frag-fest, and the level design itself is, for the most part, a clone of each level before. It's understandable to restrict the size to make the action more frantic, adding to the claustrophobic sense of impending doom, but it also runs the risk of being a little repetitive. The game would be much better with some sort of online play as well.PSB's verdict? Sure, the visuals aren't top notch, and the audio is like listening to a three year old playing the theme song to Titanic on a pipe organ in an empty bathroom, but Burn Zombie Burn is so much more than that. It's Left 4 Dead meets Monster Madness with first person shooter controls. It's the evolutionary step up for the top view shooter genre. This is not the typical distraction downloadable game. This is this generation's gateway game the way that Pac Man was my generation's gateway game. This game is fun, period.If you like this review, Digg it above.

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echo 'hello';
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