Review: The House of the Dead: Overkill (Wii)

The inspiration for Overkill is evident straight from the start. The Sega and Headstrong logos are shown before a few other Grindhouse inspired offerings come on screen. Then it gets even more bizarre with the appearance of a real life pole dancer during the opening credits. Then once the sexy dance is done she pulls out a wii-mote and fires it at the screen. The reason for the 18 certificate become even more apparent when you actually start to play. This is easily the most foul mouthed game you’'ll ever play. It makes all of Rockstars previous output seem restrained in comparison. The F word is said pretty much ten times per cut scene, sometimes more, and it’s most often proceeded with the word “'mother'”. Most of the swearing coming from the Samuel L Jackson inspired detective Isaac Washington, the funniest stereotype imaginable. He’s joined by the more straight laced Agent G, a member of AMS and the only real link (apart from the zombies obviously) with the previous games. As vulgar and unrestrained the dialogue is it never grates and bizarrely is a major highlight. The ending also has to be seen to be believed, let’s just say that they even manage to shoehorn some incest into the story. Now that'’s a sentence that won’t be repeated on Gamestyle ever again.

Adding to the over the top style of Overkill is the amount of blood and gore on show. Even a lowly pistol can decimate a body with a well timed shot and the blood amount goes into overdrive once you buy the more powerful shotguns and assault rifles from the store. This is what bring you back after the games completed. The light gun genre has always been known as a quick fix with no lasting appeal, Overkill goes some way to remedying that with weapons that can be bought and unlockable content available by collecting (shooting) the golden brains scattered around each level. Then there's the more score based aspect of the gameplay, shooting consecutive zombies boosts your combo meter and builds up your score. It’s definitely one for the score attack fans, just a shame that an online leaderboard isn’t included.

What really makes the whole experience stand out is the aesthetics. The Grindhouse feel of it has already been mentioned, though the best part is the way the feel of damaged and aging film is transferred to the game. Holes and tears can be seen making it feel like you’re in an old exploitation movie and each levels opening is played out like an old movie trailer, complete with comedy voiceover. For a console like the Wii this is something quite special. It almost does it too well because the game does suffer from framerate issues, which can be a nuisance when you’re trying to shoot a collectible item only for the screen to slow down causing you to miss completely.

It is very strange that one of the most outlandish games ever made would find its way onto the family friendly Wii. It is a perfect fit though, the motion controller being perfectly suited to the light gun genre. The main story may be easy compared to the previous games in the series (unlimited continues), but once you finish that a new Uncut mode is unlocked added a much greater challenge.

It is great that Overkill has turned out to be one of the biggest surprises of the year, completely reinventing the series in the process. Let’s hope this isn’t the end of the zombie killing massacre.

Rating: 8 / 10

Words by Adam Gulliver