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Zombie Massacre

Review by Gary Storm

NOTE: I did this review about 6 months ago, but it was decided not to include it in the mag, as we couldn't get the game working beyond a certain point (which you'll read about below), and therefore couldn't conclude a satisfactory review.

But we've decided to put this semi-review up anyway, because even if we couldn't get to the later levels to see what more interesting things we were missing out on, Zombie Massacres semi-crappiness shone through, which we share with you now.....


£19.99 Available from Fore-Matt Home Computing 01793-853802

A few years ago, when people were talented and imaginative enough to realise that 'chunky-to-planar' routines were possible to be fast enough to do Doom clones, quite a few appeared. 'Fears', 'Gloom', and 'Alien Breed 3d' were the early contenders.

Gloom was my favourite of the bunch. Even though it didn't have the best graphics... but boy was it tense, and so configurable nearly anyone could play it at a decent speed. It also had a great difficulty curve. It was fun!

Gloom Deluxe was released which improved on a few things, but was really just an update without any new levels.

Then Gareth Murfin took over the mantle, and released Gloom 3, which as well as his own effort, included Gloom and Gloom Deluxe on the cd as well. Great value if you didn't have any Gloom, but Gareth's weak Gloom 3 didn't set the world on fire, that's for sure.

Well he's back with a new game, also based on the succesful Doom corridor action game. And, as Mick said..."It's Gloom with a Doom gun"!

Gloom with a Doom gun

Yep, it sure is...and that's no bad thing if it plays like Gloom. And it does, to an extent.

See, Gareths basically gone and updated the Gloom engine a fair bit with ancillary stuff like extra screenmodes (even for gfx cards), null-modem play between two amiga's, I-glasses/virtual reality glasses support and stuff....but he's done bugger all to the play of the game itself. Nearly all the sound samples are the same, nearly all the textures are the same, but the graphics of the Zombies are worse.

The staple diet of Gloom is there....big gun, secret passages, ugly enemies, moving obstacles, crap storyline, and ALOT of corridors. The level design is far inferior (on the few levels we could see) to that of Gloom's.

Thank God (or whatever) that Gareth chose to use a game like Gloom as the engine for this (what I consider to be) add-on.

It a very playable game, once you get past the laughable few levels of piss-poor drunken Zombies, who actually look like Neil from 'The Young Ones'.

Neil's revenge, more like :)

Well, it would be a playable game, if it didn't freeze on me every time I reached the 'warp' at the end of the 5th section. Just as I was really getting into it as well. I'm assuming your game is saved at the end of every level (there are 4 levels), but I didn't get that far, so had to start over again.
We tried it on my 1200 PPC, and Rob's A4000 ppc, with exactly the same 'bug' happening, so maybe it's a ppc incompatibility thing (which would also rule out the usefulness of many gfx card modes), as John from Forematt Home Computing said that there hadn't been any feedback of faults. Maybe no-one bothered to play it beyond the first few seconds??
We tried to get Gareth's feedback on how to get around this, but beyond an initial reply asking what the problem was....nada.

To buy this game or not....it's easy. It's definitely worth playing, even though it's not up to the standard of Doom or the original Gloom. If you enjoyed Gloom, you'll enjoy playing his weaker cousin. I did (honestly). Whether you can justify £20, though....I think it should have been £10. If you've never experienced Gloom before, then rush out and buy the 'proper' Gloom....Gloom Deluxe (also available from Forematt Home Computing, for £4.99......hmmm....that's a toughie :) ).

Even the zombies are running away from this game

Zombie Massacre was going to get a 'Fish Fingers' score, as it is a playable, fun game.
But........it's getting this score bacause it's a bit of an insult, expecting to pay £20 for something that's far inferior to the game that it's based (some would say 'ripped off') on. There are better, more original games that are shareware, at far lower cost.

Get original, Gareth. Get Real.

Reminds me of a girl I knew once