Valencia
06-01-2006, 05:05 PM
Valencia celebrates her 2400th post with.... (this is just a test of the emergency celebration post)
http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h129/BeMyValencia/EvilDead-HailtotheKing.jpg
It's sad to see a game with real potential go so wrong. I could say that about a great many games, but in this particular case, the unfortunate subject is Evil Dead: Hail to the King. It has been supplied to us in nearly-finished format, but it feels like a game that needs months more work, to supply such vital qualities as original gameplay and watchable graphics. As it is, it's got Bruce Campbell and not a lot else. I like Campbell as an actor, I miss Brisco County, Jr. something fierce, but the man needs something to work with, and Heavy Iron Studios haven't offered him a whole lot.
The CG cutscenes, admittedly, look great, introducing the plot of the new game just fine - Ash returns to the cabin with his new girlfriend Julie, horrors ensue, including his evil hand and an entire evil twin to boot. Then, however, the trouble really begins, because everything outside the cutscenes looks much, much worse. I don't know exactly who I'm nicking this term from, but Evil Dead typifies the "brown" sort of game that has been occasionally railed against throughout the 32-bit generation. It's so called because, well, that's what color it is. It's other colors, true, but brown definitely predominates in Ash's adventure, painting the backgrounds in uniform shades of mud. They're not very detailed, either. The recent Resident Evils and Final Fantasies have Evil Dead soundly licked when it comes to quality of rendering - the backgrounds tend to be very grainy, and they lack the kind of attention to design and wonderful little fiddly bits that we've come to expect from pre-rendered art in games today.
The 3D characters are similarly unimpressive, both Ash and the Deadites he does battle against. Ash's animation is wooden, and he looks just awful. Even considering that he looks like hell throughout most of his film appearances, this is one ugly character model, skinny and with very blurry textures. His animation is wooden and repetitive (one motion and one motion only for a swing of his axe or chainsaw), and his gun fires only a faint burst of read, with no smoke or lighting effects. The first undead you encounter, meanwhile, pop out of the ground in a blink of a few animation frames, and have two basic movements: clawing at you and heaving up stomachfuls of green gunk.
Pick up the controller, and a new dimension of difficulty appears. Evil Dead adheres to the traditional survival-horror movement system: the D-pad moves you forward and back, the left and right keys pivot you on a dime. Have we spent enough time explaining why this is a fundamentally broken control scheme, I wonder? It doesn't help that the Deadites appear literally out of nowhere, completely at random. Suddenly they're behind you, and you have to switch to your ready position, turn around, and then take a swing at them. Once you've dispatched them, more basic problems arise, like the ridiculously slow speed at which Ash moves (faster than Aya in the original Parasite Eve, but only just). The game even wastes a perfectly good face button on nothing but Ash's one-liners - triangle, rather than bringing up the inventory menu, just causes him to repeat one of maybe half a dozen stock lines.
Evil Dead may wind up being a much better game on other systems - that's what our early experience indicates, anyway. The outlook is pretty grim on the PlayStation, though. In terms of both visual artistry and game design, this is several lengths behind the pack right now.
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_1.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_2.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_3.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_4.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_5.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_6.jpg
Important: We work very hard to bring you these downloads. Some of us do it almost everyday. Pretty please, if you would be kind enough, give us a vote at the Top50 (http://www.top50emu.com/enter/top50.cgi?snesorama) (opens in new window). I know I do it everyday. Click the link, then "Click Here to Proceed", and your vote has been counted. Thank you very much for your time! What does this link (http://snesorama.us/board/reputation.php?p=34199) do?
NOTE: If you are experiencing difficulty downloading or playing this game, use our Download Difficulty (http://snesorama.us/board/forumdisplay.php?f=51) subforum. Do not post such issues in this thread, as they will be deleted. Yeah....because I'm sure I won't be able to help you. But someone else might at that subforum! Copy the URL of this page by selecting the entire address and pressing Ctrl+C, as you will need to reference it by pressing Ctrl+V on an entry box when seeking assistance.
Download links....
CD1 http://www.megaupload.com/?d=TZQ63QZF
CD2 http://www.megaupload.com/?d=GRETLE7IArchive password....
http://snesorama.usMirror by Playstation81 here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=203624&postcount=24
Mirror by Kickrulez here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=261871&postcount=26
Mirror by Alan3107 here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=312369&postcount=28
Mirror by dfactor here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=338410&postcount=32
Mirror by Mazyado0on here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=352907&postcount=34
Mirror by potatoKing: [RapidShare]
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=409898&postcount=36
http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h129/BeMyValencia/EvilDead-HailtotheKing.jpg
It's sad to see a game with real potential go so wrong. I could say that about a great many games, but in this particular case, the unfortunate subject is Evil Dead: Hail to the King. It has been supplied to us in nearly-finished format, but it feels like a game that needs months more work, to supply such vital qualities as original gameplay and watchable graphics. As it is, it's got Bruce Campbell and not a lot else. I like Campbell as an actor, I miss Brisco County, Jr. something fierce, but the man needs something to work with, and Heavy Iron Studios haven't offered him a whole lot.
The CG cutscenes, admittedly, look great, introducing the plot of the new game just fine - Ash returns to the cabin with his new girlfriend Julie, horrors ensue, including his evil hand and an entire evil twin to boot. Then, however, the trouble really begins, because everything outside the cutscenes looks much, much worse. I don't know exactly who I'm nicking this term from, but Evil Dead typifies the "brown" sort of game that has been occasionally railed against throughout the 32-bit generation. It's so called because, well, that's what color it is. It's other colors, true, but brown definitely predominates in Ash's adventure, painting the backgrounds in uniform shades of mud. They're not very detailed, either. The recent Resident Evils and Final Fantasies have Evil Dead soundly licked when it comes to quality of rendering - the backgrounds tend to be very grainy, and they lack the kind of attention to design and wonderful little fiddly bits that we've come to expect from pre-rendered art in games today.
The 3D characters are similarly unimpressive, both Ash and the Deadites he does battle against. Ash's animation is wooden, and he looks just awful. Even considering that he looks like hell throughout most of his film appearances, this is one ugly character model, skinny and with very blurry textures. His animation is wooden and repetitive (one motion and one motion only for a swing of his axe or chainsaw), and his gun fires only a faint burst of read, with no smoke or lighting effects. The first undead you encounter, meanwhile, pop out of the ground in a blink of a few animation frames, and have two basic movements: clawing at you and heaving up stomachfuls of green gunk.
Pick up the controller, and a new dimension of difficulty appears. Evil Dead adheres to the traditional survival-horror movement system: the D-pad moves you forward and back, the left and right keys pivot you on a dime. Have we spent enough time explaining why this is a fundamentally broken control scheme, I wonder? It doesn't help that the Deadites appear literally out of nowhere, completely at random. Suddenly they're behind you, and you have to switch to your ready position, turn around, and then take a swing at them. Once you've dispatched them, more basic problems arise, like the ridiculously slow speed at which Ash moves (faster than Aya in the original Parasite Eve, but only just). The game even wastes a perfectly good face button on nothing but Ash's one-liners - triangle, rather than bringing up the inventory menu, just causes him to repeat one of maybe half a dozen stock lines.
Evil Dead may wind up being a much better game on other systems - that's what our early experience indicates, anyway. The outlook is pretty grim on the PlayStation, though. In terms of both visual artistry and game design, this is several lengths behind the pack right now.
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_1.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_2.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_3.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_4.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_5.jpg
http://psxmedia.ign.com/media/previews2/image/evil/evil_6.jpg
Important: We work very hard to bring you these downloads. Some of us do it almost everyday. Pretty please, if you would be kind enough, give us a vote at the Top50 (http://www.top50emu.com/enter/top50.cgi?snesorama) (opens in new window). I know I do it everyday. Click the link, then "Click Here to Proceed", and your vote has been counted. Thank you very much for your time! What does this link (http://snesorama.us/board/reputation.php?p=34199) do?
NOTE: If you are experiencing difficulty downloading or playing this game, use our Download Difficulty (http://snesorama.us/board/forumdisplay.php?f=51) subforum. Do not post such issues in this thread, as they will be deleted. Yeah....because I'm sure I won't be able to help you. But someone else might at that subforum! Copy the URL of this page by selecting the entire address and pressing Ctrl+C, as you will need to reference it by pressing Ctrl+V on an entry box when seeking assistance.
Download links....
CD1 http://www.megaupload.com/?d=TZQ63QZF
CD2 http://www.megaupload.com/?d=GRETLE7IArchive password....
http://snesorama.usMirror by Playstation81 here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=203624&postcount=24
Mirror by Kickrulez here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=261871&postcount=26
Mirror by Alan3107 here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=312369&postcount=28
Mirror by dfactor here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=338410&postcount=32
Mirror by Mazyado0on here:
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=352907&postcount=34
Mirror by potatoKing: [RapidShare]
http://snesorama.us/board/showpost.php?p=409898&postcount=36