Monster Madness: Battle for Suburbia Single Player Review

This game gets an abbreviated review because after 3 hours of fighting with the controls and the lame gameplay it was back in it's Gamefly sleeve and sent back. Again, I didn't play any MP since I was so frustrated with the Single Player.

Controls were horrible. Putting "Jump" on the right stick blows in a game where sometimes you have to make precise jumps. They seemed overly sensitive and aiming was difficult. Their camera angle was also very skewed and when you had to look for items switching the camera angle did not help. Controls: D

Tutorials were minimal and I was confused from the beginning. They never told me how to cycle weapons (primary or secondary) or what the jump button was. Then they had a voice that was yelling at you to do certain things while an event was happening... sorry... when I'm trying to learn something I can't pay attention to 2-3 things going on at the same time. Tutorials: D

For the AI it was your basic swarm mentality with the bosses having a couple special attacks. They were dumb though. They would frequently run into obstacles and keep their running animation going while blocked by the object. Great for cheating your way through the two bosses I did kill since I just wandered around and they followed and boxed themselves in. AI: D

This was made with the Unreal 3 engine, so it should look awesome... right? Nah, it looks slightly better than a PS2 game. Visuals: D

The levels were typical hallways with triggers. Some Z-axis play was implemented, but it was pretty generic. The clutter was unbelievable. Level Design: D

Gameplay was horrid. Button commands at trigger points were unresponsive 50% of the time and you had to maneuver your character around to the exact trigger spot. Thrown weapons were random on trajectory 50% of the time. Running out of ammo with your super weapons and having no idea of how to recharge them sucks. Collecting countless pieces of junk for minimal reward (weapon upgrades) was sucky. Weapons besides the shotgun seemed underpowered and useless (3 whacks with a mailbox to kill a zombie who is faster than I am?). And the acheivements were god-awful. 3 hours of play and I have 1 achievement? No thanks. Gameplay: D

Overall SP Score: D
What Would I Pay For This Game? $8

If you like pain, buy this game. It has "Madness" on the title for a reason. They should have renamed it "Sisyphean Challenge". After 2 levels I had a monster (hah!) headache and just walked away.