Evil Dead: A Tale of Two Games

If you've read the horror that is NES Horsemen for a while, you'd know that I am a big Evil Dead fan. Go look around the internet and you'll just say "who isn't?" right at my face. Yes, the phenomenon that is Evil Dead Fever is much like Pac-Man Fever, only without a hit song by Buckner and Garcia. Truth be told, in between the "great" trilogies such as the original Star Wars trilogy and the Indiana Jones trilogy, and "cult-like" trilogies such as the Tremors trilogy and the Cool Hand Luke trilogy I just made up in my head just now, there is the Evil Dead trilogy. In recent years, video games based on Bruce Campbell's legendary trilogy of movies have appeared. Back in the late 1990s, just hearing the words "Evil Dead: Hail to the King" made the average ED fan almost swell with urine-soaked Dockers and possibly a Scanners-esque head explosion. However, once the game known as Evil Dead: Hail to the King came out, much swearing, chair-throwing, and Florida-recounting ensued. And just recently, a game by the name of Evil Dead: A Fistful of Boomstick was released to the public with mixed feelings. Here now is the "real" accounts of the two games based on the Evil Dead franchise, as told by me, the sole voice of truth and other biased opinions!

Evil Dead: Hail to the King
Ash sez: 'Hail to the king, baby!'
The first REAL Evil Dead game. "It sucks" says MatrixSephirothXBOXFan.
The very first game based on the popular trilogy, Evil Dead: Hail to the King was the closest thing to an Evil Dead 4 we could ever get. As you may well know, Sam Raimi is a "true" director now, as he is making movies that are popular, like Spider-Man. Add to the fact that most geeks are into Star Wars prequels and The Matrix more than they are with ED, and you'll never see another Evil Dead movie ever again. Nerds are more akin to horribly fake-looking computer graphics and slow-motion random crap nowadays, unlike nerds such as myself, who are into horribly fake-looking blood-and-gore. I mean, when it comes right down to it, who looks cooler while kicking ass: Keanu Reeves as he floats and slow-motions his way through a bunch of scary guys in business suits and sunglasses, or Bruce Campbell as he guts one Deadite with a chainsaw and shoots off another Deadite's head with a shotgun? Anyhow, Hail to the King was not well-received by the general public for many reasons. For starters, it was a Resident Evil clone, and if you haven't noticed, the controls for the Resident Evil games super-suck like no other. I was never a really big fan of RE, but apparently everybody on earth is, so you'd think that HttK would win the population. Wrong. If you didn't know, there's some really stupid rule that says Resident Evil is way better than Evil Dead, at least according to "H@RDC0R3 L33T G@M3RZ" like SephirothDBZFan2000 and VegitaIsCool3000. Just keep this in mind: Hail to the King is equal to Resident Evil in terms of gameplay. In storyline, no questions asked, Evil Dead wins. Who cares about some company that is making a virus that turns people into zombies? If anything, Resident Evil sounds like another anti-Capitalist message protruded by the good folks at Communism Inc. What people really want is a story about an average Joe that straps a chainsaw to his right arm and weilds a shotgun in his left, as he slices, dices, and shoots the legions of the undead. Since HttK is a Resident Evil clone, however, and since I never really like RE as much as most people did, I rate the King: 2.5 out of 5.0

Evil Dead: A Fistful of Boomstick
Ash sez: 'See this? This... Is my BOOMSTICK!'
The second game based on Evil Dead. "It rocks" says me!
A few years after the debacle that was HttK, we finally get a playable game based on the popular franchise. Unlike the first game, this game is a clone of another semi-popular game, entitled State of Emergency, a beat-em-up arcade-esque action game that people found to be too "repetitive". At a price tag of $20 in United States "yummy money", A Fistful of Boomstick is a great, addictive game that offers up tons of gory fun! Now you may be thinking to yourself "I should be searching for porn," to which I reply "you should," but gaming "publications" such as EGM rated this latest fun game really poorly, stating things like "boring" and "repetitive". If you didn't know, the beat-em-up genre is dying slowly. Most people hate beat-em-up games nowadays because back in the era of yesteryear, beat-em-up games were everywhere. From River City Ransom to Double Dragon to Battletoads/Double Dragon: The Ultimate Team to the various Konami-made Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles games, the beat-em-up has been outshined by other more-popular genres, such as the RPG and... The RPG. It's easy to be a big-wig video game "critic," really. Just ask yourself these stabbing questions and you may have what it takes to be a video game "critic" like the "professionals" at EGM:

1. Is the game an RPG?
2. Does the game denounce the evils of Capitalism?
3. Is the game an RPG?
4. Is the game made by Nintendo?

Now tally up your answers!
1. If yes, continue. If no, the game sucks.
2. If yes, continue. If no, the game really sucks.
3. If yes, continue. If no, the game really REALLY sucks.
4. If yes, then you suck! If no, then it is an AAA title!

As you can see from the questionairre above, "professionals" such as EGM suck royally. Not only are they as red as the Ruskies themselves, but they think that only RPGs such as Final Fantasy VII are the only true video games. Anyways, AFoB is a fun run-and-gun game that is most appealing. And for only $20, you can't go wrong... Ever! As an added bonus, there is a "Making of" movie included, with interviews from the game developers, and from BRUCE CAMPBELL HIMSELF! Holy crap! You will get this game now! Final rating: 4.75 out of 5.0

Time now for my final thought. You see, it doesn't matter if EGM or Roger Ebert rates a game really poorly. What matters is your own personal likings and dislikings. And if somebody says something you like sucks, well then, that is your own opinion. If you don't like my constant bashing of The Matrix, then you go ahead and flip me off, and I'll flip you off. Only then will humanity be at total harmony; a harmony full of people flipping each other off because we don't like each other's opinions. Oh, and Evil Dead rules, suckers!

Go on back now, or else!