Evil Dead: Hail to the King

by THQ

Product Details

• ASIN: B00004U62B
• Media: Video Game
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #26,708 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)

Product Description

Product Description

Square-jawed, smack-talking, shotgun-toting Ash must once again battle evil forces, but this time you take control of the fate of the world! Evil Dead: Hail to the King picks up eight years after the cult-classic trilogy ends. Bruce Campbell, the star of the movie series, lends his vocal talents to the game. It continues the ongoing saga of Ash and the Necronomicon, or the Book of the Dead. Open the Necronomicon, and battle all the Kandarian demons, ruthless deadites, and unspeakable monsters that it can spew out. The game takes place in environments familiar to fans of the films, such as the cabin, the cellar, and the bridge. It contains all of the humor, suspense, action, and gore that made the movies such classics, then adds puzzle-solving aspects to the successful formula. Ash has the remarkable ability to use weapons in both hands simultaneously, so feel free to head down into that cellar and carve yourself a witch. Hail to the King, baby!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars It may not be the greatest game ever..., December 25, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Evil Dead: Hail to the King (Video Game)

But it can be a lot of fun. The plot? Who cares what the plot is? For those of you who do, what happens (basically) is that Ash and his girlfriend Jenny (Assistant Manager, Arts and Crafts) return to the cabin in the woods, for Ash to face down his demons and perhaps find a cure for the nightmares plaguing him. Of course, that all goes to Hell in a handbasket when an old friend puts in an appearance and turns on the ol' tape player of demonic summoning spells. Result? A sylvan full of Deadites, Hellbillies, and other things that scream "I'll swallow your soul!" in the night.

The gameplay's your basic Resident Evil-styled survival horror deal: wander around, solve puzzles, kill the evil creatures. Of course, there's a slight twist - this time you get a chainsaw on one arm, and youe choice of axe or firearm in the other. Makes for some interesting methods of dispatching the (many) Deadites in the woods. Provided you keep your eyes open and pick up all the mushrooms you see, you're also not likely to run too low on health or fuel after you get past the Hellbillies' cabin.

Graphically speaking, this is excellent. Shadows and fog look about as realistic as I've ever seen them on a console video game, and the pre-rendered-yet-animated background (ala Fear Effect on the PlayStation) are still a cool effect. The character models are pretty good, and the enemies look suitably... er... Evil Dead-ish to get the job done. Bonus points for the designers who decided to include the dripping blood from the chainsaw. I'd just like you all to note that I'm talking about the Dreamcast version here, just in case this review finds its way over to the PlayStation section...

The control may not the be the most precise in the world, but - wonder of wonders - Resident Evil's control was never a strong point, either. The trick is in reading the manual once, I think. Once you get the hang of gutting and blasting the enemy hordes, however, the few inherent problems the game's engine has don't seem so... troubling. Besides, with a license like this, I'm willing to overlook some of the bugs in favor of the fun factor.

And it's a lot of fun. I found myself wanting to keep going, if only to find out what sort of things Ash (voiced by Bruce "The Man" Campbell) was going to say next. Besides, the notion of taking chainsaws to the undead is just inherently appealing, and it can be great stress relief. Especially because of all of the enemies that seem to exist in this game.

Which brings me to the one "major" flaw with the title - the monsters. They just keep coming. While it IS possible to clear an area of enemies, it takes a lot of patience, a lot of ammo, and a lot of health. Fortunately, ammunition is plentiful (you'll often get a new box of shells just after you've expended your last one blowing some Deadite scum away with your Boomstick), and if (as mentioned earlier in the review) you keep your eye on the lookout for brown mushrooms, health's not much of a problem, either.

The bottom line - is it any good? Sure. It's not on par with some of the uber-detailed and in-depth titles out there, but since it's not really intended to be one of those, it doesn't matter. It's fun to play (once you get used to it all), and it has a great license. So, in this gamer's opinion, this is one of those rare licensed titles that DOESN'T .... Of course, your results may vary.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hail to the King, baby!, January 25, 2001

By 

Robert W. Ekis (Santee, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Evil Dead: Hail to the King (Video Game)

This is a great game! The graphics aren't something to get super excited about, but its great fun! The people complaining that the game was too hard just aren't good at the game. They give you plenty of health and ammo in the game. The only problem was that it was fairly short. I beat the game in 2 days. The reason: I couldn't stop playing it. Bruce Campbell was great in the films and delivers again. This was great and will keep me busy for a long time. I was hoping it'd be longer, but hey, you can't get everything. If you're an Evil Dead fan and a Resident Evil fan then I highly recommend this to you.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not the worst game in the world, but certainly not the best, June 6, 2002

By 

N. Durham "Big Evil" (Philadelphia, PA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Evil Dead: Hail to the King (Video Game)

When I heard about an Evil Dead video game, I didn't know what to think. Well, the game isn't real bad, but its not good at all either. First off, the characters are blocky and the animation stiff, the graphics look more 32 bit than 128 bit. Not to mention the constantly respawning enemies, they're good for a scare, but they keep the game frustrating, and the controls could have been done a lot better. However, here is where Evil Dead fans can rejoice: the great Bruce Campbell offers his voice bringing Ash to life, plus so much attention to detail has been paid to the environments; the cabin is straight out of Evil Dead 2, and the midevil stages look directly copied from Army of Darkness. All in all, this game could have been an all time classic if the controls and gameplay would have gotten as much attention as the detail of the game did, Evil Dead fans will have to play it either way, but those who don't like the Evil Dead universe won't dig the game.