Before I start this review, I must say this upfront. This game has a bug that prevents saving, but there is an easy way to get around it. Basically, it had these always-online features, and when the game was turned on, it would go out looking for these servers. But the servers were shut down and the game was not patched to not go out and look for them. So when it can’t find them, it freaks out. However, you can get around this by turning off the internet on the console before starting the game, and you will be able to save normally. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s get started.
This is Monster Madness Grave Danger for the PS3. It came out one year after the Xbox 360 version, making some much-needed improvements. This is the version to get if you’re deciding between versions. We’ll address these improvements as we go on, but let’s really dive into the review.
The story for Monster Madness is the same in both versions. Our four teenage heroes, Zack the nerd, Carrie the goth, Andy the skater, and Jennifer the popular, are accosted by zombies and need to fight back, find their missing neighbors, and put an end to this monster menace. The more retro inclined must be thinking “Gee, that sounds an awful lot like Zombies Ate My Neighbors”. Well, it’s funny you should say that because this game was inspired by that game. It even references it in the first ten minutes of gameplay.
Speaking of Gameplay, Monster Madness is a top-down beat ’em up, similar to something like Gauntlet. You advance through the stages, fighting enemies and getting money and parts to buy and upgrade weapons. Defeated monsters drop Monster Tokens, which are brought to a man named Larry Tools to buy the aforementioned weapons, but also secondary weapons like bombs, Molotov cocktails, and others, and upgrades for our heroes. Things like faster movement, more melee damage, passive healing, etc. Unlocking and upgrading weapons, and strengthening the four teenagers is hugely helpful because as the game goes on, the enemies turn up the heat. Keep an open ear for rock music, because that is the signal that Larry is nearby, though you can’t talk to him if monsters are nearby. There’s an annoyance with this but we’ll touch on that later. The weapon variety is quite nice, and what’s even nicer is you can hotkey favorite weapons to the D-Pad buttons.
The game runs about twenty-five chapters across different areas. Suburbia, the mall, the school, etc. Each level is distinct from the others and is fairly large. Running straight to the end will take about twenty or thirty minutes, but you will want to keep an eye out for tool chests. These are where you will find the weapon parts. AT first, I thought you were given random parts from each chest, but different parts are only found in different areas, so you’ll basically have to play through all of the levels to be able to max out your weapons.
Each of the four heroes specializes in a certain type of Weapon. Zack uses Axes, Carrie uses swords, Jennifer uses dual-wield weapons, and Andy uses miscellaneous objects like plungers. In each level, there is a new weapon for each character. If they find the correct weapon (there is a little circle around the weapon, color-coded. Blue for Zack, Purple for Carrie, Pink for Jennifer, and Orange for Andy) they will do more melee damage. Grabbing the wrong weapon will have them complain and do less damage.
Throughout levels, you will find vending machines that dispense health and ammo refills. These can also be bought from Larry as well.
At regular intervals, you will be locked in and need to kill a quota of monsters to be let out. Most of the time you can kill them with whatever’s convenient for you, but other times you have to do a certain thing. For example, in the third Mall Stage, you need to use the skulls of the normal skeletons to kill the summoner skeletons, as they can’t be killed by other means. You will also fight bosses, which you can usually just kill however you want, but some are gimmick battles.
You will also pilot vehicles, and these are a step up from the Xbox 360 version where they control poorly. Here, they control much better but still not perfect. You have a car, a swan boat, and a mech to mention just a few. These can be fun to play with but for most of the game, you’ll be on foot.
Speaking of controls, they were given a much-needed coat of polish from the original version. They are much smoother here and I don’t feel like the game is fighting me back. Another improvement is death. In the Xbox 360 version, if you died, you were sent back to a checkpoint. But here, you just respawn right where you were. Although if you die in a gauntlet of some kind, you have to restart the gauntlet. Fair compromise. Also, some levels were shortened. For example, in the Downtown level on Xbox 360, you had to do a basketball challenge about halfway through, and then an annoying chase at the end. Both of those were removed from the PS3 version. Shooting the guns now functions as a dual-stick shooter, so you can shoot in one direction while moving in another, which is pretty much a requirement for most fights.
Also added to this version are the challenges. Things like platforming sections, mini-games, enemy gauntlets, and so on. They can be pretty tough but completing them rewards you with costumes for the heroes. They don’t give any advantages you didn’t already have but are cool to look at and can be fun to go for. You only need to get a C for the costumes, but even that can be quite tough.
While using your melee weapon, a meter fills up. Once it’s full, you can use a special attack, which attacks all enemies around you. It can be helpful in clearing out enemies and give you some much-needed breathing room if you get overwhelmed, but if you switch to a gun and then back to the melee, it resets the meter. Annoying but not a dealbreaker.
Another annoyance is how you can’t talk to Larry while Monsters are around. But sometimes they just keep spawning when all you want to do is buy something, but you can’t because they won’t get off your back. Another kind of annoying thing is that your guns share ammo. So if you’re out of ammo for one of them, they’re all out of ammo. Again kind of annoying but nothing to eject the disc over. While the game does have its faults, it is a marked improvement over the Xbox 360 and PC versions.
Presentation-wise, the game is really cool. The graphics look good, and all of the areas look different enough. And you never spend too long in one area so they never have time to get boring. You have a little icon of your character that fills up as you take damage, the image even changes to show them getting hit. Most of the cut scenes are done in a comic book style, and the jokes did get a laugh or two out of me.
The voice acting is good, everyone sounds appropriate, such as Andy sounding like a surfer or Carrie being monotone. They breathe life into their characters and bounce off each other nicely. Meanwhile, the in-engine cutscenes are goofy but they work. There are also some interesting changes between them. In the comic cutscenes, Zack’s glasses are opaque, while they’re clear on his character model. The music is good as well. Nothing you’ll want to rip on to your music player of choice, but gets the job done. I only have two gripes about the presentation. First, your characters scream when they get trapped. And when enemies trap you back to back, you’re gonna get real familiar with their screams. Second, the frame rate likes to dip from time to time. It’s mostly fine, just a few drops now and then, but the worst is during the catacombs level, in which the frame rate turns into a slide show at some instances. It’s insane, but nothing that’ll ruin the game.
All in all, Monster Madness Grave Danger is a fun time. The controls and gameplay were given a much-needed coat of polish from the Xbox 360 original and plays great. The game doesn’t fetch high prices nowadays but jump on it quickly because PS3 games are starting to get pricey. So pick up your ax, load your nail guns, and take down the monster menace, with Monster Madness Grave Danger.
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