The cheesy Grindhouse style, classic railed shooter action, and extra enhancements make this a must have for PS3 owners
The over-all presentation of Overkill pays homage to Grindhouse cinema with the cut-scenes presented with the poor print quality common to the genre (grainy images streaked with areas of bad exposure) and the narrator over-hyping the story by turning phrase after phrase and firing off lengthy alliterations with the same speed as the main characters' fire round after round from their many weapons. The loading screen animations further this theme by being the basic intermission loops from the theaters.
The story follows detective Isaac Washington and Special Agent "G" as they track Papa Caesar, the man who killed Washington's father. Papa is up to more devious evil now, and now he can be linked to this outbreak of zombies – I mean mutants! - that currently plagues Bayou City. As the story progresses Washington and G cross paths with stripper Varla Guns whose crippled, genius brother is murdered by Papa Caesar. As these protagonists (they never clarify which player is which character) blast their way through wave after wave of mindless mutants the only thing that spews out more often than the gore of your victims is the profanity from the cast. In another way the game adheres to the traditional Grindhouse fare is that the F-Bomb is dropped so often you might actually think there is a character with that name.
The game features two modes of play: "Classic" and "Hardcore". Classic is the traditional playthrough with an unlimited number of lives, the only penalty for utilizing a continue is your score. In hardcore mode you have a set number of continues which you can use to complete each level. The most appealing part of the presentation is that each level is treated as another installment of the Grindhouse movie saga that collectively makes up Overkill. This means that each level is prefaced by another cheesy introduction to the story by the narrator. I personally loved this. I am a major fan of B-Movies, exploitation films, and the majority of the films that constitute Grindhouse. Each level ends with another cinematic to wrap up the events of that level and set up for the next.
During each level you can find various pick-ups to unlock things like concept art, character models, and even earn extra money to be used to acquire and upgrade weapons. Once you earn the scratch and unlock another gun you can wade into the unforgiving mutant onslaught with two guns you can switch between, at will. You can mix and match things like the shotgun, automatic shotgun, magnum, assault rifle, submachine gun, and others. These each have their own advantages and disadvantages so you can find the ones that work best for you. They can also be upgraded, things like damage, reload speed, magazine capacity, and rate of fire can be increased through three levels.
Most of these elements may make this game sounds like a departure from the tried-and-true HotD games, but the action is definitely pure House of the Dead. The game progresses on rails so don't anticipate trying to explore each level or anything blasphemous like that. You move from area to area, blasting waves of horrific mutants. This makes the challenging element of collecting the extras from the levels identifying and shooting them with enough time to take care of the mutants in each area before they kill you or the game moves on. The boss battles also hold fast to the arcade roots, you have to endure the boss's assault and wait for your moment to fire again, normally to deflect a devastating attack or strike at their weak spots.
To increase your score you can achieve combos. These combos are indicated by a revolver's cylinder in the HUD. Every successive kill without a miss or taking damage adds another round to the cylinder and every six increase the combo another level. These rank up until you achieve a Goregasm. Each level is called out by the narrator who calls out Goregasm with a sadistic glee that echoes my own feelings on the subject. This is another element which helps to keep the game from becoming too repetitive and stale as railed shooters can.
The Wii version suffered from awkward clipping issues and framerate dips. The power of the Playstation 3 helps to ensure that the technical issues which detract from the Wii version don't tarnish the lovely face of the PS3 port.
My only real gripe about this game is the control when using a Move controller. To reload is the Move button, switching weapons is X, and throwing grenades is circle. All of these are positioned on top. This makes it somewhat awkward, especially with a rifle or other gun accessory. However, I did not find this enough to detract from my enjoyment of the the game and my battle rifle.
My verdict here may be influenced by my love of the old arcade scene, my fondness for railed shooters (I have an old blog entry about that, if anyone is interested), and my affinity for Grindhouse B-movies, but I feel like this game would be an excellent addition to any PS3 owner's library, particularly if that PS3 owner had a Move gathering dust. I love playing this game, the experience truly hooked me and still hasn't let go after all the times I've played through it. I even spent the extra ducats to grab a Move Battle Rifle from Amazon just to make the experience more authentic. Therefore I also advise that anyone who enjoys this game find some a reliable Move gun accessory simply to heighten their enjoyment.