NeverDead
NeverDead is a great concept for a game. When an immortal hero takes enough damage he'll lose a leg or a limb or even his head, but he can still roll a round and collect himself like a Katamari ball of a hacked up murder victim. He can even regenerate those limbs over time. Yet, the fun concept of the game is in no way the poorly executed pile of poo that's now only $11 after a year since it release.
Now I know this review is out of date from it's release, but I'd rather no one pick this up for cheap, because of how bad this game is.
It started off fun enough for me, but by the second level the monotony of killing the same enemies, poor story, you're saving a pop star, which is a very Japanese plot device that happens hundreds of times in animes just gets to you. Incredibly unfair boss fights with poor programming causing bosses to knock you apart gets you angry as you have to keep pulling yourself together, while at the same time other little demons can eat you and it takes even longer to reassemble.
I found myself not knowing where to go or what to do constantly as the game will never repeat itself on your objective or tell you what to do more than once. It can be very hard when you have to rip off your head, then regenerate your body to reach another area, which sounds like a fun game mechanic until you realize you don't know where your suppose to go.
The worst level was the subway, at one point subway cars kept coming back and forth in a small enclosed area requiring me to dodge them, but not causing and damage for my enemies. This has happened many other games, but I've never had to deal with having an AI with me, which can't tell which side to move to. If my dumb blonde, poorly written sex object of a partner gets hit and dies, it's game over. Funny enough, the new Devil May Cry had a subway section and it took the smarter course of you being able to throw your enemies into the passing subway cars to take damage. You could still get hurt, but you could simply dodge the car.
Then there's the odd unlocking of abilities which should just be fully unlocked over time. Instead you suffer from not being allowed to unlock or keep that many fun abilities like when you're on fire, shooting fire bullets. Once again the new Devil May Cry did an excellent job with abilities to unlock in comparison and being only a year apart is quite sad.
Pacing was also unkind as levels just kept going and should have been separated into shorter pieces. Each level must be an hour or something ridiculous for the run and gun action game.
I'm not going to get into how stupid the dialogue was, but saying f*ck or having head quips when you become decapitated get old. Problems that should have been fixed at the testing stage make the game seemed rushed towards the end.
It's simply not worth the time to even check out.
Konami
Looking at Konami's recent release catalog you see the same old titles and for fairly cheap. The Silent Hill series has been disliked by critics and fans over the latest releases. Recent HD re-releases have been questioned for poor frame rate and running slower than they did on their original systems.
The future looks oddly optimistic with Castlevania: Lords of Shadow Mirror Fate for 3DS and Metal Gear Rising "REVENGEANCE", stupid title. However, the demo for Revengeance was horrible, a big step back for Platinum Games, but fans may give it a try. Castlevania might be well received on 3DS with so little titles to choose from.
I have no idea how Konami is staying afloat with such mediocre series. They can release as many games from Metal Gear as they want, many are planned, but it isn't going to do much, but just make the same titles and if the only new ones they offer are as annoying as NeverDead I think they may end up like THQ.
