Ultra-Viloent, highly stylized, delightfully offensive. It's worth having around for those bad days when you need it.
Welcome to Madworld. The focus of Madworld is a gameshow called "DeathWatch". A large, metropolitan city much like NYC has been cut off from the mainland by persons unknown and now the city is the stage for this savage bloodsport. The bridges have been destroyed and all communication in or out has been cut off. The purveyors of this bloodsport have patched into every camera in the city, from the pawn shop security cameras to the city's many traffic cameras have been tapped into and are being streamed via unknown connections to the DeathWatch audience. Contestants must carve a bloody swath through the other contestants to make their way to the bosses of each area. The bosses are also ranked members of DeathWatch and you must defeat them to progress. There are vegas-type odds and the audience bets on the fighters.
You assume the role of a contestant who snuck into the event, undetected. His/your name is Jack. There's no surname here, it's just Jack. He has contact with some law-enforcement shadow agency and is apparently there to solve the mystery of who brought this chaos and bloodshed to the city. He's your usual battle-hardened shirt kicking bad-@$$ with a chainsaw on his arm. They repeatedly mention that the only way for him to find out who is responsible is to ascend through the ranks of DeathWatch to get to the ones pulling the strings. This storyline plays out through the course of the game. Each step towards the championship bout brings more of the game's amazingly stylized cut-scenes which present the story. It's not too convoluted and it does make for a nice addition to keep the action rolling. It has some refreshing twists and turns and it makes for engrossing viewing. Since they keep the identity of the DeathWatch champion secret when the time comes for that fight you'll find you were chomping at the bit to know who it was and the answer is one of the best twists in the story.
One thing that I have to mention before I continue this review is that this game reminds me of one of my all-time favorite games: Smash TV. The ultra-violent game show style and the flamboyant commentators (who will be discussed later) just scream "New Millenium Smash TV". As those of you who have read my reviews know, I hate comparing games and normally NEVER do it. The resemblance to Smash TV has hit me so hard that I will probably mention it several more times.
The first talking point for this title is the graphics. The game carries itself with predominately black and white graphics, in the vein certain popular graphic novels. And by black and white I MEAN black and white. There is no gray at all. It's either black or white. It carries this presentation into the cut-scenes and adds to it picture panels and comic book onomatopoeia to emphasize points. The onomatopoeia can also come in black, white, yellow, or red. This helps it to really pop when it appears during actual gameplay. Of course, the game is like the corny Kindergarten joke, "What's black and white and red all over?" The answer, "This game". The black and white graphics and the occasional comic book onomatopoeia are all bathed in HEALTHY splashes of red. Every punch, kick, slash, and stab is coupled with a veritable deluge of blood. Injured opponents will spurt red from their injuries and their severed body parts look like a leaky can of red Krylon. Weapons and environmental hazards get covered in red splatter as you feed them more baddies. It helps to emphasize this title's ultra-violent nature.
The graphics are both a high point and a low point, though. Like Smash TV this game throws power-ups like extra lives and weapons your way. In this game you also have a health meter and the game provides you with methods of replenishing the health gauge. The problem is that only the extra lives have any color (they're red baloons with Jack's image on them) so that in more intense situations or times when you find yourself progressing through a horde of cannon-fodder baddies you can over-look the onions or pills that recover health. The way that all the levels work is based solely on score. The game sets incriments and when you score that many points it unlocks everything from weapon/health/one-up dispensers to the ability to end the level either via Boss Fight or opening the level exit. When you run out of lives you have to "continue" which means re-playing that entire level. Most times the boss fights are seperate events but hacking and slashing through the slew of mindless, low-level baddies and then having to redo it because you couldn't see a health restoring "Happy Pill" or "Happy Onion" is a bit frustrating and the one big flaw of the title. The other real issue is trying to find your way through some of the levels with their simple graphics might have you getting lost once or twice. I had it happen to me in one of the "Area 66" levels. I couldn't find my way up to the boss fight bell and ate up a large amount of the clock.
I already started discussing some of the gameplay elements of the title so I'll continue on with that. I already mentioned how each level progresses so I'll go into detail.
Since this is a Wii title the controls are simple but well made. Swipes of the Wii-mote cause Jack to execute powerful punches, A brings on the basic punch attack. Holding B lets Jack whip out his chainsaw. Holding B in conjunction with swipes of the Wii-mote causes him to swing the chainsaw. Holding A makes him grab an enemy and you can carry them around to hurl them into the death-devices in each area. Shaking the nunchuck causes him to dodge out of the way of attacks. It's context sensitive so if you time it right in opposition to an attack he will dodge the right way, in slow motion to add to the dramatic impact. The joystick is obviously your method of navigation. C locks on targets while Z is for jumping. Pummeling baddies down to size eventually gives you the option to hit them with a "Finisher". These are interactive cinematics which ask you to shake, swing, or swipe your Wii-mote to deliver absolutely devastating, brutal kills. As I said, it's pretty simple but they made solid use of the tools provided.
To amass your score you have to destroy the countless waves of mindless baddies in creative ways with the unique environmental hazards the game provides for you. These include tires or steel barrels you can smash over your opponents to trap and immobilize them, road signs you can jam through their necks, and a wall with row upon row of spikes called the "Rose Bush" which looks like one of Vlad Dracul's wet dreams. These are just a few of the many environmental hazards you will see. Each level does have a time limit but it's incredibly generous so it's rather difficult to ever run out of time. Your best bet to rack up a high score quickly is to combine as many of the hazards as possible. Things like the Rose Bush can be used by either hurling enemies into it or by walking up to it and begin a cinematic, interactive, and undeniably brutal murder. As for a combo, a fine example that you will use countless times throughout the title is to trap them in a tire, jam a sign post through their neck, and then carry them over to carry out the interactive murder (and the game refers to it as "murder") on the Rose Bush. The more things you do, the higher your score per kill. This is definitely fun, but if you try to play this game for porlonged periods the repetition can get monotonous. The high point here is that it isn't an incredibly long game so if you really enjoyed the game like I did then it shouldn't get too stale for you. Anyone who doesn't revel in the gallons of blood will probably get very tired of it and should play it in short sessions (one level at a time) to keep from wearing it out.
Aside from the weapon and power-up dispensers your score also unlocks each level's "Bloodbath Challenge". These elevate the game's way-over-the-top violence to new heights. Each one incorporates a special and unique way to destroy the mindless, cannon-fodder baddies. As examples we get things like "Death Press" with a giant, spiked press that raises and then periodically comes down, crushing anything underneath it. You have to try and hurl as many enemies under it as possible. There's also "Man Darts". This delightful piece of violence gives you a giant dartboard and a baseball bat. Obviously, you have to smack the beejesus out of the enemies and send them screaming, headlong into the scoring area of the dartboard. Each of these particular events has a cinematic introduction starring a delightfully offensive character calling himself "The Black Baron". And this guy is blacker than the ace of spades both in skin and racial stereotypes. He saunters in wearing pimp attire, spewing stereotypical dialouge about what the challenge entails. During his explanation, one of his "ladies" stalks into the scene like some kind of super-sex-vixen and proceeds to use The Black Baron to demonstrate how it works. BB must be incredibly resilient because he dies in every one of these cinematics but he's in them to die. A problem with these is that they repeat. Only about half of the levels have new challenges. The second half are things like "Man Darts II" and "Death Press II". These are timed and at the end of each they give you your body count and your score. You can replay each level after you beat it and can try to beat your score.
In certain levels your score eventually unlocks the Boss Battle. This is the match that allows you to progress through the DeathWatch rankings. Each one is a large bell, similar to the ones you had to ring in the old carnival games where you hit the target with a mallet and send the weight to ring it. The boss fights are the break to the game's monotany. Each boss encounter is a unique experience and where the game's cinematic, beautiful brutality is on full display. Each boss has their own weakness and at some point you will be asked, usually during one of their attacks, to move the Wii-mote in a specific direction (often with the chainsaw) to initiate a power-struggle. These are not unique to the boss fights, and come up on some of the higher level baddies you encounter hacking through the levels (their appearance ALSO unlocked based on score). These power struggles will see you swinging, swiping, and shaking the crap out of your Wii-mote and nunchuck while jack and the boss engage in a violent clash of wills. These stylish cinematics are usually insanely brutal. They do the most damage to bosses and in some cases are your only way to inflict any real damage to these guys. Some of them are incredibly interesting like the lady vampire. At one point her and Jack grapple and she shelters herself with her arms. Jack pries them apart and becomes destracted by two of the less subtle features of her character. These, again, are the most original parts of the title that keep you trudging through the baddies. When you knock their health down to almost nothing you get you're prompted to deliver your "Finish". These may sound like the finishers you deliver to the normal baddies but these animations are 100% unique to the boss you're fighting. They make use of everything from severed parts of the bosses to the environment in which you're fighting them, and one even has Jack bringing in his motorcycle to drag one of the bosses to death. Again, the boss fights are the highest of high points for this title.
Now, as I promised you before, it's time to discuss DeathWatch's commentary duo. This duo is an exceptional pairing of Greg Proops and John DiMaggio. Greg, of course, was a regular on the hilarious improv series "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" and seasoned veteran of the stand-up scene. John is the amazing voice artist whose credentials include Bender (and several "extra voices") on Futurama. Their dialouge is written to capitalize on the way they sound. I am a HUGE fan of both of these people but Greg's nasal voice and even his sarcastic personality lend his talent to a nerd voice and John's beefier sounding voice (he does the "gruff New New Yorker Trucker" voice on Futurama) lends himself more to a meathead type role. So they satirize the classic sports commentator dynamic with Greg being the "Expert" commentator who has studied every aspect of the sport but never participated while John is the "Retired Pro" commentator. He's been there and done that so his insights come from experience. Of course, considering the offensive nature of everything else, their commentary is UN-BE-LIEVE-A-BLY offensive. Pick a word most parents wouldn't want their children to hear and you'll hear it hundreds of times through the course of the game. Drug humor, body parts, bodily function, sex, an alduterous wife, it's all there! If you're not easily offended (and you obviously aren't if you're going to play this game) then the waves of obscene commentary that this dynamic duo spews forth will be the hilarious icing on the obscenely violent cake with blood filling. These two talented guys and some good writing (all things considered) give them excellent chemistry. One exchange during the cinematic to introduce the boss battle sums up this chemistry perfectly. "I don't know why they call this guy 'Little' when he's so effing big!" "Well, I do believe its an ironic nickname." "WTF does ironic mean?" "The use of words to express something other than and especially the opposite of the literal meaning. A usually humorous or sardonic literary style." "You got beat up in school a lot, didn't you?" "Yes." I absolutely love this commentary. They even carry on through the credits, making fun of the various job titles. "I don't remember the director." "He brought pizza for everyone once, asked us all how we were doing and then left again." "I thought that was the pizza delivery guy." "He's sort of both." The commentary on multiplayer is just as awesome as the single player and had myself and my brother in law rolling in hysterics.
Now, this rolls on to the "multiplayer". The Wii lacks a lot of online multiplayer for most titles (the original intention of the console was to bring people together. Online multiplayer is a bit contradictory) so the "multiplayer" is on the same console/TV. It isn't all that involved. It's just the BloodBath Challenges redone. You and the other player have to compete to see which one of you can garner the highest bodycount (and therefore score). You can smack eachother around but it's fairly pointless since you can't actually eliminate them from the competition. Smacking the other player around keeps him from scoring but also keeps YOU from scoring. It's just kind of fun to expose other players to one of THE most offensive titles to ever see the light of day through a Nintendo console and see their reactions. After that it wears a little thin. It's definitely not a high point.
All in all I have to refer to this game as "Delightfully Offensive". Its ridiculously-over-the-top violence and insanely offensive "color commentary" from Greg Proops and John DiMaggio conspire together to make this game one that's definitely worth playing. It's defintely not some kind of Masterpiece like Shadow of the Colosuss, but I have a saying in life in regards to my occasionally indulging in something like this. "Every once in a while it's fun to just turn off your brain and laugh your arse off at something low-brow". This is my "low-brow" gaming moment. I also love B-Movies that over-use things like violence and gore and never take themselves seriously. Madworld over-uses violence and gore and never does take itself seriously. I recommend this as another "Bad Day Game" like every GTA and/or Postal 2. It's just fun when you come home from a crap day at work or something else that stresses you out. You plug in this title, and then decimate wave after wave of brainless enemies. Each blinding spray of blood from each "violent for the sake of violence" kill and "F-Bomb" from the commentary crew ends up being a healthy way to deal with your frustrations. If my review of this game sounds like its something you'd enjoy, then you should be able to play this title for longer sessions. If you're a fan of this much excessive violence then it won't get stale for you in the long run. Now, considering the price-drop for this title (and the fact that Wii titles never were as excessive as their 360 and PS3 peers) makes this a great buy. If you can find a copy hiding somewhere, fire away. I fully endorse this game.