In the small town of Dearborn, bad things are happening. An overly clever occultist has read the Necronomicon on live TV, setting off an invasion of the Deadites all over town. It's up to you, as Ash, to leave your comfy bar stool and go fix things, again. Thankfully, there's quite a variety of weapons to do this with. Starting off with the basics of a shovel in the left hand, Ash quickly advances to a two-fisted armament of shotgun and chainsaw. Though a good selection of hardware is gained throughout the course of the game, these two weapons will be your best friends through most of it.

Combat is done wielding two weapons at the same time, with a button for each. The left hand is usually the shotgun and the right usually the chainsaw, but a good selection of toys are waiting to be discovered for either hand: pistols and handguns, swords and scythes, dynamite, Molotov cocktails, a flame thrower, a Gatlin gun, and assorted upgrades to certain weapons. Adding to the mayhem are different types of ammo for the guns: standard, shrapnel, piercing, incendiary, and explosive. Topping it off is the magic system, where holding down a shoulder button and tapping in a face button sequence activates a spell, with spells of possession, strength, lightning, summoning, and even an earthquake available. (Mistyping the spell gets a time-, but not health-, consuming zap.) There's even a basic combo system for the non-ranged weapons that involves the pressure sensitivity of the PS2 buttons. One hard push on the chainsaw button will do a slash, while a lighter push will make Ash crouch down, releasing a powerful swing when the button is let go. You'll also master 2- and 3-hit combos. One two-hit move leaves a Deadite impaled and hanging off Ash's upraised chainsaw, where you can either let it hang, blood flying everywhere; blast it off the end with whatever gun you have in the left hand; or jam a stick of dynamite into its mouth and watch it run around screaming (straight at you, run away!) before it explodes. Thankfully, there are hordes upon hordes of Deadites wandering the streets of Dearborn to unleash all these wonderful toys upon.

Lots of wandering will be required, too. Though Evil Dead only has six levels, they are large and non-linear and Ash basically gets to be an errand boy for every person or group of people he runs across, running hither and yon across the map and through clumps of shambling undead. Though some have wondered why Ash is being everyone's gofer, it does keep the story moving and the action flowing, so I didn't have any problem with it. Whether it's retrieving some silver to close portals to the netherworld or finding scrap metal for a blacksmith in colonial Dearborn to make a new weapon with, almost all the tasks have a purpose in the story. There's even a convenient to-do list that's the default item in the inventory. (A noticeably missing inventory item, however, is a level map. Most levels aren't so intricate that a small bit of memorization won't get you through them, but level four in particular, "Colonial Dearborn," could definitely have used a shot of cartography.)

There are other minor flaws in the game, too. The graphics get the job done and little else; although the frame rate stays solid at all times, character models and textures are little more than serviceable. The audio portion comes out a bit better, though. The soundtrack is forgettable but never bad, and the voice of Ash is, as is required in a just and proper universe, Bruce Campbell. He spouts a large number of one-liners as various Deadites are dispatched, not one of which falls flat, and his voice acting during the cut scenes works very well. The other characters aren't quite as professionally voiced but there's no "master of unlocking" caliber acting either, so it all works out okay. The only drawback to the cut scenes is that no force of God or man will allow you to skip them, meaning that you will hear the pre-boss dialogue a few times more than absolutely necessary. This can be remedied somewhat by the game letting you save before the fight, and you may want to have a second save slot for them just in case you need to back up and restock on health or ammo a bit. Normal saving of the game is done by using save tokens, but there's enough of them floating around that it basically works out to be a save-anywhere system so long as you don't go totally nuts with it.

All this should technically add up to a game that's decent and little more, but something happened along the way and Evil Dead becomes bigger than the sum of its mediocre parts. The average graphics and so-so (Bruce Campbell excepted) voice acting don't detract at all from a game whose main point is to turn as many of the undead back into really-dead as possible. There are enough tools at your disposal that combat doesn't once get old and the cheesy story works perfectly, considering its B-movie source. The enemy's one combat pattern of "run at you, attack" works perfectly in a game clearly designed as a throwback to the days when arcade action ruled the streets and consoles. Even the considerable gore level seems like a tribute to games of old, when chainsaws left trails of blood in their wake. Up the psycho content just a bit and we'd have a contender for the Splatterhouse throne.

Also worthy of note are the bonuses you get outside the game. Extras include a G4 Gaming Network article on the game complete with Bruce Campbell interview, an arcade mode that unlocks as you beat levels that also doubles as training on the proper use of the various weapons, and even a production art gallery. For a $20 budget title these are some very nice additions above and beyond the usual call of duty, and something publishers of $50 games might want to consider.

I liked this game and liked it a lot. It doesn't try to be anything other than what it is, which is a gory and straightforward action-fest. No pretenses, no deep insights into human nature, no overly-clever gameplay hook that wears out its welcome by level three. Just a sharp, fun, zombie-killin' good time.

· · · James