The game also makes use of a lot of Quick-time Events. The combine section in Stage 3 & the retro sections in Stage 4 were a lot of fun. Some of the other mini-games fare better. The lock-on itself seems a bit fiddly, often locking-on to empty air in the opposite direction of where the zombie actually is. The game tells you to aim for the head, but if you get anywhere close to a zombie it automatically locks on to their body. I think it’s mostly a problem with the lock-on. In particular, Zombie Baseball is awful, mainly due to how crappy the Chainsaw Blaster is. Switching between combos can feel stiff & sometimes Juliet takes too long to respond to your commands. They try to add variety by having different combos, but I found that you only needed a few to be able to take out the groups of zombies that you’re constantly faced with. Gameplay: My overall impression of the gameplay aspect is that it’s hit & miss. But they do a pretty good job of fleshing him out & showing his motivation for cursing the school in the short time he’s on-screen. My only complaint about the story is that they don’t give a lot of attention to Swan, the main villain. It’s a nice moment of character development & gives some depth to Juliet & Nick’s relationship as they work through the dilemma. One part I really liked was near the end where Nick gets mad at Juliet for cursing him to a life as a decapitated head. Also, although the story isn’t groundbreaking, the craziness makes it interesting & there are some parts that take a more serious tone. The bosses also have distinct personalities & exchanges with Juliet. The interactions with the family are also fun & shows that the family really cares about each other. Juliet & Nick have an almost constant running dialogue that always makes me laugh, usually from a dry comment Nick makes at Juliet’s bubbly dismissal of the strangeness going on. But what really sells the characters for me is the way they interact. Juliet’s family also have distinct & crazy personalities. He points out all of the weirdness that’s going on around him which Juliet & her family seem immune to. Nick seems to be intended as the straight-man we’re supposed to relate to. She comes across mostly as spunky & upbeat. Sure, she’s your stereotypical ditzy cheerleader, but they don’t overplay that. I was surprised at how much I liked Juliet as a character. They are all so crazy, unique, colorful & loveable. Story: For me, the biggest draw of the story is the characters. There are also several mini-games such as Chainsaw Dash, a driving-esque course, Zombie Basketball, where you have to knock zombie heads into the basket, & Zombie Baseball, where you have to protect Nick while he runs around a baseball diamond. The game itself is broken up into stages with a boss fight at the end. You can also pick up Nick Tickets that allow you to play Nick Roulette & have a chance to use a special attack with Nick. Stars build up on a Sparkle Meter, which when full allows Juliet to go into Sparkle Mode & one-hit most enemies. The medals are used to purchase power-ups, new combos, costumes & music. As you decapitate zombies you earn medals & stars. She also has two chainsaw attacks, one high & one low. Her pom-pom attacks are quick & do little damage, but are useful for stunning zombies. The game scores you based on a variety of factors, such as time to complete a level, coins collected, damage dealt, etc. The game has an arcadey, hack-&-slash feel to it. Juliet, along with her boyfriend Nick whom Juliet turned into a sentient talking head to save him from the zombie virus, has to work together with Juliet’s family to stop them. Swan also summons five Dark Purveyors to complete a ritual to spread the zombie curse to the entire town. She learns that one of the school’s outcasts, Swan, has broken the barrier between Earth & Rotten World (the game world’s equivalent of Hell), releasing a gas that turns people into zombies. On her birthday, Juliet finds her school overrun with zombies. In Lollipop Chainsaw you play as Juliet Starling, an eighteen-year-old blond cheerleader with a zombie-slaying family. So how does this game fare? Since when do chainsaws have hearts on them? Campiness, craziness & a bunch of other -nesses. If you’re familiar with Suda 51’s previous works, you probably have some idea of what to expect. Part of the reason behind it is because Lollipop Chainsaw is a pretty short game, but another part was because it was so bizarre that once I got into it I couldn’t put it down. Once again I found myself finishing a game before I’ve even did a First Impression.
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