Maybe it’s just playing “Final Fantasy XIII-2”, but as bad as “NeverDead” is, it’s not as bad as you’ve heard. Still bad, mind you, just not the utter “stab your eyes out” horror that some reviews seem to think it is. I still don’t think you should buy it, I’ve played much, much worse.
Still, there are dozens of problems with this game. First of all, the entire thing is an escort mission: if your sidekick dies, game over. t She’s not always with you, but often enough to make it feel like she is; her dialogue is terrible. On the flipside, your sidekick is made of some sort of adamantium/titanium alloy. Seriously, she’s so annoying I spent a little time trying to kill her, and it just wouldn’t stick.
Then there’s the gameplay. This is the entire game: enter room. Monsters appear and room seals off. Kill monsters/monster dispensing units. Room opens up. Enter next room. Repeat. They barely even bother with puzzles.
There are one or two bright spots. The central gimmick of the game, which is so poorly marketed that I had no idea about it, was that you can’t die. You can just be dismembered, and you go have to find the chunks of yourself. This is actually pretty amusing, especially when you’re nothing but a head rolling around, but unfortunately it’s the only original mechanic about the game, and they have to ruin it with a quicktime event (some creature called a GrandBaby wants to eat your head, press X to not die, you know the drill).
Also, the Megadeth soundtrack isn’t entirely awful.
In short, “NeverDead” is bad, but at least it’s making an effort to not suck. Hopefully the funny dismemberment mechanic will get put into a decent game next time.
image courtesy Konami