100 Gruesome Games For Halloween (80-76)

80 - Night Slashers (Arcade) :

Another game filled with pretty much every horror baddie type ever! It's a pretty standard side-scrolling beat-em-up, with three selectable characters with their own sets of moves and abilities. You know the kind of thing! The horror theme makes for some pretty disgusting death animations though, and it's pretty fun....

The repeated sayings of the characters can get a bit annoying, but it is bearable. And if keep pumping credits in, or are just really good at the game, then you'll get to see the bizarre Bonus Levels! The first one has you participating in some sort of Whack-A-Zombie, where zombies heads stick out of the ground and you need to kick them.....and the second one has you hurling a zombie at some others set up like bowling pins! So yeah, worth a go or two...





79 - The Darkness (Xbox 360) :



Jackie Estecado has just turned 21...he's also just survived a car crash, and an attempt to blow him him up by his crazy gangster uncle...oh, and an ancient demon entity has awoken in him and he now sprouts tentacles with teeth in tricky situations!

Based on a Top Cow comic, this game has you out for revenge against your uncle and the crimes he's committed against you and other folks, using your newly acquired demonic powers to help you out! Of course, being ancient evil, The Darkness isn't entirely on your side as it wants to possess you completely and get rid of you so it can unleash havoc upon the world...

Playing your way through this FPS, you'll find yourself taking out any light sources you can, as you tend to work better in the dark. Lights hurt you after the Darkness makes his first appearance, and the little Darkling creatures you can summon for help won't go past any lights either, so you should definitely learn to embrace the shadows!

Various guns are at your disposal, but it's when you decide to use the Darkness that the fun really begins! You can control the tentacles that spring from your body, and make them crawl up walls and through vents....biting baddies heads off when you find them or impaling them and flinging them off roofs!

The aforementioned Darklings can be sent forward to deal with any enemies lying in wait too, and their witterings add some much needed humour to the game! As the game goes on you get even more powerful abilities until eventually you become a pretty much unstoppable force!

The story will keep you gripped to your seat too, as you hunt down your uncle and his lackies...with occasional visits to another time and another world, that I won't say too much about other than that, like the rest of the game, it's very dark in nature but utterly awesome!

As a little extra, Public Domain cartoons and films have been added to the game and can be watched on any of the Tv sets lying around...it's even possible to sit and watch a full length movie snuggled up on the sofa with your in-game girlfriend!

As far as bad points go, there are occasional control issues with the tentacles, and the multiplayer is laggy as hell and no one really plays it these days....but other than that, this early Xbox 360 title is brilliant and can be picked up for about 3 quid these days! A sequel is on the way early next year too, so you really should go pick this up right away!





78 - The Detective Game (Commodore 64) :

Halloween is also a good time for a decent murder mystery, and this little gem on the C64 has you filling the shoes of a Detective looking for a murderer in the house of Angus McFungus, who recently fell afoul of the killer! All of the guests who were present in the residence at the time of the crime have been kept in the house, and on this dark and stormy night you must question them and hunt for clues...gathering enough evidence to properly collar the culprit!

As with all good murder mysteries, it's not as simple as all that....more guests are murdered along the way, locked doors bar your progress and the occasional secret passage must be found! And of course, the murderer eventually decides to try and off you too!

This is a great little adventure, and you'll enjoy trying to work out who the killer is! You'll be notified about the other deaths as they occur and as you can see from the screenshot above, they can be pretty grisly but pretty funny when you stumble upon them.

Go use your detective skills and track this one down right away.......





77 - Resident Evil Dead Aim (PS2) :





Now if you know your horror games, you'll know all about the Resident Evil series..With 6 proper games (including Code Veronica) and various spin offs, if you've been playing games at all for the past 15 years or so it'll be pretty remarkable if you haven't heard of at least one of them. One that you might not be familiar with though, is this light-gun enabled one on the PS2 !

An Umbrella employee named Morpheus has gone a bit off the rails (what a surprise!) and has nabbed a bit of the G-Virus..a newly modified version of the T-virus that saw Raccoon City wiped from the Earth...and has hopped aboard an Umbrella owned luxury cruise ship to escape, but also decided to use the virus to experiment upon himself and the other passengers!

The American government sends in special Anti-Umbrella Pursuit Investigation Team member, Bruce McGivern, to retrieve the virus and stop the threat. Also onboard is Fong Ling, a Chinese government agent who is also out to stop Morpheus her own way. Cue much tumbling around and flirting from both agents as they have the usual love/hate relationship type thing that always seems to occur in such situations...




Unlike the other Survivor lightgun games in the Resident Evil series, this one allows you to walk around in 3rd person mode using the GunCon 2 or a standard PS2 controller. This helps it feel more like a proper RE game, and makes it far easier to explore and pick up items.

When you do come across the inevitable zombie baddies, a quick press of the trigger on the lightgun sees you enter 1st person mode, and you can blast away the undead numpties at your leisure before popping back into 3rd person to leg it away again.

The game is filled with the usual rubbish, campy dialogue and the environments can sometimes feel a bit empty, but the story does feel like a proper offshoot of the numbered RE sequels, and has the usual increasingly difficult and weird bosses to defeat. It makes an interesting and enjoyable change from the usual Resi stuff, so if you own a lightgun and a PS2 you should definitely get this one in your sights...





76 - Horror Zombies From The Crypt (Atari ST, Amiga, PC) :

Count Frederick Valdemar has taken it upon himself to eradicate all the ghosties and ghoulies from his castle, and in this arcade adventure you play as he and must collect magic skulls and various other items and power ups to aid you in your quest....

This game has a great spooky atmosphere, helped by the cinema-style intro screen and creepy music. It's a tough little game, but if you stick with it you'll eventually work out how to reach certain objects by moving tables, or finding hidden doors, etc.

The different baddies are pretty cool and make the game a delightfully horror filled treat as you square off against werewolves, vampires, Frankenstein-style monsters...all the usual suspects really...and they're all nicely animated and everything, so yes...another fantastically fearsome game for the list!

100 Gruesome Games for Halloween (85-81)

Zoinks! Jinkees even! It's the 8th of October already, and I'm taking way too long to get through these games, so in an effort to let you know about them all in time for Halloween, I'm going to cut down a bit on the details and try to get through them a bit quicker!


85 - Condemned-Criminal Origins (360) :




Ethan Thomas, a SCU (Serial Crime Unit) agent, is framed for a double murder after investigating another murder by a serial killer he's hunting. As Ethan, you have to use his forensic tools to try and find the real murderer and find out why he's so interested in you. This isn't made easy by the fact that something is causing the homeless population of the city to go psycho, and there are loads of them in your way! Also, you are slowly awakening to psychic abilities you seem to have....and what the hell is that scary, looking thing crawling around in the shadows??

The game plays in first-person, but combat tends to be more melee than shooter based. Any guns you do find are low on ammo, and you'll soon be picking up pipes, signs, mannequin arms...pretty much anything that can be used to bludgeon brains! Creeping around in the dark, there are loads of scares as things jump out at to attack you....and things only get freakier and freakier as the game progresses. The forensic stuff is handled brilliantly too, and helps add to the creepiness as you follow trails into dark, dangerous corners...

This was one of the first games I got for the 360, and it's still one of my favourites...it also has an awesome sequel too, and as you can get your hands on both games for only a tenner second-hand, I recommend you get using those detective skills to track them down....



84 - Castleween / Spirits and Spells (Gameboy Advance) :





Some kids are out indulging in some Trick or Treating fun, when suddenly some Pumpkin-headed Bogeyman appears and turns most of them to stone! Alicia and Greg manage to escape this fate, and in order to save their chums, they must travel to the land of the dead and track down this evil fiend!

I've only recently discovered this game, and so haven't played it that much...but from what I have played it seems to be a really enjoyable platformer, with lots of stuff to collect and find. Also, you have to switch between both characters to progress, as both have different abilities to help you get past obstacles..

Apparently, there are also Castleween games available for PS2 and Gamecube, but I can't seem to find any info about those online..after playing this though, I'm interested to know what they're like! So if anybody reading this has played either of those games, let me know what you think of them....



83 - Dark Seed (Amiga, PC) :




Fed up with his life as a wealthy businessman, Mike Dawson decides to spend his cash on buying an old, creepy mansion...where he hopes to find inspiration for a science fiction horror novel he is planning to write. During his first night's sleep in his new home however, he has a terrifying dream about an alien embryo being planted into his split head by bizarre creatures! Waking in the morning with a headache from hell, he suffers from strange visions and upon exploring the mansion finds clues about it's previous owner's death and also uncovers strange stories about a parallel universe known as the Dark World....

This is a groovy point-and-click adventure, with snazzy graphics as designed by H.R. Giger of Alien fame! It can be quite annoying in bits, with you needing to be at the right place at the right time to find objects to help in puzzles, and you might find yourself starting the game from scratch quite a few times, but it's worth sticking with it. It's probably best to let you find out for yourselves how the story unfolds, but you should definitely give it a bash, as it's known for being one of the freakiest games around....



82 - Frightmare (ZX Spectrum) :




Everybody likes a good dream! But, if you've been playing all the games mentioned so far in this 100 list, chances are that any dreams you do have will quickly be corrupted by the gruesome sights you've been witnessing..and will become bad dreams! This is exactly the type of predicament you find yourself in at the start of this platformer....

This particular nightmare is filled with all manner of spooky specimens. Werewolves, ghosts, skeletons, vampires, mummies...all these and more are after your soul! You must advance time to try and wake yourself up from this deadly dream, otherwise you might just find it to be a bit more dangerous than your usual night terrors!

This game has always confused me! On the one hand, it asks you to wake yourself up so as you don't stay stuck forever inside your own horror-filled head, and on the other it tasks you with increasing the terror that you're enduring to get a better score by elevating the Bad Dream to a Nefarious Nightmare!

Ah well, it's a great little game anyhoo, and you can pick up guns with silver bullets and crosses and things to help you achieve these goals...and it should keep you awake into the wee small hours if you're too frightened to go to sleep in case of suffering a similar fate!



81 - The Ooze (Megadrive) :



There can't be many games where you control an oozy puddle of radioactive mess, but that's exactly what you do in this pollution filled piece from Sega! After discovering his bosses evil plans for something called Operation Omega, Dr. D. Caine is captured by his aforementioned employers and injected with radioactive waste! This turns him into some sort of glowing gloop, and they flush him down the loo thinking that he's a goner....

They are of course wrong, and now as this ooze you must slide your way around the levels, trying to get your revenge, stop the baddies evil plans and perhaps (if the collecting of DNA samples suggests to me) try to return to your former..uhm...form!

This is a pretty original title, with you oozing around shooting spit at enemies or extending your puddle-type fists to smack them silly. It can be damn tricky though, and it isn't always clear where you have to go or what to do. As a unique and fun game it does the trick though, so go slither yourself into a chair and indulge in some groovy glooping!

The Letters !

Time for another delve into the vaults of the Digital Comic Museum, methinks....

Here's a spooky story from the pages of Fawcett's Strange Suspense Stories Issue 5, dated February 1953, about someone who loves to keep in touch with his dear old aunt....even after he moves to slightly damper surroundings!

100 Gruesome Games for Halloween! (90-86)

90 - Call Of Cthulhu :- Dark Corners Of The Earth (Xbox):

Based on the works of American horror writer H.P.Lovecraft, Dark Corners Of The Earth tells the tale of Detective Jack Walters. After being called to come to a derelict mansion by the police, he discovers that the leader of a weird cult has asked for him by name. But Jack has no idea who the man is and has never met him before.

Currently the cult is in a siege situation with the cops and the leader says he will only talk to our detective chum! Entering the mansion just as a firefight starts, he finds photos of himself and newspaper clippings of cases he has worked on totally covering one of the rooms! Who are these guys, and why are they so interested in our hero??

Hearing a strange noise coming from a staircase leading to the basement, Jack (or you, as you're in control) decides to investigate! Amongst other gruesome things, you discover a strange electronic device and upon powering it up, seem to conjure forth some weird alien entities! Yipes! Passing out in sheer panic, the screen fades to black and it's another 6 years before we catch up with the story....

Recently released from an asylum where he has spent the last 6 years, Jack goes back to being a Private Investigator. Trying to forget about his horrifying ordeal, he takes on the case of a missing shopworker, and travels to the small fishing town of Innsmouth to discover what he can about the disappearance. The locals don't take too kindly to outsiders, and soon Jack is fighting for his life and trying to escape the town and it's creepy inhabitants. As the story unfolds, he struggles to maintain a grip on his sanity as he uncovers more and more terrible and unbelievable secrets....

When you first start the game up, you'll be forgiven for thinking it's going to be a first-person shooter...actually though, it plays more like an adventure game. You creep around investigating the town and it's locked buildings, trying to stealthily avoid the residents and work out various puzzles to help you with the case.

Early gameplay also involves escaping pursuers, and one piece has you running from your bedroom locking doors with bolts behind you as you go and pushing furniture in front of them to further hinder capture! It makes for some pretty atmospheric action, and although it's tricky you'll keep playing until you get past as you'll want to see what happens next...

The game does seem to be rather tricky in general, and I haven't got too far in it yet..but from what I have seen, it only gets crazier and crazier as it goes on. It's certainly atmospheric, and there's lots of fun to be had working out how to proceed past the puzzles. Jack will start panicking occasionally and the screen will blur, or he'll start muttering away to himself as his insanity increases..which is another nice touch!

I do have a few issues with it though...control can sometimes be a bit fiddly, and I especially had problems during the escape sequence mentioned above, but it seems to happen a bit randomly and doesn't really break the game.

The biggest problem for me though, is Jack's voice. Although not actually that badly voice acted, it seems somewhat disjointed from what's happening on screen. Your character can be scared stupid and trying to leg it through a door, but he'll just calmly say something like "Hmm...it's locked. Maybe I should try somewhere else." As you can imagine, this affects the immersion of the game and makes you very aware that that's all it is...

Still, apart from those tiny flaws, it's another great spooky specimen and comes highly recommended!

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89 - Body Harvest (N64) :

Halloween isn't just a great time for getting freaky with ghouls and ghosts, it's also the perfect time to indulge in a bit of alien hunting! And in this N64 title from DMA Designs ( who would later go on to become Rockstar North ) you can indulge in a great deal of bug-blasting shenanigans!

Since 1916, alien invaders have been visiting Earth every 25 years and harvesting it's inhabitants for food. In 2016, the last few human survivors are orbiting space in a space station and decide to send some Troopers back in time to try and prevent these body harvests from happening. However, the baddie bugs attack the station.. and our hero Adam Drake barely escapes into the past, being the only Trooper to do so! You then, must take control of Adam, and explore the areas where the aliens plan to invade and try to stop them munching their way through history!

Doing so involves some RPG-lite type exploration of buildings, chatting to the folks that populate these time-zones and seeking their help to battle the beasts. Some will loan you vehicles to use, or give you keys to secret passages or buildings that hold better weapons. The ultimate objective in these areas is to locate the Alien Generators that spawn the creatures and destroy them, whereupon you will gain access to the next area..

The aliens will attack in waves and attempt to capture humans and eat them. If you're to make it to the generators, you'll need to stop these waves! Running around on foot can be very dangerous, so it's very handy that there are all kinds of vehicles lying around the place and you can enter any one of these for a bit of extra health and firepower. Yes, that's right...just like Rockstar North's later titles you can hop into any vehicle you can see, and this game has loads....

Image - Mike Dailly

From Fire Engines to Fighter Planes, Tanks to Ice Cream Vans..there's load of different driving styles to master. It's easy to see that sandbox gaming is slightly older than most people think too, as the levels are huge and the vehicles allow you to explore them however you choose! It really is like GTA crossed with Earth Defence Force....

This is one of my favourite N64 games, and I can't recommend it enough! The levels get crazier and more filled with slimy alien bugs of increasing strength as the game goes on, and finding which weapons and vehicles to use and where is loads of fun. There are plenty of secrets to be found too, and it'll take you ages to see the end...

It's by no means perfect, and even at the time of it's release people found Adam to travel around a bit too slowly on foot...and it does have the occasional game-breaking bug, if you explore a bit too far from the course the game ideally wants you to take...but if if you give it a chance, stick with it and reach the later time-zones you should end up loving it as much as me! Go track it down and give it a blast!!

(Edit - Also click here to read a great article on the making of the game at Nintendo Life)

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88 - Invasion Of The Zombie Monsters (ZX Spectrum, MSX) :

If you've been away from the Spectrum scene for a few years, you may be unaware that it still has a healthy amount of games being released for it each year! The next game on my list was released last year, and although originally only available to buy, thanks to it's generous creators you can now play it for free...and play it you should!

Young Ned is indulging in a bit of smoochy-smoochy with his girlfriend in the back seat of his car, when it suddenly gets struck by lightning! But this is no ordinary storm, and the lightning brings with it an evil shadow creature...who kidnaps Ned's girlie and reveals plans to conquer the world with an army of zombies!! What the shadow doesn't know though, is that in times of great danger Ned receives the wondrous "Moonshine" power, gaining energy and power bolts from the moon's rays! Off he goes to stop this evil fiend and get back his lady....

Presentation in this game is excellent, and if you didn't know any better you'd really think you were playing a big-budget release from back in the day! A funky tune and cool intro sequence start things off, and when you start the game proper you can expect colourful graphics and some great gameplay too!

It owes a lot to Capcom's Ghosts 'n' Goblins series, but is no worse for that! You traverse the platforms and pitfalls, battling zombies, monsters and killer plants and at the end of each level you'll face a boss, which you'll need to beat to progress to the next groovy level! Your bolts of energy can be made more powerful by picking up power ups along the way, of course...




Do yourself a favour and go find and play this gem right now! It's also available for the MSX (which has slightly groovier graphics) so if that's more your scene, go play it on that! And if you like it lots, you can still buy an actual physical copy from Relevo too, which comes with some extra goodies! Hurrah!!






87 - Zombie Raid (Arcade) :

This is a funky lightgun shooter that was released in the arcades in 1995 by Sammy ! It had a shotgun attached to the arcade cab apparently, although I've only discovered it's delights via MAME and use a mouse, so it's probably lost some of it's atmosphere there...

Set in England in the early years of the last century, you play the part of Detective Edward Windsor and go roaming around graveyards and sewers battling zombies, werewolves and other creatures of the night! The screen pans around letting you pick off the baddies, who like to hide behind trees, gravestones and the like before leaping at you and biting your face off or shredding you with their claws!

This is a truly gruesome game, with bits flying everywhere as you blast the baddies away...it certainly isn't afraid to show you some gore! It has a nice variety of ghosties, ghoulies and long-leggity beasties to brutalize too which keeps it interesting as you advance through the game. It's all pretty standard lightgun-type stuff to be honest though, and there really isn't much more to say about it other than it's a lot of fun and should keep your trigger finger happy for a bit!

86 - Dead Rising (Xbox 360) :

Adding yet another zombie-filled game to the list, we have Dead Rising from the masters of survival horror Capcom ! This is a bit different from the usual zombie games the company produces though!

As photo-journalist Frank West, you hitch a ride in a helicopter to a town where you here strange things are happening. Hoping to get some good shots, you head to the roof of the local shopping mall and tell the pilot to come back for you in 3 days...now you just have to stay alive that long!

It doesn't take long to realise that the place is crawling with zombies! You hole up with a few random survivors, some of whom seem to know more about the situation than they're telling. After a while you decide to head back into the mall to try and gather up any other survivors, and also to get those photos that'll guarantee you fame and fortune!




What makes this game stand out from the zombie horde is the ability to use pretty much anything you can find lying around in the mall to dispose of the brain-biting freaks! Lawnmowers, golf clubs, guitars, frying pans....even Servbot masks from the Mega Man games.... all of these can be used to fight the undead! And of course they'll also provide the perfect photo opportunity to get you some much needed points, which you can then use to beef up your skills!

Surviving for the 3 days is a tough job, and it isn't helped by certain survivors who have gone a little crazy. These are known as Psychopaths and must also be destroyed before they end your fun. Later on, a weird cult shows up too and they also try to stop you from finding out just how the hell all off this came to happen!?! Needless to say, you need to change your tactics when dealing with these foes, as they ain't no brainless brain-munchers....

The game is a huge load of fun, but it is stupidly difficult in parts. And it's not helped by a save system that only allows you one save slot, and if you die you can save your character but not your progress. This saw me starting the game at least 4 or 5 different times, but eventually I was able to progress all the way through having beefed up my stats enough to be able to take a bit of a beating!

Anyway, the story should keep you entertained enough..the mucking about in the mall definitely will..and you should definitely at least give it a go and see if it's your kind of thing! If it is, then there's a sequel ( which is about to get it's own updated version with the character from this game ) and 2 XBLA games to accompany it! You should try them out too, as they add to the fun by allowing you to create your own zombie-killing weapons!!

100 Gruesome Games for Halloween! (95-91)

95 - Zombies Ate My Neighbors (SNES, Megadrive) :

Or just plain Zombies in the UK.....this is a perfect game for Halloween! You fill the shoes of either Zeke or Julie as they take to the streets to battle all manner of horrors that for reasons unknown, have suddenly decided to launch an all-out attack on humanity! Using everything you can lay your hands on, you fight your way through waves of pretty much every classic movie monster (oh, and giant babies!) until a final confrontation with the evil Dr. Tongue who seems to be the mastermind behind this evil uprising....



The game is filled with references to classic B-movies, and if you know your stuff you'll know what weapons work best on what creatures...(Silver kitchenware against werewolves, Fire extinguishers against the Blob-type things, etc.)... Various potions can be used too, turning you into a monster that can break through walls or giving you invulnerability for a while. It's a huge load of fun, especially if you find someone else to play it with as one of you can sometimes get transformed into a zombie or a monster and lose all control as you chase down your buddy!

Weirdly, there a few differences between versions...the US version has no blood in it, and any red stuff has been turned to purple gloop! But, it does have chainsaw wielding lumberjacks which the PAL version deems too violent and replaces the chainsaws with axes (which are obviously, way less violent!?!?!?) Oh, and Americans seem to be fine with eating neighbours too! Anyway, go give it a try if you've yet to sample it's spooky superb-ness! And we'll try to forget about it's horrible sequel-that-wasn't-really-a-sequel, Ghoul Patrol....



94 - Shadowman (N64,PS1,PC) :

The Nintendo 64 was often wrongly regarded as a machine for kids, whilst the PS1 was the choice for the older gamers. People complained that there were no decent games for the mature player on Nintendo's machine, and the general cuteness of it's games put a lot of people off...but then along came Shadowman!

Described by a few magazines as "Zelda's Evil Twin", Shadowman had plenty of swearing and gory, gruesome bits! It saw you play the part of Mike LeRoi, an unwilling latest addition to the line of Shadowmen...a group of Voodoo warriors blessed by the dark gods with supernatural powers, which they used to protect their tribes from threats crossing over from the undead plains known as Deadside.

The latest threat to the world is a chap calling himself Legion, who has gathered up a group of serial killers and built a huge place called Asylum in Deadside, which will enable all manner of nasties to creep over the divide into Liveside. As Shadowman, Mike is able to travel between both worlds, and must collect Dark Souls, evil energy that Legion plans to give to his many minions to make them powerful. As you collect these souls, you gain more power which helps in the fight against evil..



You collect lots of different weapons, some of which have both a Liveside and Deadside equivalent. A cool feature is being able to wield a different weapon in each hand, giving you more ways to battle the baddies! The game does play a lot like some twisted Ocarina Of Time and you can tackle it in a similar non-linear fashion so long as you have the right equipment to make it past certain obstacles.

The boss battles are great fun, and see you making trips back to some nasty, dark Liveside locations...the fight with Avery Marx as he stalks you in the dark with night vision goggles being a personal favourite! All in all, it makes for an atmospheric, freaky game that I personally think is a must-have for any N64 collector..

The game did get a PS2 sequel, Shadowman - 2econd Coming which was okay but not a patch on the first. It seemed to lose a lot of the atmosphere of the first game but I suppose it's still worth checking that out too...if you can find it cheap!

93 - Monster's World (Arcade) :

Not much to say about this one really..It's basically a rip-off of Pang! with you popping these crazy monster heads, which then split into smaller different monster heads!

It's bloomin' difficult, and the funky background graphics sometimes make it hard to see what's going on..but if you stick with it you'll find it to be a nice puzzley-type distraction for a while!

92 - Werewolves Of London (ZX Spectrum) :

Cursed by a family of Gypsy yuppies, this game has you hunting down every last member of that family and killing them, in a bid to cure yourself of an evil, lycanthropic affliction that sees you become a werewolf by night! You have to munch your way through London to get to them..but be careful of the police as the more you kill, the more will be after you!

You can collect various items to help you in your quest and if you eat people as a werewolf, you can find some useful stuff like train tickets which will let you into the Underground, or keys to let you enter the park. Members of the family of fiends who cursed you can be found by keeping an eye out on the bottom of the screen. A cross will flash when they are near and they are easily distinguishable from the other randoms walking around as they are always clad in black.

Inevitably, you'll end up in jail before you find all eight of your enemies. The key to success is to store items in your cell that will help you escape, like a file to open the window or a torch to see in the dark sewers. A manhole cover lifter gets you into these smelly tunnels so best keep an eye out for that too!

This game is brilliant, and there's loads of fun to be had prowling around London's parks, sewers, rooftops and Underground, preying on helpless civilians and armed police alike! Finding a family member always induces a slight panic as you strive to get them before they escape and legging it from the policeman with the keys who locks you up can also be a right laugh ....

Unfortunately, the original release came with a bug which meant the game couldn't be completed. But thanks to the wonders of modern science, a bug fixed version can now be obtained from World Of Spectrum meaning you can finally be free of the curse after all these years! Hurrah!

You can get the fixed version here...




91 - Bioshock (360, PS3, PC) :

After surviving a plane crash into the Atlantic Ocean, this game's hero finds himself entering a lighthouse that also houses a lift to an underwater world where things have gone very wrong. He receives a call for help from another chap who is fighting for his life in the underwater city, and sets off to find out what the hell is going on....

Rapture, for this is the city that has went all to hell, is filled with crazy folk known as Splicers, who have genetically modified themselves via injections of a substance called ADAM...if you are to survive in this hellhole, you'll need to fight fire with fire and collect a fair bit o' this ADAM yourself. This will give you various different abilities to use against your foes...



How you go about collecting this ADAM depends on how naughty or nice you want to be...There are these little girls called Little Sisters who run around filled with the stuff, y'see! And they are protected by these mammoth lunks called Big Daddies. If you manage to take out one of these Big Daddy protectors, you have a choice of either harvesting the little sister's ADAM for yourself or setting them free from the sea-slug that resides inside them...Needless to say, whatever you choose there will be consequences....



This is an awesome game and one that really makes you think. From the dilemmas of collecting ADAM, to the twists and turns of the wonderful story of which I've been deliberately vague. You really have to experience this game for yourselves!! Go get it and play it if you haven't already! And while you're there pick up Bioshock 2 as well, as it's almost as good!

100 Gruesome Games for Halloween! (100-96)

Every year when Halloween approaches, I like to play as many spooky games as possible to get me in the proper horrible mood. I usually ask around the various retro forums for suggestions on what games to try out that I might have missed, and I now have a rather vast selection of freaky deaky wonders to play through...

But I was finding it tricky when it came to decide which ones to talk about on the blog! So I decided to include as many as possible, by choosing a horrific hundred and giving a brief but hopefully informative few words about each one! So lets not waste any more time, and get on with taking a look at them...in no particular order of preference......Here's the first batch...

100 - Blinky's Scary School (ZX Spectrum) :

Already talked about in detail on this very blog! Go read the review a few posts down.....

99 - Alan Wake ( Xbox 360) :

In this game, you play the the role of Alan Wake, a writer who is having problems writing new material. His wife drags him to the middle of New England to try and get him some relaxation and inspiration....but when he arrives in the town of Bright Falls, things start to get a little strange....



This is a great game with a really compelling story and it'll keep you entertained most of the way through.. It does have a few faults, becoming a bit repetitive in bits and suffering fiddly controls at times, but the story and excellent use of the soundtrack more than make up for those.

I highly recommend it to anyone who hasn't tried it yet! Oh, and check out the live action shorts that came out in the run up to the game's release for some freaky Twin Peaks type action too! You can find them on Youtube!



98 - Gregory Horror Show (PS2) :

A weird and wonderful take on the Survival Horror Genre played in 3rd or 1st person...Based on a japanese cartoon, this game sees your soul enter a spooky old hotel run by Gregory, a freaky gimpy-eyed mouse! He sets you up with a room, but as you drift off to sleep you meet Death (complete with Swedish hat), who informs you that the hotel is filled with lost souls that need returned to him.

They are being held by the weirdest bunch of mixed up characters you're likely to see for a long time, and it is they who make the game the joy it is to play! Anyhoo, Death sorts you out with a new body, hideous and cuboid as it may be, and then you go around peeking through keyholes to find out the hotel guest's dark secrets and how to steal back the souls they carry around with them...

It plays like a cross between Resident Evil and old point-and-click titles, with you trying to work out which of the many items lying around to use where...and if you manage to work it out and steal back a soul, the guest you pinched it from will then chase you around whenever they see you!

If you get caught, you are subjected to the horror shows of the title..basically a sequence where something horrible happens to you, which depletes your energy bar. It can get a bit boring trudging around, and a bit tricky later on when you have loads of guests hunting you down, but the quirkiness of it all and mental characters should keep you entertained! Definitely worth checking out if you like Survival Horror, but want to try a different slant on it....



97 - The Adventures Of Dr. Franken (SNES) :

You, as Dr. Franken, must traipse around looking for bits of your dismembered girlfriend so you can put her back together and get on with some dodgy dead dating! Not played much of this to be honest, but it seems to be a fairly run of the mill platformer with some nice spooky graphics. Has a couple of nice classical tunes in it too to add to the atmosphere. Will need to play it some more before I can give you a proper verdict....

96 - Weird Dreams (Amiga, Atari ST) :

Properly freaky stuff! This game came with a rather large back story told in a 64 page novella which came with it ...to cut it short, you fancy this girl who turns out to be possessed by a demon who is a bit fed up and trapped in her body, only you don't know that and the aforementioned demonic chappy decides to faff about with your mind for some giggles. You start having crazy dreams after it gives you some pills to help "cure" you , and eventually end up in hospital where you start having another, and possibly your last, weird dream!

You have to try to work through various puzzles and defeat the various nasties which are living in your head thanks to that old demonic numpty inhabiting you lady friend...but this is a very tricky game, or at least I found it to be...and I remember that a modified version appeared in a phone-in game on the old Saturday morning show Motormouth and people were pretty useless at getting anywhere in it on that too!

It is filled with freaky graphics and bizarre gameplay, and definitely deserves a go or two, but I just kept getting killed and watched a video of someone else playing it on Youtube instead...so here's the video, which obviously contains spoilers, so if you do fancy giving the game a bash without knowing anything, don't watch it!

Stuff gets Spooky!!

October is upon us already, and the nights are drawing in...and Halloween fast approaches!

As you can probably already tell from the stuff already posted, I do tend to like the spooky side of things, so keep an eye on this here blog for a whole load of horror related stuff throughout this whole month...including gruesome games, scary sounds, creepy comics and fearsome films!!!