Zombie Tycoon 2: Brainhov’s Revenge Review

Do not let the name fool you, Zombie Tycoon 2 has nothing to do with building an empire or formulating a grand strategy. Zombie Tycoon 2: Brainhov’s Revenge is a comedic zombie RTS that combines two of my favorite things in gaming. Real Time Strategy and Zombies! Developed by Frima Studios, Zombie Tycoon 2 really is the perfect mix for me and is a great game for fans of either real-time strategy or zombie games.

You choose a side in the epic war between two masterminds of Evil: apprentice-gone-rogue Orville Tycoon and his army of heavy-duty zombies, or his vengeance-thirsty mentor Professor Brainhov and his rioting mass of twitchy brain-munchers. Learn how to master the 4 Monsters units and level them up while leading your squads of zombies through 8 epic single player missions each about 30 minutes long. Each chapter consists of one map with a series of objectives that must be completed in order to advance and find out who gets to become King of the Undead!

The gameplay is inline with most of the current real-time strategy games which gave it that familiar feel. This tied in with the unique movement and features of the unit being zombies really made it a massive hit for me. One of the key features that stood out compared to other RTS games was the ‘Codex’ which had information on each unit and building. While this in itself is not an entirely new concept the way in which it showed each unit and buildings special abilities as well as their passive abilities really helped me get used to the game. Playing as the main character there was lots of different ways for them to change and expand and interact with the environment. An example of this is part of the first mission when the main character changes a motor home into a mobile turret. This is just the first in a long line of customizations this character makes to defend himself.

Graphically this game has more of a cartoon feel but in my opinion that really added to the game it made it more of a fun game than some serious horror RTS. With this in mind and the cartoon feel to the game, the movements of the models in-game as well and the vehicles was very smooth. This meant that despite the jerky looking cartoons that the game is built around it still moved quite fluidly and fully immersed the player in the game play rather than being something that distracted away from the game.

One thing I was disappointed with however, was the lack of subtitles. I went through all the menus to try to find subtitles for different noises and none could be found. This problem, however, is so minuscule that it made no difference to me and for the majority of players i cant see it being a serious issue.

The sound for this game was perfect for to go with its graphical appearance. Ranging from squelching noises to go with the zombies movements all the way to the noises made by the shaking human guards trying to fend them off this game really was done perfectly. The audio was also full of useful hints at certain events happening around the map such as the players units being attacked of a building being taken over. The music did get a little annoying really in the longer missions with it just being repetitive looped music but that is to be expected and is much the same among most RTS games.

Overall Zombie Tycoon 2: Brainhov’s Revenge is a perfect blend of strategy and comedy. I found the game to be thoroughly amusing despite the fact that no character ever says a word. The entire story is given through various sounds, looks, and actions; no dialogue. I would recommend it to not only fans of either genre but to gamer’s in general. It has a little fun with the classic RTS genre while also bringing zombies into the mix without making it a serious horror game. It has a fantastic story line despite the comedic feel of the zombies and is an excellent purchase for any gamer!

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary PC code was provided to Brash Games for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to editor@brashgames.co.uk.

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