Gaming update: Evil Dead – Regeneration and Marvel Nemesis

Having decided against the next gen consoles for a little while (at least until the Nintendo WII comes out, which might be the console to wean me of my Sony/MS dependence), and really, really being bored of wasting my life on Civ4, was looking for a new way to, erm, waste my life. And on browsing Amazon’s bargain basement, decided to pick up a couple of games that I knew were just going to be a useless waste of money at full price… but might prove entertaining with a twofer 15 quid deal.

Both are obviously based on film / comic franchises that I love. Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead series (of which I’ve seen 1 and 3: Army of Darkness) is fully entertaining, and there’s something about Bruce Campbell’s ridiculous machismo that is hugely entertaining – and proves to be in the ludicrous cutscenes of the game. It’s like Duke Nukem meets… well, Evil Dead. Very, very funny – simple, addictive, button mashing game play, decent graphics and a plotline worth sawing your arm off for. So far, anyway – I’m only about 20 minutes in. Have a feeling its going to get repetitive quick, but for now…

And Marvel’s newest beat-em-up, after a long line of really, really awful games, is actually relatively entertaining. It, like MK: Shaolin Monks, turns the game into something more of a platform game and gives a nice bit of variety between characters. Of course, there’s no two-player cooperative mode (d’oh! – although haven’t tried on Xbox Live yet), and the combos seem limited, it is very true to Marvel so far and quite fun as a consequence.

In short, great diversions for a small investment. This pleases me.