Land of the Dead: Road to Fiddler's Green

"A fun budget zombie shooter that would make George A Romero proud"

Land of the Dead: Road to Fiddlers Green is a video game tie in to the latest George A Romero movie, Land of the Dead. The movie picks up after the game ends so you really do not really to see the movie first before playing it.

Created by Brainbox Games based in Canada, I believe the team that developed it was fairly small, around 6 people. It retails on the PC for only $20 and $30 for the Xbox.

THE GOOD - Finally someone has made a commercial game that really captures the feel of the Romero world of the walking undead. It has a nice variety of different zombies and the models and animations are all very well done. These are the classic walking undead that will not stop their relentless pursuit until they feast upon your flesh. Doors will not even stop these rotting shambling corpses since they can smash them down. (A brilliant feature by the way) Brainbox shows you its sick sense of humor by giving you the ability to shoot or chop off their limbs. The zombies are blindly determined to feed upon you however and will crawl after you if you shoot off a leg. Chopping off their arms makes them a little less dangerous but they still have a nasty bite. Of course, as everyone should know, all it takes to put one down permanently is some severe head trauma. Sounds are good and the music is simple, effective and adds to the creepy atmosphere of the game. Levels are pretty small for the most part and keep the feeling of progression. There are more melee weapons in this game than any other shooter I've seen. The single player game is a little short (I didn't keep track but it's under 10 hours) but I felt like I received my moneys worth in the end. Multiplayer is fun, fast paced and spiced up with the addition of zombies on the playing field as well as a new online "Invasion" mode which is fresh multiplayer idea that works really well. Because the game uses one of the older Unreal engines, it runs smoothly on older PCs. Finally, the game was released on the PC for only $20 which you just can't beat.

THE BAD - Most of its shortcomings feel as though they could have been resolved if the developers simply had more time to work on them. Graphics were a mixed bag, while the models looked good some of the levels are bland, boring and ugly. Hit detection feels quirky and sounds do not seem to diminish over distances very well. The gun selection felt a bit lacking in variety, especially in multiplayer where it feels like your choices are limited to either a pistol or a shotgun. And finally I never saw the large zombie hordes like I did in the trailer which was disappointing.

THE UGLY - There is an almost unforgivable bug which can suddenly prevents you from seeing any multiplayer servers which completely cuts you off from playing online. Groovegames tech support was unable to provide much help on this the last I checked with them. Completely uninstalling and reinstalling was the only known fix. (If you suffer from this, please see the Gamefaqs forums for a quicker remedy).

I should also mention that the game is very difficult to find, Gamestop seems to be the only retail store that carries it. Other stores, like EB claim that the game was even canceled!

Final Words - This is an instant cult classic, just like the movies, and for the money, it can't be beat. The developers are clearly fans of the genre and their passion and creativity for it shows. Zombie lovers should have a lot of fun with this game; the creepy atmosphere and fun game play overshadow its quirks and flaws. Non zombie fans may not be quite so forgiving. In my opinion, this is one of the best zombie games since They Hunger and Brain Bread (free mods for Half Life). I find myself more often choosing to fire up a quick session of online Invasion instead of playing the current big budget shooters installed on my PC.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/11/05