Bad Habits - Geeked - June 02 2005
When you were a kid, did you identify with Gargamel rather than the Smurfs? Does the mere sight of the Teletubbies make you want to grab a grenade launcher? Would you pay good money to see the combined cast of “Tiny Toon Adventures” and “Muppet Babies” get torn apart by a mob of vicious apes? Well, if you answered yes to any one of these questions, then you need to pick up a copy of Majesco’s latest third-person shooter, Raze’s Hell, and have yourself a little sadistic cartoon fun.
The idea is this: An obnoxiously cute race of creatures called Kewletts - kind of a cross between Care Bears and Kewpie dolls - have decided that they need to bring peace and happiness to the rest of the world. Unfortunately, they’re willing to kill everyone else to do it. Enter Raze, a nasty, ugly-looking monster whose entire village has been wiped out by the Kewletts and who has been transformed into a vicious weapon of revenge by a chance encounter with a bizarre ancient artifact. It’s Raze’s job to stop the nefarious plans of the Kewletts’ evil princess - and he’s armed with a wicked-looking sword-arm, as well as the ability to suck up local insects and spit them back at the Kewletts in the form of deadly projectiles. He even has a little, bossy, flying sidekick that looks like the mutated offspring of Marlon Brando and 2004-era Kirstie Alley.
Despite Raze’s general badassness (he not only sucks up insects, but can also inhale fire, and heals himself by hoovering up the bloody chunks of the Kewletts he kills), stopping the princess is no easy task.
For starters, though the Kewletts may look like complete creampuffs, they’re mean as hell. The basic Kewlett soldiers, each armed with a jack-in-the-box-like laser gun called a “death-in-the-box” and a propensity to attack in large numbers, can inflict some serious damage if you’re not careful. Your only consolation is that they’re not very accurate, often shooting their own buddies in their haste to get at you. It’s actually a lot of fun to listen to Kewletts wounded by friendly fire yelling at their trigger-happy comrades in high-pitched squeaks.
Of course, once you get the hang of Raze’s insect arsenal - for starters, you’ll have access to a machine-gun-like attack, a sniper attack and an explosive attack - these Kewlett gunners will cease to be a challenge. But that’s just about the time when the Kewlett Special Ops appear from behind you, floating down from the sky at the end of heart-shaped balloons. And while you’re trying to deal with these black-pajama-wearing Kewletts, you’d better watch out for the Bomber Bears - big, overall-wearing, mildly retarded-looking bastards who toss grenades around like poo-flinging monkeys - and the Suicide Bears, the Bomber Bears’ insane little brothers who charge at you screaming at the top of their lungs in an attempt to get as close as possible before detonating all the explosives strapped to their bodies.
Survive all this and you just might stand a chance, though there will still be plenty of surprises in the Kewlett arsenal. And it’s these “surprises” that are at the core of what makes this game so fun.
WHAT’S COOL: Chopping Kewletts into little bloody chunks and then inhaling the pieces to regain health; listening to the hilarious one-liners each Kewlett spits out before it dies.
WHAT’S UNCOOL: Not the most cutting-edge third-person shooter; Raze and his allies aren’t quite as well-designed as the forces of Kewtopia.??