Crossover: Dredd Vs. Death

I've always liked Judge Dredd comics, particularly how the UK comic's universe has maintained a pretty strong overall continuity despite how the various Dredd books have been running for over 30 years now. I've also always been a little bit pained that he isn't a more popular character here in the States, probably due in large part as to how awful that Stallone movie was back in the 90s. Maybe if he had a good video game, that might get the ball rolling on this side of the Atlantic...

Rebellion's FPS, Judge Dredd: Dredd Vs. Death can easily be voted the best Dredd video game to hit the market. Which is a shame, really, because -while it's by no means terrible- it wasn't really anything all that special. It's also a little surprising, since Rebellion is the company responsible for the celebrated Aliens Vs. Predator games, too, which featured far more innovative gameplay.

In its defense, though, Dredd Vs. Death has a lot of things that work in its favor, too. When I first played it on the PC, the graphics looked pretty decent with their bright colors and fun rag doll physics; the look of the game felt appropriate for the neon universe of Mega City One. Of course, when the game was actually released onto other consoles in 2005, the visuals just looked dated and sad because of their simple textures and borderline identical enemies. The music, while a bit generic, wasn't anything to complain too much about, either, but I found the voice acting to be suitably campy and enjoyable.

The game's storyline, though, was something straight out of the comics: a particularly nasty plague is released upon Mega City One's population of 400 million and turns a number of civilians into zombies and vampires. As Dredd progresses through the eleven short levels, he learns that the Dark Judges (some of the bestest comic villains EVAH) are behind the plague and need to be taken out. Of course, the boss battles left something to be desired (Judge Fear's in particular, all he did was throw bear traps), but there was a certain nostalgic thrill to the thought of being able to take on the Dark Judges with nothing but your guts and your LawMaker... and maybe a couple of other weapons picked up along the way.

Gameplay-wise, this was and still is a pretty generic shooter, though Rebellion tried to make things a little more difficult by instituting a GTA-like feature: if Dredd killed too many criminals instead of arresting them, or started shooting civilians, SJS squads would start coming after him with the intent of taking him down with extreme prejudice. Personally, I found the feature to be pretty annoying, so I was soon glad to be done with the early levels and instead just blasted my way through the unholy ranks of the Dark Judges' minions.

All in all, Dredd Vs. Death is little more than an average FPS title which is slightly elevated by the fact that it's based on a fun franchise. It's a little on the short side, and the gameplay doesn't really do much to distinguish itself from other games of the same genre, but if you're a fan of Judge Dredd himself it's not a terrible way to spend an afternoon.