Corpse Killer (Sega CD)

There's another crosshair/lightgun shooter with zombie theme, beside the well-known House of The Dead series. I'm not talking about recent Walking of the Dead game on arcade machine. No. It's Digital Picture's Corpse Killer (1994). 

That's some gritty title, graffiti that's made by using cheap spray paint. Those nuts also look awful too. The option only contain setting for sounds, music, and controller type (whether i want to use lightgun or joypad). Therefore i have no worry (or perhaps not) to start the game immediately. Protip: you have to disable second controller because the game registers both controller on gameplay and alternatively switches controller's role on menus.

 

Unlike most game, the prologue start before the main menu instead on the beginning of new game. There's some bloke in army uniform parachuting to some tropical island with palm trees and beautiful beach. But then his parachute get stuck in a tree while he listen to radio about his comrades are in crisis like in every horror movie -as we know- with gunfire, bit dialogue, and screams.   

While the protagonist stills stuck in a tree, an ugly zombie comes out and try to bite his leg. I know that there's no zombie that's not ugly. What i mean is that zombie's presentation is bad. His face clearly on some rubber white mask while his entire skin is normal like everyone (who's not pale, of course). The only aspect of the proper zombie that he gets it right: dirty cloth and inability to normally speak (only groan and yell).

 

Luckily, this bloke rush with his jeep, causing the zombie surprised and distracted. Then he throw his machete at zombie's stomach, killing him. We know that zombie's main weakpoint is in the head but i humbly ask you to forgive this B-grade acting. They worked so hard on this scene although apparently they can't figure out how to show us safe decapitation acting. Anyway, this Jamaican (or maybe fake ones) retrieve his machete and saying "Welcome to hell, sucker!" then he climbs through the protagonist with knife in his mouth to free the soldier. By the way, this whole scene is stamped with credit once in a while but isn't too hard to take good & clear screenshot.

His name is Winston Crown. He's my guide and taxi driver in this region. He's cheerful and talkative chap unlike me who's silent protagonist. Even though Winston comments on how he likes my M4A1 with grenade launcher attachment (spoiler: i don't have screen-clearing bomb) or he mocks me about American soldier's honor like in Hollywood movie, i say not a single word or even slight gesture. I'm depicted as very-serious soldier, apparently.

 

Our joy ride is disrupted by plane wreckage on the road, forcing Winston to go to off-road nearby. Then suddenly car's engine is dead and refuse to start, while zombie surround us. I can hear some Jamaican language coming from Winston's mouth and luckily there's subtitle. He said "Balana zombie! Foo-Pah!". I don't know why they don't translate Foo-Pah. I hope it's not so vulgar bad word as it get stuck on my mind up until now. Then Winston tell me to lit 'em up. Thus first combat happens.   

 

As i mentioned before that Corpse Killer is Crosshair/Lightgun shooter. So the main gameplay is definitely simple. Move the crosshair to enemies then pull the trigger or press 'A' button if you use joypad controller. Pressing 'B' button will change ammo that you use. The bottom HUD consist of (from left to right): Health remaining, photo of the protagonist a la Doom, ammo counters, abort signal, and ammo indicator. The left side of ammo counter is counter for normal ammo and armor-piercing ammo. Normal ammo is limited so you can leisurely hold the trigger button and drag the crosshair to enemies. Armor-piercing ammo is supposed to be stronger than normal ammo but so far enemies fall quite easily by using normal ammo. 

The zombie on left isn't blinking because i shoot him. He's already when he comes out. This special zombie act as explosive barrel in this game. Shoot him and other zombie around him falls but only if it's on light tone. If you shoot it while in dark color, you will get damage instead so you have to wait for the correct time. As you can see the scale in this screen is very improper. Look at those zombies and that skeleton then you compare them to airplane there and you see what i mean.

After i walkcrab to the distance where the game is satisfied to end the stage, a blonde journalist named Julie comes from ruin over there. Winston doesn't like her because he hates reporter, i guess.

 

On next stage, we attack some gate. By that i mean i do all the shooting while Winston drives and Julie just either photograph or write article about my action like typical press. Winston gave me blowpipe. So in this stage i shoot zombies using it instead of my assault rifle and there's no significant change on gameplay though the sound effect of my shooting is clearly changed. I can just rapidly shoot enemies with blowpipe like when i use M4A1. Is that mean i have remarkable talent like Dart Goblin? Also zombie here start to throw grenade/skull/mace instead of charging at me. Great.

 

After gate stage, i have to choose either to village or swamp before go to fortress where the main villain resides.

 

Then this movie plays showing Hellman (who's the villain) have held captive my comrades. Their neck is held with chain by the zombies. Lucky for them that their brain is left unbitten. One of them mock Hellman that Lieutenant (which is me) will come after him. Well, see if i can do that. Though i doubt i can.

Can you believe that guy is a zombie? Because i can't. He walks in not normal zombie's way. More like some drunkard try reaching toilet door while he want to take dump really bad. Nothing different in gameplay aspect except some zombie pops from water puddles around here.    

Clearing swamp stage, Winston offer me either Datura Bullets or Breath. I reckon i have no problem with my current ammo so i choose Breath which restore my health back to 99. I'm hoping to reach 100 or even more but beggar can't be picky as they said.

Fortress stage is filled with prisoner zombies. I have to admit that every stage offer me with different zombie but only in visual department not in gameplay.

 

Delve further into the fortress, i meet with some zombified of -presumably- my comrade. They are in military uniform and also more durable and faster than any zombie i encounter. After passing swamp stage, i don't get anymore health refill so i'm pessimist about my survival here. There's either cool or scary feature on my portrait, if i get damaged my face will be scratched of melted until become skull if i reach very low health. Of course, i know that because i'm dead here.

That's quite fancy top score naming board. Steel board and signal lights and such. Shame the naming inputs are small. I guess i will try this game again.

 

Turns out pressing 'C' button will allow me to escape from current stage. Winston here said that it's best to retreat for now. It seems everything looks reasonable except why we retreat to graveyard? I prefer military outpost, village or something.

See! This is why. Winston explains that Hellman will bound to attack graveyard here so he can increase his minions to number that's unstoppable. My strategy so far is pay less attention to zombie on left corner as the stage scroll from left to right so there's a quite good chance that zombie's attack will "miss".

 

After some compliments from Winston and Julie that i cleared the graveyard for us, i get to see this datapod (that's perhaps military's prototype version of ipad). Most of these icons are live action scene. They're all contain various information like that special zombie that can kill others if you kill it while in light color, AP bullets, Julie, and Hellman. Also you can save your game here. Instead of playtime, the save slot tracks your score. Quite unusual.

Hellman is neuro-biology scientist that's used to be working with Pentagon. In this conference, he said that he has solution for 'military casualty' problem. Though the answer is off-screen, it's obviously zombiefication. If someone's named by his/her parent with villainous name like Hellman here, it's good indication that he's bad person that shouldn't be recruited for humanity's sake.  

 

The most center icon is satlink map where you choose quest to go. Tombstone icon is return to datapod. Small skull icons are basically common quest. Leaves icon is datura quest that if you finished it, you will gain datura bullets or breath. Bullet icon is quest to get AP bullets.  Big skull icon is the continuation of main quest. Treasure icon is Winston's quest for treasure hunting. Camera icon is Julie's quest for news intel. Spoiler: all of the quest is all about shooting zombie from left to right like usual.

This time i go with Julie's quest for information and she stole Winston's jeep. She said it's no big deal. That's quite true as i have helped him searching for pirate's treasure and he's busy counting it. That should keep his mood in check.    

 

Finishing Julie's quest will reveal more information on datapod. It's revealed that this zombie accident is involving Defense Department which is barely surprising.

 

I went to another Winston quest for treasure. Ho boy! He sure looks happy finding the hidden riches. There's a chance that Winston can't find it when the mission is over and you have to do it again at next try. Instead, he found Juju stick (that can negate 1 certain attack), or other items. Or sometime none at all. Even he succeed on treasure searching, there's no benefit that i got at least that's what i feel. But i like to help him because he's most useful ally. He's driver and also guide that know Hellman, voodoo stuffs, Datura leaves, etc. So i don't mind being used by him like this.   

 

On to another Julie's quest. Stealing someone's jeep is bad enough, moreover calling it 'piece of junk' when it's suddenly broken down. You should be nicer, you ungrateful lass! I notice that my photo is more resembling doomguy's than ever.

 

Unlike Winston's quest, Julie always get what she wants thus providing me with more info. But again, there's no real benefit behinds it except for 'story building' like the good from Defense Department is transported via submarine. This could mean that Hellman's zombies are capable of operating submarine. If zombies are that resourceful, then the world is already doomed. 3:

Things get more complicated with that zombie in dark costume comes to play. You can't dispatch it no matter how many bullet it takes. No luck with AP bullets too. You can only hear 'plink!' sounds everytime you shoot at it. I'm afraid that the zombie is this game's 'mandatory damage' factor like in every lightgun shooter even though you can negate its attack once if you carry Juju stick that vanishes immediately after 1 use. This kind of zombie also appeared in fortress stage but i couldn't take picture of it well.

 

I got Hanja Root which looks like ginger. Winston explains that it's good for making Datura Bullets. That means good, i guess? 

Going to some quest isn't always going well. Sometime we got ambushed by zombies on our way and forcing us to return after clearing the ambush for some reason. Maybe this is like random encounter like JRPG but serves no purpose except hoarding score (that doesn't provide you with any 1up if you reach certain number) if you're that kind of guy. You might retreat when you get ambushed. Hell! Even in starting scene when ambush is about to happen. Though you have to finish another graveyard stage everytime you're retreating. No one's the winner here.

 

Not only the gameplay is repetitive but also the stages and also the cutscene. I count  more or less 5 stages (including the graveyard) that get used over and over again. No wonder i reach saturation point at this moment. But the atrocity not stops there. I notice that quest for Datura Quest only appears if your health is 35 or so. Above that number, it won't appears meaning it's impossible to refill your health to fullest. There's occasion where said quest appear even my health is 44, but that only happens once in my playthrough. Should you get opportunity to get Datura leaves there's 'risk and reward' gambling situation where you choose between ignoring your low health and get some Datura Bullets or you replenish your health but you can't get opportunity to get Datura Quest on next occasion. This time i got lucky, i play through several stage but i found no 'obligatory damage' zombie at all. That's why Juju stick is intact as you can see letter 'J' near my portrait. Also i notice that choosing 'Datura Bullet' option will convert my AP bullet stock into Datura AP bullet stock, which is great. Why it's good? I will explain that later.

Suddenly

AAAAAHHH! Yelled the game because i save too often. Of course, i save like crazy if my health is dangerously low on my way too collect Datura Bullets as many as possible. Yet the game punishes me with this jumpscare. It really gets me good. I totally don't expect this in the slightest. Soldier_negativevocalization05.wav

 

Here is the reason why Datura Bullets are important. The once invincible zombies can be defeated by shooting Datura bullets. It's really helpful to get rid of them as you can see here that the zombies are making conga line with the special dark ones in front, to drain your health surely and heftily. That's being complete jerk! Then i realize that Datura Bullet's stock is easily depleted. This mainly because it's quite hard to cycle back to the unlimited normal bullets. After 1-2 hours finishing the small quests, i have no idea what the game wants me to do in this repetitive quest before going for the main ones because is not there's leveling up system or what have you. Collect as many Datura Bullets as possible, maybe. But as i have mentioned before that, they're easy to waste. And also there's problem of very strict health refill. Therefore i decide to quit.

 

The credit plays after game over so don't take it that i have completed this game. Maybe next time.

What can i say about Digital Picture's Corpse Killer (1994)? It's not good. Even the gameplay's core feels incorrect and tedious. The shooting seems lack of impact. Even the zombies flinch a bit when get shot, they will continue to attack you as if nothing happens. So you have to finish a zombie thoroughly then move to next one. Crosshair moves bit slow, so it's kind of impossible to shoot at one corner to another in opposite direction on some occasion. The game tries to add some specialty but most of them don't work well or feels fun, like the exploding zombies, sandbox-like gameplay, bullet selections, or the special dark zombies. The music are just ambience with no real catchy rhythm. The sound effect is just plain generic. The movie scene and acting is quite good. I say that not because Julie is bit flirting me. But because i really like Winston's character. He should be in genuine game rather than this B-grade setting game.

It goes without saying that i don't enjoy Digital Picture's Corpse Killer (1994) mainly because there's no way to get full health refill. Therefore i can't recommend you to play this game. Play The House of the Dead 2, instead. You can get satisfactory in decapitating or dismember zombies unlike here where there's no significant impact whether you shoot zombies in the head or crotch. I tried that, believe me!