The House of the Dead 4 (PSN) Review

After a rather robust lineup, the Move has now dissolved into a pointless gimmick. Sure some games use it in a token sense, but very few games really make use of it. Seeing this obvious market, Sega has started releasing The House of the Dead games on the Playstation 3. After getting The House of the Dead III last month, we’re finally seeing a console release for The House of the Dead 4. Having come out during the decline of the golden arcade era, is this a forgotten classic or should it have just been forgotten?

Let’s see what’s Hot and what’s Not in our review of The House of the Dead 4.

HOT

Varied and Different Enemies
When it comes to rail shooters, you tend to see the same enemies constantly. This is true with just about any game in this genre, but The House of the Dead 4 changes up the formula. You see, every stage has unique enemies that leave a more lasting impression. This can range from bat people to just seeing undead in a different costume. Additionally, several enemies change the way you play. One of my favorite enemies have two butcher knives. This is because they actively block their head, so you either need to wait for them to move or attack a new part of the body. These simple elements make The House of the Dead 4 feel less tedious than other rail shooters.

Surprisingly Creepy Art
Having come out three years after The House of the Dead III, there is a huge leap in graphic quality. While this might be great news for fans, the real highlight is the enemies. Unlike the first three titles, The House of the Dead 4 uses different designs for just about everything. Some enemies from previous titles look virtually unchanged, but for the most part it actually feels like a different game.

Not Completely Linear
Similar to previous games in the series, some parts offer you an alternate path. Each path will lead to different challenges, which will either cause you greater or lesser difficulty in the long run. Certain paths also contain special elements, so it might take you several cycles to do everything possible. These elements include unique enemies, special rooms, lives or simply more points. All of which can increase or decrease, your overall performance score.

4 thoughts on “The House of the Dead 4 (PSN) Review

  1. I have a question Did the editor of this article play the original arcade game?
    I’m only curious about it :D personalty the points marked as “not” are my favourites about the game just because remember me all that coins that I spend in this game trying to reload and me wondering why was between 2 and 3 in the arcade XD…
    anyway great review! keep up the good work jps!

  2. I think is a good review but you are wrong in one point, if you play with the sharp shooter you forget about shake the move, you just pum the sharpshooter and you reload it, so the problem is gone.
    Over all is a good game is very fun to shoot zombies after a hard day at work jejejeje.

  3. Actually, the first H.O.T.D. game WAS ported to the Sega Saturn, and PC in 1998. I know, as I have them both, and that game was a very good one too. I do hope it gets re-released eventually, especially since it’s currently the only game in the series that never got a perfect console port (unlike the other ones), just only the two flawed versions I mentioned. Neither of them really compare to the original arcade version, even if they’re both somewhat decent for the hardware they were both released on.

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