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Introduction:
Brains…braaaaaains!  Method actors like to know their ‘motivation’.  Well, he’s no method actor, but Stubbs The Zombie knows just what motivates him: brains!  After all…he is a zombie!  Stubbs was a door-to-door salesman; a bad one.  He faced rejection at door after door; until, that is, he met his untimely demise at the wrong end of a shotgun in 1933.  It seems one of his prospective customers didn’t appreciate door-to-door salesmen, and Stubbs was the last straw.  The irate customer blew a hole in his gut and buried him in an unmarked grave in the Pennsylvania countryside. 

Now it’s 1959.  More than 25 years have passed since Stubbs was shot & buried, and above him has risen the idyllic town of Punchbowl, Pennsylvania.  The brainchild of billionaire, visionary and playboy-industrialist, Andrew Monday, Punchbowl, PA is truly the town of the future – complete with hover-cars, a monorail and even robot labor.  Well, it’s opening day in Punchbowl, and whatever strange forces have transformed Stubbs from dead to undead have worked their magic.  A grisly looking hand punches its way out of the dirt as startled citizens run away in horror.  Stubbs is back…and he’s hungry, so watch your brain!

Gameplay:
Zombies are not really what you’d call intelligent.  In fact, they’re actually rather stupid and can be very single-minded; y’know – brains & stuff.  Well, Stubbs isn’t all that smart either, but he is fortunate to be a least a bit more intelligent than the average Zombie.  That’s a good thing too, because every undead horde needs a leader, right?  Of course, there must first be a horde to lead. 

When Stubbs first emerges from his unholy grave beneath Punchbowl, he is the only zombie around.  However, that changes fast.  With each new citizen of Punchbowl that Stubbs kills, he gains another ally.  That’s because every character in the game that’s killed by a zombie (Stubbs or one of his horde), they become a zombie themselves, adding to Stubbs’ army of the undead.  If these new undead allies take enough damage, however, they will eventually become just plain dead and no longer the undead, so Stubbs has to keep killing to keep the horde’s numbers up. 

To be perfectly honest, all of these new allies are pretty dumb.  Then again, how smart would you be if you just had your brain eaten out of your head and you came back to life?  They will try to follow Stubbs around as best they can, and will attack on their own when they see another citizen of Punchbowl in their path.  Often times, however, Stubbs must call to his zombies, which is done by standing still, looking at a group of them and then whistling to them (using the ‘Y’ button).  Stubbs can also give confused zombies a shove in the right direction…literally.  If you want a member of your horde to go in a particular direction, or one of them just gets in your way, tapping the ‘Y’ button will give them a good shove. 

Your horde can be useful to you in many ways, but their primary functions are to be ‘meat shields’ for Stubbs and to distract or otherwise occupy some of the attacking citizens of Punchbowl.  The larger your horde becomes, the more protection you’ll have, as the horde keeps your would-be attackers occupied. 

Zombies aren’t exactly in the best physical condition either, and Stubbs is no exception.  Apart from his lovely green complexion and the gaping hole in his side, he just isn’t what you’d call ‘attractive’.  Most of his horde isn’t that pretty either, considering Stubbs or one of his horde had to do some damage to kill them the first time.  Many of your minions will have missing limbs or heads, but that doesn’t stop them.  Heck, you’ll even see little ‘stump’ zombies with nothing left but, perhaps, one arm and maybe their head still.  Those little guys sure can’t move very fast, but bless their little undead hearts, they sure try! 

Now, besides limping around, moaning about brains and generally being ugly, how, you may ask, does Stubbs inflict damage on his victims?  I mean, he can’t just walk right up to someone and eat their brains, right?  Well, in some cases, yes he can.  You may have to run up to them instead of walking, but Stubbs can pretty much just come right up to any of Punchbowl’s unarmed citizens and press ‘Y’ to feast away.  It can be pretty humorous too.  As Stubbs proceeds to chow down, his victims cry out in pain and horror as a huge stream of blood sprays comically out the top of their heads.  They don’t lie there dead for long, however.  They’re up again within moments, but now they’re on your side. 

Unarmed citizens are one thing, but Stubbs has to work a little harder for his meal when the Punchbowl cops and other armed characters begin to show up.  At first, Stubbs only has two ways to attack.  First off, he can run up to an enemy and slash at them.  This is done using either the ‘X’ button or R-trigger and it’s Stubbs’ default attack.  After slashing at them a few times, your opponent will drop his weapon, allowing you to hit the ‘Y’ button and have lunch. 

The only other weapon at Stubbs’ disposal at the start of the game is his ‘unholy flatulence’.  “His what,” you said?  Well, if you were the undead and your diet consisted entirely of human brains, I bet your farts would smell pretty bad too.  Pressing the ‘B’ button will cause Stubbs to crouch down and let one fly.  Those caught in the limited range of Stubbs’ unholy stench will be temporarily incapacitated, allowing you to walk right up and have a snack. 

Of course, Stubbs can’t just sit there and toot his butt flute all day.  As with each of Stubbs’ weapons, the rest of which I’ll go into next, each time you use your unholy flatulence, you have to eat some brains to replenish your ‘ammunition’.  As the game progresses, Stubbs will learn how to use other parts of his body as weapons as well. 

The next bodily weapon Stubbs learns how to use is his ‘gut grenade’.  Stubbs can reach right into that gaping hole in his side, and pull out organs to hurl at his foes using the L-trigger.  After being thrown, the grenades will explode on their own in a few seconds, or you can detonate them yourself by pulling the L-trigger again.  Stubbs’ supply of gut grenades will grow the more brains he eats, and he can hold up to three grenades at once.  These grenades can be very useful for taking out one or multiple armed opponents. 
At times throughout the game, it might be more prudent for Stubbs to take some cover and let his zombie horde do some of the work.  Of course, if you still want to help them out and also stay out of harms way, you can do it from a distance.  After tucking him away someplace relatively safe, pressing the black button will cause Stubbs to yank off his right hand and toss it to the ground.  Once this is done, you will see the world around you from the hand’s perspective.  Since it is just a hand, your vision is now in black and white and the edges of your vision are dim and blurry.  However, now that you have control of the hand, what do you do with it?

Well, the main use for the hand is possession.  If you can sneak up to someone and latch onto their head with Stubbs’ severed hand (using the ‘Y’ button when the indicator appears), you will then posses that person.  Once they’re possessed your vision is still in black and white and a bit fuzzy around the edges.  You will maintain control of this person, including the ability to wield any weapon they are carrying, until they are killed.  There is no way to regain health for possessed characters and, once they go down, you will be back to where you tucked Stubbs away to keep him out of harm’s way.  Also, miraculously, Stubbs will have grown his hand back. 

The last weapon Stubbs learns to use is his own head.  Pressing the white button will cause Stubbs to rip his own head right off his neck, and roll it towards his enemies like a bowling ball.  As it rolls it can knock down opponents and spew out ‘zombie sputum’, turning anyone it knocks down on spews on into a zombie.  At the end of its roll, or when you press the white button again, the head will explode and kill anyone in the blast radius.  Stubbs will instantly grow a new head after the explosion, leaving you all set to carry on with your zombie rampage. 

If you think that this all sounds rather cheesy and comical, well…that’s the point!  Stubbs The Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse is meant to be reminiscent of a cheesy zombie horror film, complete with corny dialogue and cutscenes that look like old, worn out newsreel footage.  Punchbowl, PA may be the town of the future, but it’s still part of 1950’s, ‘Leave it to Beaver’ America. 

Stubbs The Zombie was built using the Halo engine, so the controls are, overall, pretty solid.  The only thing that felt a bit strange was jumping.  When you hit the ‘A’ button to jump, Stubbs jumps, pretty much, straight up.  You can control yourself in the air to a degree after jumping, but the initial jump is straight up, even if you are moving forward when you hit the jump button.  I’m thinking this must have been done on purpose, because it’s the only part of the Halo</em-based control scheme that doesn’t quite feel right to me.  Thankfully, jumping isn’t a major or crucial part of the gameplay. 

There are also vehicles in the game but, with one small exception, they go unused until the later levels of the game.  This was a bit disappointing, as I was expecting more vehicle action in a game based on the Halo engine – a fact that the game box proudly touts.  The vehicles available to Stubbs at certain points in the game include: the 1959, Monday Industries Hovercar, the Police version of that same hovercar, the Sod-O-Mobile (designed for ‘ultra-modern’ agriculture), a standard Army Jeep, a Pershing Tank and, last but not least, an Impala tractor.  When in use, the vehicle controls are solid and each one is relatively easy to drive.  The Sod-O-Mobile and hovercar are similar in feel to the way a Ghost moves in Halo. 

Also, like in Halo 2, there are no health packs in Stubbs The Zombie</me>.  If Stubbs is getting close to making that transition from undead to just plain dead, just find some cover and let Stubbs rest up a minute.  As he rests, his health meter will fill up again. 

The graphics in Stubbs The Zombie are, for the most part, pretty good.  Some of the buildings and especially the robot characters have almost a simplistic look to them, but again I believe this is intentional, to help keep that 1950’s, old yet modern feel to the game.  The character models are decent, if a bit repetitive, but the best part is watching Stubbs do the things he does (his flatulence, bowling his head, using his gut grenades, etc.)  The blood that sprays from your victims’ heads as you eat their brains is also humorously excessive. 

Work in the sound department is solid as well; and downright hilarious at times.  My only complaint here is that a few more and different screams from your victims might have bee nice (you can only hear “Oh God, my brain!” so many times before it starts to get old). 

Also, the game has some really great music on the soundtrack (great remakes of songs such as “Lollipop” (Ben Kweller), “My Boyfriends Back” (The Raveonettes), “Mr. Sandman” (Oranger) and “Earth Angel” (Death Cab For Cutie) just to name a few).  Unfortunately, however, most of this music goes woefully unused, and you get more ‘generic’ game music throughout most of the gameplay.  One notable exception is a funny and off-beat mini-game in one of the early levels, where Stubbs has a ‘dance off’ with the Punchbowl chief of police. 

Extras:
Stubbs doesn’t offer much in the way of extras.  The co-op mode was a nice addition, allowing you and a friend to go on a brain-eating rampage together.  Beyond that, however, Stubbs is strictly a single-player game. 

Conclusion:
With solid yet humorous gameplay and some truly unique concepts, Stubbs The Zombie in Rebel Without A Pulse is definitely a refreshing change of pace.  The gameplay is surprisingly addictive and there’s just the right amount of humor to remind you that this is, after all, a takeoff of just about every cheesy zombie flick ever made.  The one thing I will say, however, is that the game was painfully short.  When it was done, I found myself asking, “That’s it?”  I wanted more.  The game’s short story mode and understandable lack of any multiplayer mode beyond co-op are its only serous downfalls.  Also, there isn’t a whole lot of replay value once you’ve completed Stubbs’ journey through Punchbowl.  So, while I found Stubbs The Zombie to be a nice change of pace and an enjoyable gameplay experience, at $49.99(US) I’d suggest a rental rather than a purchase, at least until the price comes down a bit. 

Score: 7.8

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