

Most importantly, Dredd himself is a solid walking lump of justice, stomping around the levels with his lawgiver (or other weaponry, depending on what you choose), dealing with a variety of zombies. It feels like the comic, while not feeling cartoonish. There is a solidity to the graphics that makes the levels feel futuristic and stark, fitting in with the world of Judge Dredd.

I also like that you can choose to have the stick in a fixed position on the screen, or have it centred on your thumb when you touch the screen so any slide to the right, will translate to moving to the right. I'm not a great fan of the virtual stick in general, and a poorly implemented stick has damaged many a good game, but I'm glad to say that I can get on with the stick in Dredd, so congrats to the coders behind this one. and those explosive barrels of goo are very attractive if you want to take out a huge group of zombies standing close by. You can override this targeting by tapping on the screen on your desired target. Targeting is automatic and you'll have perfect accuracy on whichever target is highlighted (come on, this is Dredd - of course he'll have phenomenal accuracy). After all, I am 'The Law' here.Īs a faux-3D shooter (the camera is fixed above the action, but looking down at an angle of around 65 degrees to give a 3D effect to a level mapped out in two dimensions), Dredd vs Zombies goes for a virtual stick under your left thumb, and a great big fire button under your right thumb. To be fair to the game, you also earn credits for completing levels and carrying out other tasks, and because the power-ups are aids to gameplay, rather than required to complete a level, you can play through for free, or buy up the goodies to make the title a little easier.Īll I need is my Lawgiver and a badge. The upgrades to your weapons, and the power-ups available for one 'game', are all measured in credits, and you can buy bumper packs of credits via Xbox Live and the in-app purchasing model. One important thing to note here is that Dredd vs Zombies is a freemium title. This does seem like a missed opportunity, but it does provide an attractive name for the title, which is important for online marketing and to capture people browsing the Windows Store. With splatterings of green blood, it's more acceptable ratings wise, and the focus can be on a good competitive game. By going with a 'Zombie Attack' storyline, the focus can be purely on violence and good gameplay. One thing that is missing is the political tones of the Dredd stories. And I found a great game with very little 'grudd'. But then having Dredd on my smartphone was a temptation that I couldn't avoid. The iconic British comic creation rarely makes the jump to other media while retaining the core aspects of the character. There's always a certain amount of trepidation whenever I see Judge Dredd in something other than 2000AD.
