Corpse Killer: 25th Anniversary Edition [Nintendo Switch] | REVIEW

Developer Screaming Villains have seemingly made it their goal in life to remaster all of the cinematic FMV games of the 90s, with Night Trap and Double Switch already under their belt. Now they’re back with Corpse Killer: 25th Anniversary Edition, a title that has already been available on the PlayStation 4 and PC since 2019, but that has recently made its way to the Nintendo Switch.

Check out a gallery of screenshots down below:

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Look, let’s get the obvious out of the way immediately: Corpse Killer: 25th Anniversary Edition is a bad game. It was a bad game when it released back in 1994, it was a bad game when it re-released in 2019, and it’s a bad game now on the Nintendo Switch in 2021. That doesn’t mean it’s not worth your attention though, if only to laugh at how abysmal it really is.

Whilst titles like Night Trap and Double Switch were more about switching cameras, uncovering a mystery, and using traps to catch baddies, Corpse Killer: 25th Anniversary Edition takes a more action-orientated approach. It is set on a mysterious tropical island, where the villainous Dr Hellman is working on an army of zombies. It’s up you to bring them down, with cheesy and bad-acted FMV cutscenes (which I’m admittedly quite fond of in that ‘so bad it’s fun’ kinda way) pushing the story forward. The FMV sequences have actually been upgraded for HD consoles, but it’ll be hard to tell… they still look really grainy and poor.

The action also takes place across scrolling FMV sequences, with the player moving an aiming cursor around to shoot at zombies coming their way. It’s like your typical on-rails shooter really, except the zombies are cut and pasted real-life actors storming towards you with an unnatural trudge that looks absolutely ridiculous in-game. Honestly, you’ve got to see it to believe it – it’s so cringey and just looks like a gif file has been pasted over some video footage.

“It’s like your typical on-rails shooter really, except the zombies are cut and pasted real-life actors storming towards you with an unnatural trudge that looks absolutely ridiculous in-game.”

The zombies go down fuss free with a few shots, though your slow aiming cursor will make things difficult for you, meaning moving between targets can feel like a chore. You can collect improved ammunition to make life easier, but it doesn’t make the shooting any more fun. It’s just a repetitive cycle of going through levels, shooting the same old zombies over and over, and repeating until you beat the game. It’s dull and boring.

At least the ‘in your face’ zombie attacks were kinda cool, with each one taking up the full screen with a zombie you’ve got to blast away. Of course, it made it easier to see how bad the make-up effects for the game really were, but I still liked them. Some even caught me off-guard and gave me a little shudder…

It won’t take players much longer than an hour to get through Corpse Killer: 25th Anniversary Edition, which feels like a blessing. There are other difficulty options to tackle, but in honesty, you probably won’t want to play through more than once. There is plenty of bonus content to check out though, which is cool; things like videos, photos and so forth from the creation of the game that shows that the actors and developers did have a fun experience working on it. It almost makes me feel bad for giving the game such a hard time… almost.

Developer: Screaming Villains
Publisher: Screaming Villains, Limited Run Games
Platform(s): Nintendo Switch (Reviewed), PlayStation 4, PC
Website: http://www.screamingvillains.com/corpsekiller.html