Stubbs the Zombie in "Rebel without a Pulse" (xbx: 2005): Reviews

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Stubbs the Zombie in "Rebel without a Pulse"


8.0

based on 55 reviews
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based on 15 votes
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Cheat Code Central

Guaranteed to turn some heads, this third-person action game is an original IP by Bungie Studio veterans that uses an updated Halo engine to deliver a stirring tale of one man's hunger for love, justice...and brains. In this game, players take on the role of the rebel himself Stubbs, a wisecracking Zombie who takes on an ultra-modern city of the future using nothing but his own carcass and the weapons of his possessed enemies. The games tongue-in-cheek humor, innovative combat and strong storyline keep Stubbs the Zombies gameplay as bizarre and unpredictable as its namesake. On his quest, Stubbs lurches his way through numerous large and visually captivating indoor/outdoor environments in and around the gleaming city of Punchbowl, PA, a city built during the Eisenhower administration to show off the ultra-futuristic technology of the 21st century. Stubbs brain-eating adventure brings him through bustling shopping districts and verdant farmlands to battle mad scientists, rural militiamen and the world's deadliest barbershop quartet. His enemies have shotguns, tanks, and all manner of futuristic weaponry. All Stubbs has is his own rotting corpse, a distinct lack of pain or conscience, and the ability to turn foes into zombie allies. What begins as one zombies search for revenge quickly escalates into an all-out war between the living and the dead - but this time it's the zombie fighting for truth, justice and the redemption of true love. Yes, it's a love story too. [Aspyr Media]

PUBLISHER:	Aspyr Media
DEVELOPER:	Wideload Games
GENRE(S):	Third-Person Action, Adventure
PLAYERS:	2
ESRB RATING:	M (Mature)
RELEASE DATE:	October 17, 2005

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

Detroit Free Press

The chaos that ensues is as lighthearted as a blood-soaked zombiefest can be.

Gaming Horizon

A refreshingly original game. It looks wonderful, and its blend of humor and addictive gameplay is very entertaining; it will certainly keep you amused from beginning to end.

1UP

One of those rare games that manages to not only be creative and challenge many of the game industry norms, but do so within the confines of an extremely entertaining and polished game... One of the best games it's seen in quite some time.

Kombo

So if you're looking to play a great action/strategy game, or you just want to make up for the videogame genocide you have committed on all zombies, Stubbs the Zombie is the game for you. Just remember to bring a friend.

Electronic Gaming Monthly

Stubbs is required playing for anyone who craves more bold originality than our current gaming culture churns out. [Jan 2006, p.124]

My Gamer

It has its own brand of off color humor, and the gameplay is top notch. Again, I can’t say enough about the music. It’s so cool!

Gamer's Hell

While Stubbs is a well constructed, solid package, it doesn’t reach the stratospheric levels that its older brother "Halo" did. Wideload’s first title is nonetheless a fantastic game, as it takes an original premise and executes it with finesse and skill.

Play Magazine

There's a lot to be said about plowing through town with a zombie horde, biting brains. [Dec 2005, p.59]

GameBiz

Stubbs is a fun title but unfortunately is a bit too short.

Team Xbox

Fresh, fun, and completely unique. While the story pushing the events of the game wasn’t quite solid enough, and we weren’t always sure as to the current mission, the gameplay throughout is still solid.

Game Chronicles

The possession mechanic is hands-down (no pun intended) one of the coolest things I have ever seen in a game, and never before has farting in a crowd been so helpful. But make no mistake – Stubbs the Zombie is no Psychonauts.

Xbox Evolved

Combined with its humor, innovative gameplay, and presentation, Stubbs the Zombie is the most charming and playable title this year yet.

Game Over Online

Imaginative gameplay and a brilliant sense of humor. The main downside is how short the game is.

IGN

Stubbs is not an epic. It’s a game that is great to pick up at any time of the day, eat a few brains, and then move on to something else. It’s simple and easy to understand controls make it a title that can be popped into your Xbox whenever anyone is over and fire up the cooperative mode.

Gaming Nexus

While a bit on the short side, Stubbs is an example of the innovation we need to see more of in the gaming industry. It’s not a perfect game but it is certainly one of the funniest, entertaining games to come out in the last year or two.

DarkStation

What could be more satisfying than decapitating people and eating their brains? Stubbs sure knows how to have fun in this B-movie style zombie actioner.

GameSpy

As short as it is, Stubbs is an instant classic and should appeal to any gamer with even a slightly morbid sense of humor. It's the perfect Halloween rental.

Console Gameworld

Pass gas to stun your opponents, eat human brains, roll your own head around like a bowling ball, and use your own guts as a grenade in this great new action game.

Cheat Code Central

The best aspect of the game is the two-player co-op mode. It's so much more fun to play this game with another person.

Worth Playing

It's the best rental you'll ever make.

Xbox World Australia

A pretty addictive action game with a rather dark sense of humour that actually works well most of the time, and good comedy in video games can be very hard to come by.

Official Xbox Magazine

What makes Stubbs worth finishing is the wacky story and raunchy cutscenes that would've been censored into oblivion in the real 1959. [Holiday 2005, p.78]

Game Informer

For zombie fans, this one is a no-brainer - pun definitely intended. [Dec 2005, p.180]

Cincinnati Enquirer

Sure, it's not the most action-packed or finely tuned game, but there are enough clever attacks and humorous elements in Pulse to keep you playing through to see what other goodies - or appendages - they'll toss your way.

XGP Gaming

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.

GameSpot

Eating the brains of the living to form a massive army of the undead is extremely satisfying, often hilarious, and, unfortunately, almost painfully brief.

GamingTrend

A genius concept that is fun for a little while, then grows as stale as its protagonist. The ideas are perfect, but the execution is weak.

netjak

Although you won't get much replay value out of it, it's an awesome game to have on the shelf/in the CD folder for periodic replays. It doubles as an immensely fun two-player game as well- it's quite amusing to grab a buddy and go cranium-crunching.

GameZone

Stubbs makes his way to the finish line a little lethargic and humdrum. That’s not to say that Stubbs didn’t offer an entertaining night out on the town. I never knew eating someone’s brain could be fun.

Gamezilla!

If your stomach is strong and the "Evil Dead" movies are your thing, this should be right up your alley.

MS Xbox World

The sheer novelty factor of the game wears quite thin very quickly as the game is basically the same throughout bar some minor deviances here and there.

Loaded Inc

It’s not the deepest of games and its limited arsenal does curtail the experience but overall it’s still a fun chomp.

Talk Xbox

I really wanted to love this game, I truly did, but it was just way too repetitive for me. Walking around slowly and eating brains is only fun for so long.

Da Gameboyz

Stubbs the Zombie: Rebel Without a Pulse is for the gamer looking for some mindless fun with tons of carnage.

Total Video Games

In the same vein as last year's "Destroy All Humans" (also from THQ, but developed by Pandemic), Stubbs the Zombie is very much a one trick pony. Though there is a consistent vein of humour running throughout ever aspect of the game from the visuals to the soundtrack, the dialogue, and the gameplay itself, Stubbs does stuff a tad from repetitiveness.

Sydney Morning Herald

It's a brief ride and the action can become repetitive, but the sharp humour keeps you smiling.

games(TM)

Stubbs deserves to succeed, just to prove to publishers and retailers that new IPs and obscure ideas aren’t something to fear. [Mar 2006, p.118]

Thunderbolt

Stubbs might be left craving a few more brains and he might have wished that he could have done a little bit more than just feast and fart, but I think that by the time Punchbowl and love have been conquered, Stubbs is reasonably satisfied with the second chance he was given for life and love.

Gamestyle

Packed full of limitations and issues, the sense of fun and destruction overcomes the majority of flaws on display.

GamerFeed

It's a good game overall, but it does have a tendency to become quite repetitive, and the gameplay isn't exciting enough to propel this title into the must buy category.

Yahoo! Games

Thankfully, the game's humor and action overcomes the technical glitches. The brain-crunching animations are so much fun that, coupled with the peoples' cries for help, it's easy to get lost in Punchbowl, even as you realize that there's not much there.

Adrenaline Vault

It's short and sometimes repetitive game play with limited multiplayer doesn't exactly ooze with replay value.

GamePro

While Stubbs the Zombie is rambunctiously fun, the game engine is extremely dated. Stubbs the Zombie is riddled with clipping, questionable AI, and if you thought The Master Chief's jump was slow in Halo, Stubbs is even slower.

Extreme Gamer

A definite rent, the reason I cannot recommend this for everyone is because you really need to enjoy the B-Movie substance and Stubbs is short.

Game Revolution

Great style and shambling zombie hordes make for some terrific undead moments, but it’s a shame there are only a few of them in the game.

GameShark

What I like best about this entire game is the music. It is perfect for this game, as recent artists like Death Cab for Cutie, Cake, and the Flaming Lips, remix and redo old songs. Oranger redid the song called Mr. Sandman, and with the punk rock style, makes it seems like an instant classic all over again.

IC-Games

It’s repetitive and lacks any kind of real long lasting game play. This is more of a game to play to pass a bit of time.

Jolt Online Gaming UK

It’s too short, too easy, way too repetitive, and the level design is left wanting.

AceGamez

I'd suggest a weekend rental rather than picking it up full price. And while it might be short-lived, there's nothing quite like leading a horde of zombies around to convert every last citizen you can lay your decomposing hands on! Say it with me folks - "BRAINS!"

Boomtown

If the thought of using noxious farts to temporarily disable mad mid-western farmers at Knobb Cheese Farm (where the password to get in is cornhole) has you laughing uncontrollably, then Stubbs the Zombie will keep you entertained from beginning to end (assuming your tendency to drool doesn’t short out your controller).

G4 TV

Honestly, the gameplay in Stubbs isn’t bad. It’s just not close to as cool as it ought to be.

PALGN

As different, interesting and funny as Stubbs is, clunky controls are annoying, poor design and many dubious decisions are intolerable at market price and simply, an ordinary game is an ordinary game.

Edge Magazine

Wideload has placed a welcome knee in the groin of the status quo, but by taking its subject too lightly it’s also failed to turn an adventurous prototype into a durable production. [Christmas 2005, p.102]

NTSC-uk

A game that runs out of steam far too quickly for its own good. What begins as an intriguing and fun game rapidly goes downhill.

EuroGamer

Average execution, terribly repetitive combat, lots of reasonable ideas that don't quite work, a general lack of cohesion: it's not diabolical, but it's far from great.

The average user rating for this game is 8.0 (out of 10) based on 15 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

James H. gave it an8:
Great game, funny, the insane mode is almost as hard as legendary mode in halo (so if you found the game too short maybe you should consider making it harder). That said, playing it on coop will definately lead to a short game because as in halo you can do the "respawn" cheeze that keeps any part from being that difficult. Of course, short is relative, at coop the game takes about 8 hours to beat. All the game really needed was a way to extend its life, as the gameplay in it is great. Anything, such as keeping score to the number of brains eaten or kills in a level that could add some competition to coop would had helped (you can kill your buddy if you feel like it... hmmm). For most people this is a must rent at blockbuster, where you get to enjoy it for two weeks.

Stubbs G. gave it a7:
I rented this with a friend and played it on Co-op mode and we beat in two days. This is a very funny and amusing game. The setting and humor are great, and the music is really really funny. "Mr Sandman" "Lollipop" and others. I just wish they had "If I only had a brain" on there. This game is really short, and repetitive, but its a great rental (wouldn't even recommend buying it). I don't understand Sub Zero's gripe, there's not much to figure out. You can hit, and eat people's brains, then use guns and stuff of people you possess later. And yes, you fart, throw your spleen, throw your hand to possess people and bowl with your head. It's great. The strangest part is that you don't understand your characters "motive" until the very end. I wish there were more mini games like the dancing one, so funny. A great love story this is.

Mark B. gave it a9:
Great Game. Hilarious story and definitely a fresh game. Must Play this one. My only gripe is that it's too short, I could have played this game for another week!

FPS Master gave it a6:
Most repetitive and boring game to ever grace the Xbox. The fact that they just had to put "made with the Halo engine" logo on the box should tell you it isn't worth buying because they knew without that no one would care. Just like Advent Rising's "million dollar contest" logo, the game wasn't good enough to sell on it's own meris but instead they had to try to give you incentive to buy it. Rent this garbage at most. The grainy filter over the entire game will make you hate it if nothing else.

Charlie M. gave it a9:
I bought this as recommended by a game store owner and it had me instantly calling friends over to check it out. Incredibly funny game, brings out a much needed zombie sympathy and has a very distinctive and clever look and feel.

Sub Zero gave it a3:
Most ridiculous game ever. I could not even figure out what the hell the point of the game is. There seems to only be a single button for attacking, one button that "eats peoples brains" (how stupid.) and a button that farts (wtf?) They don't teach you a single thing about how to play, they just expect you to walk around and have fun eating peoples brains for some reason.. Maybe a 4 year old might think its funny, but I think its lame. 3 out of 10 for this wack game.