NeverDead Critic Reviews

NeverDead is a cool and solid hack'n'slay like the good old Devil May Cry games. The crazy setting and the immortal hero will not appeal to every player, but I like the new and fresh gameplay mechanics.

Even if NeverDead isn't quite the quirky prize it might have been, it's certainly an idiosyncratic (and often one-legged) dance through entertainingly outlandish territory.

This nutty shooter offers some zany and creative gameplay-mechanics and a refreshing old-school experience. Unfortunatley our enjoyment was held back by camera issues and a frustrating lack of variety. In the end the game feels more like a grind than an epic adventure.

It's not dead on arrival, but it never reaches its true potential. It's not enough to stand out, but Neverdead will satisfy those willing to try something different.

A decent action-game that resembles Devil May Cry's gameplay in many ways, with less style and a single, interesting new idea that Rebellion, unfortunately, didn't develop as it deserved.

An unusually innovative combat system that, although lacking the game structure to properly exploit it, still offers some enjoyably bizarre entertainment.

NeverDead's heart is in the right place: committed to entertaining you, no matter the cost - even if it means losing your head a few too many times along the way.

NeverDead is a unique game that is marred mostly by its poor design choices. Still, I found myself really enjoying the ridiculous premise and limb severing game play.

The problem with NeverDead is that while its Japanese design (the characters, the story) is really good, the game mechanics implemented by the British team are not.

Fun though it is, NeverDead is several good ideas short of fulfilling its conceptual promise.

We wanted NeverDead to be a good game, because it was trying to achieve something different. But the game is frustrating and sometimes even boring.

NeverDead feels like gaming's equivalent of Buckaroo Banzai, or Phantom of the Paradise, or any one of those weird B-movies you used to find lurking in the midnight spaces of an old video store and which you often loved for their unlikely concepts or their wilful obscurity more than their actual quality. NeverDead hasn't been given room to get the most out of its strange ideas, but it's still plucky, warm-hearted and genuinely idiosyncratic.

NeverDead is a prime example of a game that conjures an excellent premise, but then destroys it with poor design choices. We don't play games to be exhausted, we play them to have fun, and there are just too many moments in this game that feel like a chore.

Neverdead is a classic example of an interesting premise falling flat on execution. A brilliant exercise in game physics and boss battles, this game is weighed down mostly by the mundane combat across nearly a dozen dull and uninspired levels.

Enjoyable highs interspersed with crushing lows make NeverDead as inventive as it is frustrating.

NeverDead's immortality mechanic is certainly intriguing, as are its destructible environments. You may even develop an attachment to Bryce by the end of his quest. If the combat was more involving, and the destruction more deliberate, the developers at Rebellion might have been on to something. For now, in trying to tread new ground, NeverDead's greatest success is in finding the middle.

If I'm being brutally honest, aside from the dismemberment and decapitation mechanics, NeverDead is a goulash of sterile platitudes and worn-out stereotypes. It's great for a few chuckles right out of the box, but once you've been playing for a while, the game's shortcomings start to pile up pretty quickly. Perhaps my disappointment was magnified because the game had so much potential, but ended up being the same game we all played numerous times ten years ago.

NeverDead had a good chance to bring something new in the videogame market but it failed due to an awkward development. Rest in peace Bryce.

The tale of the immortal demon hunter is far from fresh and presented mostly uninspired, but the dismemberment concept works remarkably well, although it just scratches on the surface of its potential - a problem shared by almost every aspect of the game. And how Rebellion managed to mess up the shooting mechanics is beyond me.

NeverDead does try something new and original, but its mechanics are unpolished and poorly implemented.