Stubbs the Zombie in "Rebel Without a Pulse"
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| Stubbs the Zombie in "Rebel Without a Pulse" | |
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| Developer(s) | Wideload Games |
| Publisher(s) | Aspyr Media |
| Engine | Halo engine |
| Version | 1.02 Windows (2006-05-15) 1.01 Macintosh |
| Platform(s) | Xbox, Mac OS X, Windows, Xbox 360 (as a downloadable title) |
| Release date | October 18, 2005 (Xbox US) November 21, 2005 (Xbox Europe, Mac/PC) May 19, 2008 (XBLM) |
| Genre(s) | Action |
| Mode(s) | Single player, Co-op multiplayer (Xbox version only) |
| Rating(s) | ESRB: Mature (17+) BBFC: 15 |
| Media | DVD (1) |
Stubbs the Zombie in "Rebel Without a Pulse", or simply Stubbs the Zombie, is a third-person zombie game developed by Wideload Games, published by Aspyr Media, and built on the Halo engine. The title is a play on Rebel Without a Cause. It was released on October 18, 2005 for the Xbox, and was released for Windows and Mac OS X in November that same year. Finally, the game was released on February 10, 2006 in Europe.[1] Later, the Valve Corporation made the game available for purchase via Steam on May 17, 2007.[2] This title became available on Microsoft's Xbox Live Marketplace as an Xbox Originals for 1200 pts. ($15USD) on May 19, 2008.[3]
Contents |
[edit] Story
In 1933, Stubbs is a travelling salesman during the Great Depression trying to eke out a living. However, according to the game manual, Stubbs has had a string of bad luck since he was born, and was thereby unable to get people to buy what he was trying to sell them, life insurance. After making love to Maggie Monday, she became impregnated. Stubbs was then murdered by Maggie's father, Otis Monday, and was then buried in a remote Pennsylvania field. Maggie Monday later gave birth to Stubbs' son, naming him Andrew Monday. He would later become a playboy industrialist responsible for the creation of the city of Punchbowl.
The game takes place in the fictional city of Punchbowl, Pennsylvania at its opening ceremony in 1959. Stubbs rises from his grave and decides to get his revenge by eating the brains of the inhabitants of Punchbowl, thus creating his own army of the undead, creating increasing amounts of havoc as the undead clash with the various militant factions of the area. During the chaos, Stubbs kills Otis Monday by blowing up his house after a brief reunion. Shortly after this in a spoof of War movies Stubbs stands infront of an American flag hanging from a barn wall and gives a speech to his zombies. Though the speech consists only of the word "Brains" said in many tones with limited gestures his Zombies apparently understand him well enough to let loose a cheer of 'BRAINS" before shuffling away.
Stubbs eventually reunites with Maggie Monday and the two lovingly embrace, with Stubbs promptly eating her brain (whether she was willing or not is uncertain). Andrew tries to avenge his half-destroyed, zombie-infested city and his mother by killing Stubbs behind a force field. Stubbs, however, destroys the force field and looms toward Andrew, but Maggie, now a zombie, convinces him to spare him. It is implied that the two zombies declare themselves married to each other. The game ends with Stubbs and Maggie sailing off on a small rowboat, kissing as Andrew and all of Punchbowl are destroyed by a nuclear bomb, and they both "live" happily ever after.
[edit] Setting
Punchbowl is a retro-futuristic city that resembles the future as portrayed by the media in 1950s. It includes hovercars, laser weaponry, a monorail, and robots, but no computers. Punchbowl was envisioned and funded by Andrew Monday and created by his teams of scientists, led by former Nazi scientist Dr. Hermann Wye. The game begins when Stubbs rises from his burial site under a patch of grass in an urban area of the city. He appears during Punchbowl's opening ceremony, and is immediately greeted by a robotic, female, tour-guide called a guide-bot. Stubbs soon begins to wreak havoc on the citizens and police officers of Punchbowl, travelling to several locations in and around the city, such as the plaza, a futuristic greenhouse, a police station, Punchbowl's Shopping District, a mall, a farm outside of Punchbowl, and a large electric dam.
Stubbs' only apparent long-term goal (besides the destruction of Punchbowl) is to resume a romantic relationship with Mrs. Maggie Monday, Andrew Monday's mother. In his search of Mrs. Monday, Stubbs goes on to unwittingly uncover the cause of his death, and in the process of satisfying his bodily functions and cravings for brains manages to kill those responsible.
[edit] Gameplay
Stubbs gameplay is unusual because the player plays as a zombie, rather than a human, and the primary goal is therefore to kill and eat the brains of humans. Eating brains gives back a certain amount of lost health to the player as well as converting humans into zombies, causing them to fight alongside the player. The player also has the option of beating an enemy to death with melee strikes to transform them into zombies.
Stubbs' zombie state prevents him from wielding any conventional hand held weapons, and instead wields a variety of improvised weaponry and combat techniques:
- Severed arms - Used as improvised clubs. Procured by forcefully tearing them off. They wear out after 3 hits, and kill most anyone. The first chainsaw man's can be used until he dies though.
- Unholy Flatulence - Stubbs' powerful "farts". A useful byproduct from digesting brains that temporarily incapacitates his enemies within a small radius and damages those in a still smaller radius. Useful for tanks. When done nearby, you can get the men out, and Stubbs can get in.
- Gut Grenade - Stubbs' own pancreas that he pulls out of his abdomen. It sticks to those it is thrown at and eventually explodes on its own, but can also be triggered to explode by Stubbs himself. It regrows when Stubbs eats brains.
- Stubbs' hand - Stubbs' own detachable left hand. Used for scouting, operating controls and possessing individual humans. Humans possessed by Stubbs' hand have their weapons at Stubbs' disposal as well as an applicable secondary attack and are necessary for infiltration, operating stationary weapons, and driving vehicles. There are two modes a possessed individual can move, which are attack mode and nonchalant mode, and if nobody witnesses the individual getting possessed then no one will attack that possessed person unless it attacks or stops moving in a nonchalant mode, which is a much slower pace than the attack mode. Conversely, if the humans in the room don't yet know the character's possessed state, neither will the zombies, who will attack the possessed character until he dies or blows his cover. Stubbs is vulnerable while controlling someone else, and his hand can not possess those who wear protective helmets.
- Stubbs' head - Stubbs' own detached head. Referred to as his Sputum Head in game. Used in a manner akin to a bowling ball. Eventually explodes on its own, but can also be triggered to explode by Stubbs himself. Aside from the very powerful explosion, the head sprays sputum as it rolls, effectively converting whoever it rolls by into a zombie.
All of the aforementioned improvised weapons, excluding Stubbs' hand, have a chance of converting the humans they kill into zombies. Stubbs can herd zombies which are in range by whistling. Since there is a limit to how many zombies will follow him at a time, Stubbs can guide the rest by sending whole groups of zombies in a direction with a single shove. Zombies, both followers and wanderers alike, will attack other humans that they notice and will turn them into zombies as well if they eat their brains or beat them to death. An enemy that fires upon a zombie in a group will attract the attention of all the rest of the zombies, which makes the zombie-herding technique of shoving groups of wanderers useful in assaulting a dangerous gathering of enemies with a horde of zombies. Crowds of zombies serve as a great shield when approaching enemies armed with ranged weapons and are needed for sowing the necessary chaos and confusion into a difficult melee.
Stubbs can also drive a wide variety of vehicles, such as cars, tractors and tanks.
[edit] Stubbs' enemies
Stubbs has a variety of enemies, most of which are hostile towards him. His enemies include:
- Civilians - Usually unarmed, and often unhostile, but males occasionally carry improvised weapons such as hammers, crowbars, shovels, axes, baseball bats, pipe wrenches and even fish as a weapon.
- Scientists - When first encountered they are unarmed, later they are armed with rayguns or sonic pulse carbines.
- Police detectives - Armed with revolvers
- Police officers - Armed with revolvers and wrist mounted stun gauntlets which double as police radios.
- Riot Police - Carry riot shields and wear helmets, and are armed with batons. Some also wear gas masks. As an in-joke, their shields are marked with the line "Welcome to Punchbowl".
- Hillbillies (Militia) - Militia called the "Quaker State Irregulars" made up of light-weight old-timers, strong middle-agers, and enormous mountain men armed with long-range muskets, double barreled shotguns, and chainsaws, respectively.
- Soldiers - Armed with M14 rifles, M3 Carbines with infrared scopes, M1 bazookas and grenades.
- Robots - Attack with stun guns if provoked. Unlike humans, they cannot be zombified, and will instead explode once they have taken enough damage.
- Barber Shop Security guard - Mr. Monday's personal bodyguards that wear barbershop quartet garb to avoid giving the notion that Punchbowl is unsafe. Armed with the various ray guns commonly carried by scientists, along with large RPG-like rayguns. They are occasionally seen wearing jetpacks and/or singing melodic tunes.
[edit] Vehicles
The following Vehicles are usable by Stubbs in the course of the game.
- The Sod 'O' Mobile - A Hover vehicle with mounted fertiliser cannon.
- Hover Truck - Used by Punchbowl Dam maintenance personnel.
- Tractor (AKA Impala) - A modified Tractor used by the Quaker State Irregulars which sports several large blades mounted on the front.
- Willys MB - Conventional US Army Jeep.
- M26 Pershing Tank - Conventional Tank used by Army Forces later in the game, Stubbs can use both the cannon and the turret machine gun.
[edit] Reception
Metacritic gave the XBOX version of the game a metascore of 75 from 55 reviews. The Windows PC version earned a metascore of 72 from 17 reviews.
[edit] Cannibalism controversy
Stubbs the Zombie in "Rebel Without a Pulse", along with F.E.A.R., encountered controversy in November 2005 regarding cannibalism in games.[4]
NIMF's David Walsh and US Senator Joe Lieberman also criticized the game as "cannibalistic" and harmful to children underage. Senator Lieberman stated "It's just the worst kind of message to kids".
The following is a response from Wideload, the game company who created Stubbs the Zombie regarding the "cannibalism" story:
"The current kerfuffle in the US media about Stubbs the Zombie can be summed up in one word: Semantics."[citation needed]
[edit] Soundtrack
Stubbs the Zombie: The Soundtrack contains twelve specially-commissioned covers of ’50s- and '60s-era songs (excluding the earlier written "If I only had a Brain" from The Wizard of Oz) heard in the game, performed by Cake, The Dandy Warhols, Death Cab for Cutie, The Flaming Lips, Ben Kweller, The Raveonettes, Oranger, and others. The thirteenth track, "The Living Dead" by Phantom Planet, is the album's lone original song.
[edit] Notes
- ^ Wideload Press quote. Wideload.com. Retrieved on 2006-09-05.
- ^ Stubbs the Zombie invades stream. steampowered.com. Retrieved on 2006-09-05.
- ^ "Xbox Originals 'Stubbs' and 'Gauntlet' are now available" (May 19 2008).
- ^ "Video game critics take aim at cannibalism" (November 29 2005). MSNBC.
