School Girl Zombie Hunter is a Third-Person Shooter set in a Japanese school during a zombie outbreak. Over time, we play as all of the five student survivors with each of them containing different talents, such as being able to run for a longer length of time or simply not receiving a knock-back effect when hit. The campaign is structured across many small levels that contain the plot, involving them doing all they can to escape. Each level has you play as a specific character, so you will play as all of them eventually, whether you want to or not.
For such a simple premise, a shocking amount of cutscenes are stuffed into this game. The stages themselves are on a timer of ten minutes, and you’ll usually complete them far before that. It is no exaggeration that around 60-70% of your total time in a level will be spent twiddling your thumbs and merely watching said cutscenes. That in itself wouldn’t be nearly as soul-draining if it were at the very least entertaining. Sadly, it is exactly that. Each of the five characters are generic to the extreme, and the game takes itself far, far too seriously. There are a few cheeky moments, though the vast majority of it is forced drama and pointless filler dialogue.
Sitting through all the cutscenes was a test of patience, though you can skip all of them and get straight to the action. Depending on the girl you are playing as you have a default weapon type equipped at the start and a unique passive ability. None of their skills set them apart too much, and you can’t even select the character you want unless it is a mission you’ve already completed. More weapons can be found through random loot drops, and it will be unlocked for each girl, none having any weapon restrictions. You can carry up to five guns in total, and with each character already being so similar, equipping all five of them ends up being pointless busywork as you will likely end up taking the same weapons for each one.
It controls like your typical third-person shooter and features a small stamina meter for both melee attacks & sprinting. As you may expect from fighting a zombie, shooting it in the head is far more efficient than shooting its body. By default, we start off with a few healing items, an explosive laser trap, and a grenade. The laser trap is rarely of use unless it is a stationary mission that tasks you with defending something, as zombies just materialize out of thin air to surround you, making it useless in other missions. Setting it up also takes a bit of time and will leave you wide open to get smacked in the back of the head by one of the running zombies.
There is an infinite amount of ammo so you can fire away to your heart’s content. The real trick here comes from trying to time when to reload and swapping to different weapons when the situation gets hairy. Playing on Normal will rarely give you a challenge, and switching over to Hard will require you to start from the very first level again. That annoying inclusion is something to keep in mind before starting. Depending on the level, you will either be alone or with other AI-controlled teammates. The AI makes for good zombie bait as you enjoy taking the undead down without a scratch, but do not expect much of anything from them. You can also play coop online, though you will need to bring a friend along as the multiplayer community is dead.
The AI for your enemies are not much better and can barely navigate the environments. That may be the main reason why they tend to spawn them a few feet from the player. However, unless you are trapped in a room by a magical force field, you do not have to kill them. The only two reasons to do so is if a mission requires a certain amount of kills or if it is a special zombie that can catch up to you. They will never stop spawning in, and since you are always on a ten-minute timer, it is best not to waste much time. Killing them does net you more XP during the end, yet leveling up only has a very minor effect on your health and stamina. None of the weapons are level locked either, which are the only things that matter stat-wise.
To its credit, this title does have a few rather cool enemy types like the cat-dog looking monster straight out of Silent Hill or a zombie that crawls on ceilings then flails its long neck around to hit you. It can get intense, especially when you are trying to defend something and are desperately trying to keep them at bay while your other four AI teammates shoot at nothing in particular. When things get overwhelming, you do have a trump card up your sleeve. You see, when you take off your clothes and throw them, the zombies will be attracted to your schoolgirl scent and ignore everything else as they go for a quick sniff. No that is not a joke, and interestingly enough you can order your teammates to do the same for a quick breather from the zombie threat.
Later on, you can take a shower and depending on how long you’ve worn your undergarments in-game, can use that as a much more powerful version of clothes throwing. To do so, you need to go into the menus, and you will be treated to a cut-scene of whichever girl you choose taking a shower. It is not an ‘adult-oriented’ game, though with its camera angles during that, it is bordering on it without actually showing nudity. Think of this feature as you may, but it at least is unique. The weapons themselves, on the other hand, are all relatively boring and some effects that are supposed to be beneficial end up being a nuisance. Chief among these are the auto-aiming perk some guns may have. It, in theory, helps you aim but makes it all but impossible to get a headshot and may be insistent on targeting the wrong enemy.
Another weapon perk that proves a hindrance is the Knockback. A weapon with this effect will cause an enemy to fly off his feet. It doesn’t sound too bad until you realize how floaty the physics are and you find yourself chasing that single zombie all over the place trying to land shot after shot hoping he will die soon. It is akin to chasing a leaf around with a leaf blower strapped to your face. Unlike the auto-aim perk, it can be useful at least. You can knock down a charging enemy and switch to a different gun, if you know, don’t want to use a weapon that would blow off its head in the first place. Every weapon is split up into different categories, such as SMGs, Rifles, and Pistols. There is nothing outlandish or particularly fun to use, it all comes down to stats and hoping the perks it comes with won’t ruin it.
Finding an objectively better gun is not all that satisfying either due to then having to equip it on every character. Don’t get me wrong, it is a mostly functional gameplay system at play here. It is how it is handled that drags it down. Having to spend most of your time watching terrible cutscenes and joylessly swapping things out in menus far outweigh the time you will spend playing. With most missions consisting of merely running to a specific location or slaying a prerequisite amount of zombies, both lasting a very short amount of time, you never get the chance to get into some kind of mindless flow. At the very least they could have offered some rewards for getting a good grade in a level, but nope, all the visual customization prizes like clothes are obtained by searching for hidden crows in a stage.
On the topic of the hidden crows, one character has the unique ability of having them marked on her mini-map, which is arguably the only worthwhile skill to have as the others are incredibly minor. Not being able to pick a character unless you are replaying the mission is far from ideal, and all for the sake of telling an incredibly boring story. That’s the thing with this title, the premise sounds goofy and fun, yet it is so poorly cobbled together. It doesn’t even use the b-movie feel of its low budget to its advantage like EDF to create something quirky and charming. School Girl Zombie Hunter is by far one of the dullest experiences I have had playing video games in quite some time. At 40 US dollars, you could do far better.
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