Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard is a parody of the video game industry. Anyone having grown up with video games in the past 20 years will probably find something humorous in Eat Lead. Though developer `Vicious Cycle' is quite possibly making fun of its own heavily clichéd and flawed game.
The setting for Eat Lead is simple: Washed out video game actor, Matt Hazard is recruited by his employer for a comeback to recapture his former glory (and profits). Though once his adventure begins a series of events and a mysterious helper indicate that not all is at it seems. I'll leave out any major plot twists and spoilers. But suffice to say that anyone who has a shred of common sense will see the plot twist coming well in advance.
Graphically, Eat Lead is competent. The game won't win awards or wow anyone with its graphical prowess, however, that's not really the focus of the title.
Gameplay is accomplished via a 3rd person camera similar to Gears of War. Eat Lead even attempts to implement the same cover system featured in Gears though with mixed results. The cover and control system is really where Eat Lead shows its lack of refinement. Mainly the biggest problem lies in the cover system itself. Unlike in Gears, the cover system in Eat Lead is clunky. I found myself frequently fighting with the controls as much as with the enemy. Frequent and frustrating deaths abound because of the flawed cover system. Moving from cover to cover should be a refined experience - in Eat Lead it is not. Matt Hazard frequently gets hung up on the environment or simply doesn't perform the action you're attempting to do.
There are other curious development choices too. For example enemies can use grenades - though Matt Hazard cannot. Your only recourse to enemy grenades is to scramble to a different position. The game makes fun of itself for the lack of the feature... but frustratingly it's still not there, jokes or not. I get the humor aspect of it but ultimately the game suffers for it.
Another issue is the completely unbalanced difficulty. There are three selectable difficulties ranging from the Matt Hazard equivalent of Easy, Medium & Hard. I played through on the medium and pretty much flew through the game until certain choke points where the difficulty spikes. Boss battles are particularly difficult and cheaply frustrating.
Again, though the game is a parody it is squarely making fun of many of the mechanics it uses. At an early point in the game I realized that the basic premise of Eat Lead is to move from room to room, wiping out all the enemies along the way. That's basically all you get for the entire game. In that regard it differs very little from games like `Doom' where you're simply killing enemies, finding keys and moving on to the next level. Again, the game is making fun of a mechanic it employs and actually overuses.
The in game music is mainly comprised of heavy-metal tracks that serve the game well. A lot of the music is completely over the top - and it's meant to be. It has a humorous effect on the game that fits well. The voiceovers are similarly cheesy, over the top voice actors. One particularly memorable wizard you must rescue in the game is the Dungeons & Dragons equivalent of William Shattner. It's hilarious.
I think that the people who will enjoy Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard are those that accept that the game is highly flawed and are playing more for the comedic value than those looking for a good game. I did laugh out loud at various points throughout the game and that is saying something. If only the developer had been able to iron out some of the control and balance issues this game could've really been something.Get more detail about Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazzard.
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