Nerd Girl Thoughts

I’ve selected 15 games that I’ve never played from my Steam library and committed to playing each one for at least 45 minutes this month. Undead Horde is the second game I played from this project.

If you’re looking for a super serious, grimdark game about necromancy, Undead Horde is not that game. This is clear right from the beginning, when your character is broken out of his eternal prison by a wayward chicken, who you then kill, who you then bring back to un-life. It’s that kind of game.

In a world where all the undead have been imprisoned by the good paladins of the land, you are evil’s only hope for restoring the status quo. In the field, anything you kill is yours to raise and send out to do kill more things so you can raise more zombies. It looks like it should play like a fairly traditional ARPG, but the controls have definitely borrowed a bit from twin-stick shooters, which I found awkward using mouse and keyboard.

The graphics are more colorful than you might expect, but the game is also so silly, it works. The upper left shows your health, mana, XP, and a visual representation of how many minions you have in relation to how many you can have active at one time. There are fairly frequent portals which you can use to return to your crypt where you can endlessly summon minions from a series of statues that unlock as you kill enough of those types of enemies in the world.

There is also some loot, but it feels less impactful here than it does in similar games, because your undead minions are usually going to be the difference between successfully murdering a village, and having to run away, tail tucked between your legs. It’s sometimes awkward to make your way through the horde to stab a peasant or two, and at least in the early game, your mana is so limited it makes your non-resurrection magic feel nearly useless in a fight. It may get more interesting as the game progresses, as some of the early quests have you unlocking vendors for your sanctum which might open up more meaningful items.

Overall, Undead Horde is a charming little game that doesn’t seem to have a whole lot of depth to it, but it did hold my interest for about an hour before I felt like I needed a break. I’m not sure it’s anything I’m going to return to with a eye towards completion, but as I picked it up in a bundle, I’ve already gotten my money’s worth from it.