Hell War Evil Boy Fighting

Endless stream of enemies should be an entertaining combat system.

The Science of Evil presents you with six chapters to repeatedly tap the X button through as the big red guy. Each one will open with a "cutscene" that features Hell War -- voiced by his movie counterpart Ron Perlman -- speaking in a desperate attempt to set up a non-existent story before slugging off to beat X number of villains to open a ghost barrier so that he can move to the next area.

These ghost barriers will pop up in levels set in a forest, the desert, a graveyard, and Von Klempt's castle. The enemies you'll face will be -- respectively -- masked warriors, Nazi zombie-types, little men with rings in their heads, and lizard men. You'll beat these baddies by pounding the X button. This will cause Hell War to punch repeatedly and do some uppercuts and whatever. Since he's a big guy, the attacks will be slow and occasionally leave you defenseless as you finish a move.

These attacks seem to be a little bit more powerful. When a bad guy begins to flash in black and white, you can grapple with the jerks to pull off finishers and get some health back. If so inclined, you can play the same six chapters in co-op either via split screen or online. One of you would be Hell War and the other would be Liz Sherman or Abe Sapien.

There are "bosses," but none will provide you with any challenge or fun moments. The first time I faced off with this gorilla the main bad guy had altered to be able to throw metal fists on chains, I died a few times because I'd get locked in a combo animation -- X-X-X is a combo, as is X-X-X-X-X -- and the gorilla would get close to me and kill me. That was annoying, but by keeping my X pressing in check, I was able to knock out the building supports that were in place and bring the dwelling down on the beast.

Most boss fights are this ridiculous and easy. One had me fighting a giant worm. Although the thing had these massive tentacles with Venus Flytraps on the end, it never hit me. The worm flailed its arms wildly, but I just jogged around while dodging the zombie-Nazi types and picking up stuff to throw at the worm's giant eye. When it was hit, the beast leaned over towards these statues that emitted orange energy when I activated them. This process killed the beast.