Humans don’t act until something is urgent, Terror of Hemasaurus asserts. Our time at university, leaving assignments until the very last minute, forces us to agree.
And so that’s why the Church of the Holy Lizard has brought calamity to the world. With its time machine, it planted the seed in our future for a giant creature to be born in the present. Its goal? Destroy everything. Only by doing that will people stand up and pay attention to the dangers of climate change, you see. And so begins Terror of Hemasaurus, a game about causing destruction on a massive scale and killing civilians, all in the name of creating a better future.
Comical story aside, Terror of Hemasaurus is very much a modern take on Rampage, the destruction-focused arcade series created by Midway in 1986. Playing as one of numerous oversized creatures, ranging from the titular Godzilla-like Hemasaurus to a giant sloth, your goal in each stage is to basically cause mayhem. Your goal might be to destroy a percentage of a town’s buildings, kill a set number of its civilians, or perform those tasks in a more specific way, such as by kicking cars or throwing your victims into the rotating blades of helicopters overhead.
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As with any of these types of games, it’s scarily good being bad, and so you’re likely to throw yourself into your task with gusto. We particularly enjoy how you can tactically destroy one side of a tall building, causing it to topple and destroy an adjacent building, causing absolute chaos. Kicking cars and civilians can also be fiendishly fun. And you can play with your prey if you want, seeing how long you can keep kicking them in the air before feasting on them to top up your health.
Two game modes are on offer: a story-led arcade mode featuring a decent number of stages, and an endless mode where stages are thrown at you until you can take no more. Both modes can be enjoyed alone or in up to four-player local co-op, too. And while a monster’s ultimate ability needs to be unlocked in arcade mode, in endless mode it’s available straight away, unlocking your full destructive potential.
Whether you’re a fan of the classic Rampage and want to play something like it on modern consoles and PC, or simply love fun arcade games full of accessible, over-the-top action, Terror of Hemasaurus is well worth checking out. It may look like a blast from the past but its gameplay is timeless. And it offers a hell of a lot of chaotic fun for its humble price.
Terror of Hemasaurus Review – GameSpew’s Score
