Bad Day LA

By Kristan Reed Published 18 August, 2006

Bad game, ya?

Let's start at the beginning. Terrorist maniacs have flown a jet airliner into the gridlocked 105 freeway in Los Angeles, causing death and destruction on a massive scale. But it's not just the plane's impact that causes mayhem, but their toxic cargo which turns everyone into puking zombies in a matter of seconds.

No one said this had to be a serious, responsible game based on the horrifying events that unfold from a terrorist attack, so instead we've got a rather crude and curious attempt to send up the "fear culture" running rampant in the United States. Look! That dude's on fire and this other guy's still trying to get through on his mobile phone! How we laughed.

With political incorrectness at the forefront of the game's manifesto, pretty much anything goes as American McGee and co. attempt to cram in every blockbuster disaster movie into one ridiculous bad day. Seen through the eyes of a trolley-pushing, smack-talking homeless dude, you go from insulting commuters on the busy freeway to becoming some sort of unlikely anti-hero in the time it takes for a 747 to attempt to use the 105 as a landing strip.

Bad flatulence day

'Bad Day LA' Screenshot 1

We were pretty speechless, too.

One green noxious cloud of flaming death later, it's third-person action game time, where zombies roam the freeway, the injured lie dying on the tarmac, looters run riot in happy panic, and fire extinguishers never run out. You basically become the "ultimate politically incorrect anti-hero", putting out flaming citizens, administering first aid, and, er, squirting your never-ending fire extinguisher to cure zombies from their frothing affliction.

Beyond the deliciously stylish opening cut-scenes (which suggest we should prepare for refreshing genius) the game's opening demo level reveals something far less impressive than the tenuous but bold and intriguing premise has been suggesting all this time. Any game that tries to parody disaster had better be bloody good, but Bad Day LA quickly reveals itself to be a major letdown on just about every level.

The demo kicks off with the central protagonist (once a successful Hollywood agent who's lost self respect, we're told) running around the wrecked freeway, performing the aforementioned basic tasks as instructed: pick up that gauze, use the first aid on that injured lady, pick up that fire extinguisher, put out that flaming guy and his car. Pick up that tyre iron, bust through the central reservation, whack that zombie. And so on.

Zom Bomb Com

'Bad Day LA' Screenshot 2

Press X to extinguish your dreams.

You quickly realise (with some puzzlement) that it's actually far easier to deal with the zombies staggering around by simply squirting your fire extinguisher at them. It 'cures' them. You don't know why, but it does, and it's a whole lot more effective than trying to club them to death with a tyre iron. After that, you realise that your little red squirty friend recharges itself every time you stop using it, and has other uses, too, such as scaring off looters.

Eventually, though, you have to escort a sick child to an ambulance - which happens to be flanked by terrorists who laugh in the face of your squirty attack. In time-honoured videogaming fashion, though, you swiftly get a shotgun to deal with them, and the chance to pick up the machineguns that get left behind. Soon enough, you work your way around the numerous barriers of toxic gas, piled-up car wrecks, scale neighbourhood fences and end up at said ambulance - only to find that the key to it is with the other member of the crew, who's dealing with five 911 calls.

So, then you have to seek out various people caught up in the hectic nightmare; a man dangling from a window, another being savaged by dogs, not to mention a heart attack victim and some poor sod trapped under a tree. While all this is going on, you have to keep an eye on the threat level that you pose to other people. If you continually kill innocents, for example, you clock up 'frownies' which contribute to a rising threat level. As it creeps up, the randomly generated populace start to attack you indiscriminately, chipping away at your health and posing a nuisance to you progress. To get it back down again, you have to perform good deeds, such as getting the zombie count down (either by killing or curing them), putting fires out, stopping looters and so on.

It's the end of the world as we know it...

'Bad Day LA' Screenshot 3

The best bit of the demo is when he quips 'They're not the only ones'.

It all probably sounds quite cool, but the reality is a world away from what you initially expect. Alarmingly, within the first few minutes it's startlingly obvious that Bad Day LA is shaping up to to be little more than a standard third-person action game with a few novelty elements that stack up to very little, if we're totally honest. It's inescapably ruined by truly awful combat mechanics, unexciting environments (full of arbitrary barriers) and gameplay which appears to consist of little more than a series of perfunctory tasks. Kill X of Y, cure five zombie citizens, take the NPC from X to Y. As an opening level we expected great things from this great looking game, but came away aghast. Sure, it looks pretty cool in the gameplay clips and the screenshots, and it scores bonus points initially for its unique visual appeal, but it's let down by poor animation and a fairly bland feel. Clever cel-shading techniques can't disguise the lack of effort in some of the environments, and on a PC it's glaringly apparent.

Another issue that many will have with the demo is the standard of the audio - in particular the irritating whiny voice of the main character and the tedious one-liners he spouts. It might be a good approximation of the kind of morons you come across in LA, but it doesn't make them tolerable or humorous. It's just a grating representation of how vile certain elements of society are. Leave it be, it's not entertainment.

We're still leaving the door slightly ajar for Bad Day LA to impress us when the full game makes its way to PC and Xbox later this year, but the signs aren't very promising at this stage.

Bad Day: LA is coming to Europe via Lexicon Entertainment in Q4 2006 on PC and Xbox. The PC demo weighs in at 260MB. Also be sure to visit our archive of movies and screenshots.

Picture of Kristan.

About Kristan Reed

Kristan is a former editor of Eurogamer, dad, Stone Roses bore and Norwich City supporter who sometimes mutters optimistically about Team Silent getting back together.

Read more articles from Kristan by visiting the Kristan Reed archive page.

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Comments (34) Latest comment 6 years ago

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  • UncleLou #1 6 years ago

    Yeah, the demo is baaaaad. Annoying voice-acting, toilet humour, level barriers everywhere, bland mechanics. Even the shothgun isn't any fun.

  • krudster #2 6 years ago

    Worth a download, yeah. Make your own minds up!

  • The_Foo_Fighter #3 6 years ago

    Although I like the artistic style, the execution is woeful. Kind of reminds me of an old Beavis and Butthead game I played eons ago.

  • McBradders #4 6 years ago

    But Alice was soooooo great.

    :/

  • Altrezia #5 6 years ago

    Glad it wasn't just me that hated the demo. Couldn't even change the resolution?

    Rubbish. We need good games, not masses of rubbish ones.

  • smelly #6 6 years ago

    Yeah, had high hopes for this as i enjoyed both alice and scrapland, and the trailer video for it looks ace!

    I was kinda hoping for a free roaming gta style game.

    And I got a tired 3rd person demo which plays like an old ps1 game. Invisible walls? FFS! How come I can jump and run over one crashed car and not another? Shoddy!

    Still, not quite as bad as FEAR though.

  • Darren #7 6 years ago

    Yuck, the graphics look very poor for a PC game. Maybe I've seen too much of Saints Row on the Xbox 360 but they do look very nasty...

  • El_MUERkO #8 6 years ago

    The cut scenes were great, I get the feeling it should have been a cartoon movie and not a game.

  • S.J.Rogers #9 6 years ago

    Tried the PC demo last night as I had high hopes for this game.

    Some aspects of the game are good:

    1: It looks different and is a refreshing change from every other game that is trying to look just like the real world (Games are meant to be an escape from reality).

    2: Some of the things the main character does and say’s are Very funny and good humoured (I like toilette humour).

    3: Game-play felt good and seemed to work well with the Keyboard and mouse.


    Some things were Bad though:

    1: The sound is very bad, it was to quiet when the main character was talking and just sounded badly recorded.

    2: I like to enjoy a bit of free roaming in any game and understand that there have to be limitations on where your character can move but this is awful. You can only follow set routes and have to follow the set game plot line directly (No wondering about to explore your environment allowed).

    3: As the article explained your primary weapon of choice is your Fire Extinguisher, It never runs out and cures Zombies.

    4: Add on to 3: You are not told as too why this Extinguisher is the ideal tool to cure the Zombies it just does (Very odd, I like a bit of story line)...

    There are more good points and bad points to this game but as the demo is free and I have work to do download it yourself and give it a try...

    It is worth trying the free demo as it is quite funny..!

  • smelly #10 6 years ago

    Cant believe people are moaning about the graphics. Graphics dont matter if the game is there. In this case it isnt.

    >It is worth trying the free demo as it is quite funny..!

    Were we playing the same game?

    Let me guess, you're about 10? I can only imagine a child finding the "humour" in this game funny.

    oh look.. he's about to shit into a cup.. oh how i laughed.

  • S.J.Rogers #11 6 years ago

    @ Smelly

    Unfortunately I’m 30 not 10 but I do enjoy some light relief and a bit of humour after a long hard day at the office.

    But I can see how the humour in this game will not cater for everybody’s taste.

    The girlfriend does say I need to grow up though… (She may be right)..!

  • hjarg666 #12 6 years ago

    @ S.J.Rogers - don't listen to her. Growing up isn't worth it.

    Yup, the demo was a bit of a letdown. Doubt i'll be getting this one...

  • smelly #13 6 years ago

    Theyd have done better NOT to have launched demo imho.

    How has edge reviewed this? The lanuch date is way off! And magazines get review copies 2 months before they print!

    Edited by 1 at 18/08/06 @ 11:14

  • Fatnick #14 6 years ago

    Looks like American's hissy fit the other day was a pre-emptive strike to try and turn the attention away from his poor game.

  • smelly #15 6 years ago

    Sigh. It wasnt a hissy fit. Only the fanboys had a hissy fit.

    He was asked by the press what he thought of the new consoles (which they seem to be asking everyone big in the industry) and he gave his opinion.

  • urban #16 6 years ago

    agreed

  • mezzomorto #17 6 years ago

    totally agree with the EG preview.

    I have no problem with "old skool" graphics as graphics alone don't make a game. However, the poor gameplay just made me stop just after you encounter the terrorists (and the script is funny but not funny enough to make you want to keep slogging on). A disappointment as I had my hopes up for an off-beat & refreshing game. Ah well, i see that WoW is still dominating the US PC charts TWO YEARS after release...

  • CordableTuna #18 6 years ago

    Really odd to see a clearly negative preview. Usually it's "looks magnificent, has a few bugs which will be fixed in the release". Nice to see the threat of losing access doesn't frighten everyone.

    I'm disappointed by the game, though. Psychonauts was a masterpiece with tepid gameplay, but I don't think this can pull it off. The premise was so promising too...

  • yonno #19 6 years ago

    why hasnt the bbfc or whatever it is that rates games had something to say about a game that trivilises terrorism and yet a game where a kid whos being bullied fights back gets slaughtered

  • kangarootoo #20 6 years ago

    "and yet a game where a kid whos being bullied fights back gets slaughtered "

    As I recall, the BBFC have had nothing to say about Bully yet, other than its not at a stage where they can categorise it.

  • CordableTuna #21 6 years ago

    ManicMinerUK: Well, BDLA had the same potential. Excellent humour and interesting characters made Psychonauts a masterpiece in my opinion, regardless of its rather dull gameplay. Not bad, really, but the gameplay wasn't anything special.

    BDLA looked promising in that sense. The premise is unique and has great potential for a tongue-in-cheek terror mongering, but now it looks like they decided to go with toilet humour instead. So, it looks like a very good opportunity was wasted.

  • smelly #22 6 years ago

    Pyschonauts : GOOD platformer, with great original inventive level ideas (i.e. no lava/snow/etc levels), with great humour, and nice visual style.

    This : Nice idea, crap game, not really very inventive, crap toilet humour and crap visual style.

    Not in the same league.

  • Darren #23 6 years ago

    So with this rather negative preview and Edge's rather epic 4/10 review score, this is a BAD Bad Day LA then?

  • smelly #24 6 years ago

    Well (owing to fact that reviews are written a month or two before the magazine hits the shops) edge were obviously reviewing a copy which is no-where near finished..

    So, we dont know 100% for sure.. But judging by demo. I'd say chances are quite high.

    Actually based on demo, im suprised it got THAT high.

  • toolie #25 6 years ago

    I give the author credit for telling it like it is. Too many sites *cough*Gamespot*cough* have a tendency to give a non-commital opinion even when a demo is as bad as this was simply to appease publishers and PR people.

  • BBIAJ #26 6 years ago

    Loved the demo, will hopefully love the full game too, if and when it ever gets released...

  • Kingsadist #27 6 years ago

    SomethingAwful has also ripped the demo in their current frontpage article (19-08), and from what I've read about American McGee in articles and interviews, he's a really hypocrite prick. Check out this CVG-article:
    [link url=http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_ zdcgw/is_200512/ai_n15717781
    ]http://ww w.findarticles.com/p/articles/m...[/link]

    What a sod.

  • dk_rare #28 6 years ago

    American McGee certainly is a genius. But if the execution of this game doesn't sum up then maybe his genius needs to be teamed up with another gaming genius that can help with those problems. Like if there is too much syrup with your pudding, then you should add more pudding.

  • smelly #29 6 years ago

    >he's a really hypocrite prick

    Just read this article.. how is he hypocritical?

    Although i didnt know this game was outsourced to china with a team which has never made a game before. Which explains a lot.

  • dudefella #30 6 years ago

    I downloaded the demo to see if it was really as bad as everyone says. Oh man. I think the quality of my life has actually gone down since I 'played' the demo. What an incredibly AWFUL game. Quite possibly the worst game I've ever played, certainly the worst in a long time. Really, depressingly bad. Not fun, not funny, terrible voice acting, painfully bad, unfunny dialogue, and don't even get me started on the graphics. I can't even reccomend the demo to people... steer well clear of this one.
    Edited by 1 at 20/08/06 @ 13:22

  • bubble #31 6 years ago

    Loved the look, loved the premise. Don't think I'll bother downloading the demo though.

    What a pity, but just being different does not a good game make.

  • T4RG4 #32 6 years ago

    >Although i didnt know this game was outsourced to china with a team which has never made a game before. Which explains a lot.

    I told you outsourcing was a rubbish idea ;)

  • Halo.Jones #33 6 years ago

    I am sure there was a japanese title called "Bad Day" released on PS1 (Possibly PS2) quite a few years ago. Is this is a conversion? (sorry not completely read the review)

  • Isonic #34 6 years ago

    Halo jones you can clearly tell fromm the screenshot that this game is not japanese.I mean does it have japanese graphics(e.g Pokemon)?Not being racist or anything,but the screenshot has a black person on the front with that gun,Japanese anime never have multi coloured people for some mysterious reason.........