Carrion Reanimating for Windows

Ghoulish zombie management!

Need more zombies in your life? Carrion Reanimating might satisfy your cravings.

You play Herbert West, an evil scientist who murders locals in order to carry out experiments on them. He has developed a serum which can reanimate corpses temporarily, which is useful for when worried relatives come to ask about their loved ones.

Carrion Reanimating takes place in Herbert's spooky house, with its complicated system of lifts between levels. It's essentially a platform game. When a relative knocks on the door, you must answer it, reanimate the correct cadaver with your enormous green syringe, then kick it in the direction of the enquirer. Apparently seeing their loved ones in groaning zombie form is enough for the visitors. If the you don't send the right zombie in time, the police will be called, and if the wrong zombie meets your enquirer, it'll eat them!

Carrion Reanimating is lovely to look at. It's presented in black and white (except for your lurid syringe), with 3D animated characters and a 1930s feel. The sound is great, too, with an OTT horror narrator talking you through the action.

The gameplay takes some getting used to. The sprite detection is a bit suspect, and though the first couple of minutes are pretty easy, the action gets out of hand quite quickly once you have your animated zombies roaming the house. Keeping them from eating visitors is difficult, as it's difficult to keep tabs on your zombies. There is a map, accessible with tab, but it's awkward to keep flicking it up during the action.

This is freeware, so it's possible to forgive it some of its problems. The presentation is charming, but the action certainly needs more work. There is no option to play in a window at the moment, and the game tends to exit when it's game over without warning.

Carrion Reanimating is a well presented, funny little game, that charms despite it's rough edges