What’s black and white and red all over? I would’ve thought the answer was a “newspaper” before E3, but after seeing SEGA’s MADWORLD demoed I have a new definitive answer. MADWORLD is a crazy, sick game that has players taking on the role of Jack, a man who finds himself in a Running Man like game of death, where the only way to win is to literally kill off the competition. Stylish and violent, MADWORLD looks to show the world that the Nintendo Wii is far from being a kiddy system.

The first thing apparent about MADWORLD is its unique game style, which looks like Frank Miller’s Sin City graphic novels given life and brought to the Wii system. The entire game looks like a giant Frank Miller frame brought to life, featuring characters and environments that are created by bringing the world to life with various shades of black and white shadowing. I worried that the single color scheme would be a problem, making it so the action blurred into one because of the distinct lack of color, but the game did a fantastic job of making every element of the game standout and easily showcase what’s going on in the game.

From the character of Jack to environmental items like trash dumpsters and trains, every single element is brought to life in various shades of black and white. Given the color palette, the looks and feels very cartoony, which is heightened even more thanks to the old Adam West Batman series sound bubbles that appear with certain attacks or actions. It’s silly to see a “BAM” sound bubble appear with a combo heavy punch, but yet at the same time it works perfectly given the game world inhabited by the Deathwatch game. The running commentary also helped bring the world of Deathwatch to life, as two sports announcers continue to constantly talk about your exploits in the game, narrating your actions in a very Sportscenter like presentation. I might be wrong on this since I wasn’t able to ask, but one of the commentators sound a lot like Greg Proops, who fans probably know most from Whose Line Is It Anyways or as one of the podcast sports announcers in the first of the Star Wars prequels.

I Demand Bloody Satisfaction

Players control Jack as he fights to survive and live through the mad Deathwatch game. The rules are simple – kill or be killed. Jack’s default weapon is a chainsaw, which he can use to slice up enemies quite nicely. Unlike everything else in the game, blood is the only thing that differs color wise from the blacks and whites of the world, as the juice of life splatters and smears, bringing a splash of gore to life in a colorful and yet sickly vision. I’ve seen plenty of gore in videogames before, but the stark contrast of the red against black and white world really makes the act of death seem even more gruesome.

Though players can use Jack’s chainsaw to kill enemies, Jack can also pick up environmental objects and weapons from other players to kill his foes. The best kills, however, came from using the environment itself to deal his death. In one section, for example, we saw Jack manually pickup struggling enemies, walk them to a spiked wall, and then shoved them up onto the spikes. Another environmental kill had Jack tossing an enemy into a dumpster, which caused a chain reaction that allowed the heavy lid to fall down and squish the body into half. The funniest environmental kill, however, came when Jack threw an enemy onto a set of train tracks and we all watched as blood flew everywhere after the train ran over him. It was a bloody good time! Killing in these extreme ways also serves a purpose, as the crazier the death the more points you receive, and more points lets you upgrade your character’s move roster.
We weren’t able to see exactly how the Wii remote was used, but a lot of the action and death kills looked to be prompted by onscreen motions that had our demo player quickly flicking the Wii remote and nunchuk in different directions to perform death kills or pick enemies up. Based on the onscreen remote instructions we did see, it appears to share a control scheme like the Wii’s other gory fighter - No More Heroes.

Outside of the unique visuals, the game actually seems to share a lot in common with No More Heroes, including tons of over the top moments of gore, an insane concept, and style overflowing from every orifice. I wish the game would’ve been shown longer than a few minutes, but it managed to get the job done, namely making me yearn to see just a little more or actually get my hands on it myself. I’m already anticipating the release of MADWORLD so I can deal some ultraviolence myself.