Audio

Before I go any further, I should point out the single best thing DHF has going for it: voice acting beyond comparison and a script that doesn't ever suck, even a little bit. Scrubs blowhard John C McGinley voices Fred with all the dripping sarcasm and irreverence you'd expect, and nearly all of the other characters rise to the occasion - like the puce-skinned hunchback who happens to be named Sam Spade, who speaks in a truly creepy Peter Lorre-style slur. Then there's Juju Judy, a zombie voodoo chick with an army of undead at her disposal and a creole twang - who's got her eye on Fred's big dead bone. Ahem.

Gameplay

With all the Maltese Falcon and Frankensteinian influences told through a filter of dark humor and burlesque, it would be a shame not to see such imagination put into the meat of the game. Luckily, Dead Head Fred does not disappoint on that count: Fred will collect a total of nine heads such as the corpse head, stone idol head, and shrunken head. The corpse head lets Fred glide over long jumps as well as suck up any available liquid (water for putting out fires, gasoline for refueling machines or using in conjunction with a fire source to become an unliving fire-thrower); the stone idol head delivers slow but powerful attacks as well as coming in handy whenever the occasional meat locker needs to be smashed open.

The shrunken idol head works like the Minish Cap, shrinking Fred down to pee-wee size to let him access otherwise unaccessible areas and caper around like...like a tiny headless dead man. The shrunken areas were some of my favorites, and like all of Dead Head Fred's environments, there are relatively few wasted polygons - if you can stand on a rafter, you can either get something or somewhere from that rafter, or learn how to jump around on other rafters in the area. The puzzle-solving feels pretty open in that respect, which is an excellent sleight of hand because the game is often very linear - so level design that reproduces the feeling of exploration and "figure-it-out-ness," for lack of better words, is much appreciated.

DHF proceeds largely in discreet areas that are well-scripted and engaging, although some backtracking and aimless wandering does crop up now and then. Most extraordinary are the almost-not-PSP-worthy loading times, which are mercifully brief. Though they happen relatively often, I found myself not noticing them most of the time. That's a big claim for a PSP game, and a big count in DHF's favor.

Combat:

Combat is one of DHF's few weak spots. The trouble here comes from the PSP's limited control scheme possibilities, I think: combat is primarily composed of hitting the square button to attack, followed by more square or X button presses for attack combos and the use of the right shoulder button as a modifier to use special rage powers (which is earned from defeating enemies). The big problem is this: the X button only works as a combat button if you press it during a combo - otherwise it's the jump button. This leads to a lot of accidental jumping during combat, which is both frustrating and potentially deadly - an interrupted combo just leaves you open to further pain.

The problem happens a second time with the right shoulder button, which as mentioned modifies the X and O buttons in order to deploy Fred's equivalent of magic attacks. But on its own, the right shoulder button acts as block. You can imagine that in a game whose combat depends in great part on button mashing that more than a few blocks accidentally become rage attacks, which are relatively expensive to execute and definitely not something you'd want to expend accidentally. Also, when you do so, you're not blocking. So that's kind of a pain in the ass.

The Nutshell:
Dead Head Fred is a dynamite game. It's got a fun, silly, dark, twisted, grown-up story that pulls you in and keeps the action fun. Better or more appropriate voice acting you will not find, and both the visuals and general controls make the best of the PSP's strengths and weaknesses. The combat can be frustrating but has a steep enough learning curve that you'll soon get over the fact that some of the buttons work double duty in a less than helpful way.

I also feel like I should mention the dedication Vicious Cycle has put into this game, which truly shows - both in-game and out-of-game. I happened to notice that Vicious Cycle President and CEO, Eric Peterson, who first showed me the game months ago and displayed such passion about Dead Head Fred, has been personally answering just about every post in the GameSpot/GameFAQs message boards - and probably elsewhere.

You just don't see that kind of personal attention in gaming - where the success of a game is defined by the experience players have, not just sales figures, and making that experience as solid as possible doesn't stop with the game's release. That is going the extra mile, and it ought to be appreciated!

So give Dead Head Fred a shot. If you lose your head over it, there are always more...