Game:

Zombies Ate My Neighbors (1993)

Duration: 3:41

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15

There's just one last thing to know about the general flow of Zombies Ate My Neighbors, and that's what happens every four stages... boss time! ... ... ...sort of. Though in general, it won't always be a "boss" per se, but some manner of more dangerous situation than usual. Then the tone of the next three stages should be a tad milder followed by another "boss level"... and so it will repeat until the neighbors, Zeke, and/or Julie become totally overwhelmed by the various hordes of monsters.

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Level 4: Chainsaw Hedgemaze Mayhem

Fun side note, in PAL regions, there was apparently some level of discomfort with the concept of the chainsaw maniac, so instead they became lumberjacks... wait, that actually sounds a bit MORE troubling... and seems like it would create more than a few mechanical and technical changes to the overall game... I think I'd be interested to see that sometime...

Either way, the beefiest enemy yet is Stanley Decker, Chainsaw Maniac. Yes, almost every enemy in the game has a fairly inventive name and epithet besides whatever casual naming convention you might prefer while trying to discern what you're dealing with onscreen with no such labeling to guide you in-game. It's actually a pretty nice instruction manual, since it's way too easy to phone it in and give only the bare basics of warnings, warranty information, license info, and whatnot else...

Anyway, this stage is indeed a LITERAL maze... made of hedges. But is "hedgemaze" an actual word? I don't think it is, but it's too catchy for me to question much longer and want to use the spaced-out compound construction "hedge maze" instead. I mean... I will. I'm a square like that, but it's still catchy in the admittedly sketchy official level name transcription.

So I think you can see how a combination of a maze full of hedges and a bunch of identically copy-and-pasted lunatics with chainsaws might be a bit stilted away from a couple of meddling kids and their hapless neighbors...

The real trick becomes getting to where you can see the victims but luring the limited AI that Stanley operates on into clearing a path FOR you instead of THROUGH you and staying away from the neighbors... which... as with anything in this game is not really at all simple. You could try to take them on individually, but at this point in the game it would be prohibitively expensive for your precious few most powerful weapons.

Probably the best strategy would be to use quick bursts of your fire extinguisher to freeze the maniacs in place and calmly walk around them.

As a final insult to your various injuries, there are actually bonuses for not firing a single bazooka, killing chainsaw maniacs, AND destroying a lot of hedges... make up your mind, game!

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And that's how it goes. On the fourth stage, you get a password correlating to how many victims you had remaining and for resuming the following stage. It's important to note that you couldn't possibly save your present inventory in a four-letter password, so you'll be resuming with the same original stock of squirtgun shots, three lives, and a single first-aid kit.

As such, passwords are... a bit of a mixed bag, especially since many later stages are designed around the insane arsenal you'd normally have amassed by then... but we'll get to that later, perhaps. Just be glad that in a game as huge as this one there ARE any passwords at all! ...or perhaps that's the most devious trap of them all, making you THINK you can take ANY shortcuts at all and expect to live! (Or expect to live regardless!)

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