Hellboy: The Science of Evil is the latest game based on a comic to hit our shores, anyone who reads comics on a regular basis will probably of hear of this guy, but for those who haven’t he is a demon who fights bad guys on behalf of the US government.

The game takes place over six chapters, however the story for each of the six areas you will visit is largely irrelevant, instead it just feels like it is there to introduce you to your surroundings before you set about marching through the level and beating up the same enemy time and again.

During each level you are asked to beat up a certain amount of enemies before you can move onto the next area, your path is blocked by a ghost gate so once you have taken care of your foes and any other requirements such as destroying cursed graves or lighting lanterns, the ghost gate will disperse and then you can be on your way. Much of what I have just described is repeated throughout each level until you reach the obligatory bad guy at the end, at which point you beat them up and then move onto the next level which will offer a similar experience to what you just did, albeit in different surroundings.

Throughout the different levels you will come across enemies such as Masked Warriors, Zombies, Goblins with exploding heads (at least I presume they are Goblins) and Lizards. Defeating these enemies is a simple enough affair and mainly involves you pressing the X button (a lot), though you can also use the Y button to kick and the B button to apply a finishing move. Other points to note during combat are that when an enemy is flashing you can grab them and then with the right combination of buttons you can finish them while also regaining some lost health, and as well this you can also click both analogue sticks to activate a special move which sets your arm on fire and causes more damage. It’s all fairly simple stuff, if not a little repetitive. 

Graphically the game is certainly no step forward, the environments are very boring and there are flaws aplenty such as characters getting stuck in the backgrounds or even the animations freezing (which happened to me) meaning you will find yourself restarting the game (if you can bring yourself to do so). The sound isn’t much better, the main character is voiced by the real actor, however what he says doesn’t really bring much to the game, meaning that there really is no atmosphere to the game at all.

If the game has one saving grace it is that you can play through all of the six levels in co-op mode using split screen or via Xbox Live, however all that really means is that two people will have to put up with this game instead of one.

Hellboy: Science of Evil isn’t any good, the graphics are below par, the story is practically non existent and the less said about how boring the game is the better. If you are a fan of comic books looking for a game to satisfy your needs then I would give you the same advice as anyone else looking to purchase this, save you cash until a decent game comes along, because this isn’t it.