House of the Dead Comes Back to Life on PlayStation 3

When you think of SEGA, chances are you’ll conjure up thoughts of spiky blue hedgehogs and foxes with propeller-like tails. For Dreamcast and Arcade fans however, darker, more sinister imagery may seem appropriate.

The House of the Dead series is one of the granddaddies of side-scrolling action, featuring an entourage of brain-dead zombies, kamikaze bats and other unexplained vile phenomena.

While the series never really went away with recent spin-offs like Overkill, and the Wii managed to gain exclusive rights to the first two games, on other consoles, the games have been conspicuous by their absence. Well, no more. On February 7th, SEGA have confirmed that House of the Dead 3 will be coming exclusively to PlayStation Network, with House of the Dead 4 following later this Spring! What’s more, SEGA are giving both titles a full HD upgrade, adding trophies and including PlayStation Move support.

House of the Dead 3 featured a number of series firsts, including ‘rescue events’, a shot ranking and grading system and a Boss ‘cancel’ bar that players must fill in order to counter strikes of impending doom! Not to be outdone, House of the Dead 4 added some series firsts of its own, including ‘treasure rooms’ and interactive sequences that add further tension to the gameplay. What’s more, this will be the first time ever HOTD 4 has left the Arcades to come to home consoles.

Speaking about the announcement, Senior Vice President of Digital Business at SEGA of America, Haruki Satomi had this to say. ‘The House of the Dead has always been one of SEGA’s most popular series, and over the years we have worked hard to bring that full arcade experience to console owners. The abilities of the PlayStation 3, as well as PlayStation Move, have let us get closer than ever before. The only thing these titles are missing is a need for quarters.’

No word on pricing as yet, but the most important thing is that, finally, PlayStation owners have the chance to suffer like G did.