There are 6 levels or “episodes” per “series” in a tie-in to the game’s TV production backdrop. Each level has a certain amount of gold medals to collect via successful use of pranks some levels range from a minimum of 4 to a maximum of 10 gold medals to collect. Players can expect a stealth puzzle adventure, taken from other retro classics such as Spy vs. The holiday level is the same look in principle but has different setpieces to define its identity, whether that is China, India or a Hollywood movie set. Over the collection’s 25 levels, you are taken to one of 3 locations: the Rottweiler’s residence, a cruise ship and, let’s say, a “holiday level”. Instead, they’re just some janky animations that look like they’re going to bottom out to the lowest of framerates. Perhaps it was meant to mimic stop-motion animation? That would have been fine if they made the whole game look like we were playing in a plasticine style world. I don’t quite understand why the character models move so awkwardly around the levels. It’s clear that the characters are heavily inspired by Aardman Studios and while I love a good Aardman movie from time to time, the animation made me feel ill before long. Neighbours back From Hell’s visual presentation is horrible, especially so many years from its initial release. I could dive down a rabbit hole that perhaps you’re the neighbour from hell, in some stoner meta conspiracy theory. A bit of backstory? Some amusing follow-up cutscenes or comic panels between each level or series? There are a few design ideas that could have been walked down and explored. While I wasn’t exactly expecting a well-crafted tale of two warring neighbours who can understand and eventually grow to love each other, I was expecting a little more in general. ![]() Weirdly, you end up feeling sorry for the Rottweiler family after a while. As the game progresses, the Rottweilers get rightfully sick and tired of their persistent nightmare of a neighbour and end up going on holiday, only for Woody to show up and ruin that too. ![]() Rather than using the proper channels and authorities to evict his neighbours, Woody hires a TV production crew to film him on his quest to perform some dire and often harmful Beano style revenge pranks. You play as Woody, who is more than a little perturbed that his neighbours, the Rottweiler family, are making his life a misery by being general nuisances. As a puzzle game, it does its job well, but my playthrough didn’t fill me with the confidence that it was made as a labour of love, more a quick cash grab by HandyGames. I want to apologize to anyone with fond memories of these games. For those equally baffled, this is a HD port of 2003’s Neighbours From Hell 1 & 2, which was released for PC and Nintendo Gamecube and now has a cult reputation on places like YouTube. Neighbours back From Hell was a rare breed of remaster that had me thinking on more than one occasion “who really needed this?”.
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