Aspyr Media Inc. on Friday announced that it is accepting pre-orders for Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse, the new 3D action game developed by Wideload Games for Mac OS X, Windows and Xbox. Aspyr says the Xbox version will ship in October, with PC and Mac versions following a few weeks behind in November.
While Aspyr is best known for publishing conversions of popular PC and console games for the Mac platform, this is the first A-list game they’ve published themselves. Stubbs the Zombie is the creation of Wideload Games, Inc. — a Chicago, Ill.-based game developer founded by members of Bungie Studios.
Stubbs the Zombie is a third-person action game that puts you in the role of the title character, a wisecracking zombie that finds himself awakened in the year 1959, in Punchbowl, Penn. — a “futuristic” city of the era. You battle the living by using your own body as a weapon: Explosive gut grenades, toxic sputum, and a severed hand that can crawl into tight spaces and possess the living. What’s more, you can create a horde of zombie allies by feasting on the brains of the living.
Stubbs the Zombie uses the same core technology that powers Bungie’s Halo, and features a soundtrack of 13 songs — 50’s cover tunes, mostly, rendered by indie favorites like Death Cab for Cutie, Cake, The Walkmen and others.
As you might have guessed from the subject matter, Stubbs is rated M for Mature by the ESRB. It’s available for pre-order now for US$39.99. Final system requirements are still yet to be announced — Aspyr typically waits until four to six weeks before a game ships before making such announcements.