System: Sony PlayStation
Release date: 1998

MediEvil on the PlayStation is the game that gave us a hero who was killed by the very first arrow fired in battle and spent the next hundred years getting quietly more embarrassed about it.

This MediEvil title dropped you into the skeletal remains of Sir Daniel Fortesque – champion of Gallowmere, celebrated hero, and in reality the first casualty of the only battle he ever fought – and gave him one last chance to earn the reputation he definitely didn’t deserve the first time. Part action-adventure, part Tim Burton fever dream, and entirely its own peculiar thing, MediEvil arrived in 1998 and carved out a place in PlayStation history that no amount of subsequent remakes has managed to fully replicate. In 2025, does this undead classic still rise from the grave, or has it finally been put to rest?

Gameplay: One Arm, Many Enemies, Absolutely No Jaw

The game sends Sir Dan shambling across 22 levels of the cursed Kingdom of Gallowmere in pursuit of the evil sorcerer Zarok, who has accidentally revived him along with his army of undead and stolen the souls of the living. The fact that Zarok didn’t intend to bring Dan back is the joke the whole game is built on, and it’s a good one.

Combat is hack-and-slash with genuine variety – Dan accumulates an arsenal across the campaign that includes swords, clubs, crossbows, magic and his own detachable arm, which doubles as both a melee and ranged weapon and is exactly as useful and slightly disturbing as it sounds. Each level contains a chalice that fills with the souls of defeated enemies, and collecting enough to claim the chalice unlocks the Hall of Heroes – a wonderfully characterful hub where legendary warriors reward Dan with new weapons. It’s a brilliant incentive system that encourages thorough exploration over rushing to the exit.

The levels themselves are varied enough to stay genuinely interesting across the full campaign – a sunken village, a flying ghost ship, scarecrow fields, a hilltop mausoleum, a pumpkin patch with an animated stained glass window boss. The imagination on display throughout Gallowmere is one of MediEvil’s genuine strengths and gives the world real personality.

The Wonky Camera? MediEvil’s camera is the game’s most persistent problem and it hasn’t aged gracefully. The player has largely free control of the view, but when it clips into geometry – which happens with uncomfortable regularity in tighter spaces – it bugs out in ways that disorient and occasionally obscure the very enemies you’re trying to fight. Platforming sections that require precise jumps over fatal drops are made considerably more stressful by a camera that can’t quite decide where to position itself, and there are moments where the late 90s 3D technology is working against the game’s design ambitions rather than for them. The controls also carry a slight floatiness that takes adjustment, and combat can feel imprecise when multiple enemies are closing from different angles.

Graphics: Tim Burton Would Be Pleased

The visual design is where MediEvil earns genuine and lasting admiration. Heavily influenced by The Nightmare Before Christmas, the Kingdom of Gallowmere has a distinctive gothic-cartoon aesthetic – twisted trees, crumbling gravestones, moonlit moors and lovingly detailed medieval architecture all rendered in a style that was immediately recognisable and has held up considerably better than the raw polygon count might suggest.

Sir Dan himself is a masterpiece of character design – missing his jaw and left eye, clanking around in armour several sizes too optimistic for his actual heroic capability, somehow projecting genuine pathos and comedy in equal measure. Enemy designs across the campaign are inventive and varied, boss encounters are imaginative, and the whole visual world of Gallowmere feels like somewhere someone genuinely cared about rather than a collection of assets arranged into levels.

Sound: Gallowmere’s Got Its Own Orchestra

The soundtrack is one of the finest on the PlayStation and sits in the Danny Elfman-inspired gothic orchestral tradition without ever feeling like pastiche. Bob and Barn’s compositions give each area of Gallowmere its own musical identity – the Hall of Heroes has a sweeping grandeur, the haunted levels carry genuine atmospheric menace, and the boss themes build tension with real craft.

Dan’s attempts at speech without a lower jaw produce magnificently garbled noises that communicate personality without a single intelligible word. The narrator’s dry, theatrically pompous delivery perfectly matches the game’s tone. Sound effects throughout are crisp and satisfying – weapon impacts, enemy deaths, the creak of Dan’s armour as he moves. An audio package that earns the comparison to its Tim Burton inspiration entirely on its own terms.

Replayability: Gallowmere Rewards the Thorough

The chalice system provides genuine replay incentive beyond simply finishing the campaign. Completing every chalice across all 22 levels unlocks a special ending and ensures the Hall of Heroes is fully explored – and the weapons available through thorough play are sufficiently different from the early campaign arsenal to make going back for missed chalices worthwhile rather than merely completionist.

The campaign’s length is satisfying without outstaying its welcome, and returning to Gallowmere with full knowledge of the level layouts reveals secrets and shortcuts that first-time players will have missed. Not endlessly deep, but warm and rewarding enough to justify revisiting every few years.

The Retro Looney Verdict

MediEvil is funny, atmospheric, imaginative, and held together by a protagonist whose entire character arc is built around the gap between who he was supposed to be and who he actually managed to become. That’s a genuinely clever premise and the game earns it across 22 levels of gothic Gallowmere adventure.

The camera is a genuine issue that will annoy rather than endear, and the controls carry enough late-90s floatiness to occasionally frustrate. None of that diminishes what Millennium Interactive and Sony Cambridge built here – a PlayStation classic with a visual identity completely its own, a hero unlike anything else on the platform, and more imagination per level than most games manage across an entire campaign. Rise from your crypt, Sir Dan. Gallowmere needs you. Again.

Don’t forget to check out my other PlayStation Reviews!