The anti-hero is a concept that holds tremendous intrigue - perhaps because as we are all flawed, the idea of a hero who isn't whiter than white is somehow more appealing and relatable. Whether it's someone bad doing good things for their own dark purposes, or someone good being forced to do bad things for the greater good, it's certainly a concept that never seems to grow stale. The greatest anti-hero I've encountered to date is TV's Dexter, the serial killer who only kills serial killers (does that make him a serial serial killer killer?). He kills to satisfy his irresistible urge to kill - but he carefully selects only those who are serial killers themselves in one way or another, and even then only those who the system has failed to bring to justice and who are certain to kill again. Watching such darkness being put to use in such an admirable way makes for sometimes uncomfortable but always fascinating viewing (or reading, as the show is based upon a series of books), especially given that, in every other respect, although Dexter believes he is 'faking' all of his positive emotions, he's actually a far better boyfriend, father and friend than the average guy - he's someone who you can always count on to come through for you when you need him the most. In Overlord II however, there is no anti-hero - you're just a bad guy through and through, evil to the core - and, thanks in no small part to the game's comical style, it's rarely been so good to be so bad!

The saga picks up some time after the first game, where the minions locate the spawn of evil (literally) - the original Overlord's offspring, a hooded witch boy with glowing yellow eyes. After putting him through his paces with a series of tests (which makes for a simple yet enjoyable tutorial), the villagers of the snowy town of Nordberg cast him out upon the demands of the Empire that has arisen (a parody of Ancient Rome) since the first Overlord was vanquished. Battling your way through the Empire's soldiers, you manage to make it to safety with the help of a yeti, and you grow up big, strong and evil in the netherworld. With your loyal, unquestioning minions ready to do your very bidding, and the oldest of the minions, Gnarl, as your guide, you're now ready to take over the world and vanquish the Empire - by smashing, destroying and killing everything in your path!

The story isn't particularly original or of much substance, but it's ideal as a setting for the game, which is a blend of cult hits Destroy All Humans!, Stubbs the Zombie, and Pikmin. In fact, the main concept of the game is very much like Pikmin; your minions follow you wherever you go and you can send them into battle or just to smash stuff up with a swish of the right thumbstick, which also does a reasonable but not perfect job of controlling the somewhat unwieldy (but not game-breaking) camera. You can also highlight targets with the left trigger (which also whips the camera around and can be handy for getting your view straight) and command minions to attack with the right, which is ideal when you have a group of minions, as it triggers their specific method of death-dealing.

You begin the game with just the Browns, your basic grunts who are very effective at beating down enemies with whatever they can get their hands on - pitchforks, clubs, swords and the like, and soon you gain access to the Reds, ranged units that are physically quite weak but can lob fireballs to set enemies aflame and absorb fire to clear previously impassable barriers. Once you have taken control of Nordberg, you set sail for Everlight, the haven of the Elves, where you reclaim the Green Hive, giving you access to your stealth fighters, who become camouflaged when standing still and are lethal when sent in for an attack from the rear. Lastly you return the Blue Hive to its rightful place, giving you access to the Blues, who can survive in water and the powerful blue pools of magic that litter the Wastelands, the now decimated landscape where the original game took place. Spawn points and netherworld gates erupt spectacularly from the ground in key locations, allowing you to select the best combination of minions for the job before you charge headlong into the fray and let battle commence.

Without doubt, one of the most appealing aspects of Overlord II is its style, which is thankfully very comical and slightly cartoon-like, playing to stereotypes and caricatures very well. That isn't to say that the graphics don't pack a punch, though; the fantasy landscapes are consistently breathtaking and atmospheric, teeming with flora and fauna to destroy, with intricate detail everywhere you turn, from the jungle of Everlight to the shimmering rocks of the magical Wastelands and the snowy outskirts of the freezing town of Nordberg. Accompanying these sumptuous visuals is a range of ambient sound effects and varied, orchestral music that is very effective at enhancing the atmosphere, whether you're exploring or in the midst of an almighty battle. The voice acting is great, too; Gnarl steals the show with his brilliantly delivered cringing yet devious tone and often laugh out loud funny lines, while the West Country accent of the local yokels is equally amusing.

The graphics are distinctive and constantly eye-catching - but as well conceived as your many enemies and the environment are, it's the minions that steal the show. Hunched over and looking like a cross between Gremlins and goblins, they chatter and laugh and cry out when attacked, fetching all of the souls, crystals, gold and other collectibles that you guide them to, bringing back the "treasure for Master." The way they bustle around the landscape at high speed, like you're watching a horror version of the Benny Hill show, blitzing through piles of wooden crates, marketplaces filled with food and wine, and stashes of treasure chests, is nothing short of hilarious, the cacophony of drumming footsteps, crashes, crunches and smashes, as well as the screams of townsfolk and fleeing guards, is a pleasure to hear. They're brilliantly animated and full of personality, as well as being highly intelligent and very easy to control; holding B allows you to recall them, commanding them to leave their enemies and return very quickly to your side, while you can use Y to place a marker that keeps them guarding any location of your choosing.

Your foes are equally as amusing and imaginative too, from the fat, busty mermaids, fairy and Elven princesses to the giant Pandas and baby seals (environmentalists and pacifists should steer well clear - even I felt a slight pang of guilt when chasing the ultra-cute baby seals around and clubbing them to death!). Then there are the mystical Dryads and the comical Empire grunts, who cower and run around flailing their arms when their leaders are taken down or their formation is broken; the many enemies you encounter are always entertaining. The Empire soldiers and indeed its fat leaders are very reminiscent of the Asterix books, meaning that they're both expressive and comical. The gnomes too are pretty hilarious - and sending your minions into a crowd of them then watching as they all get clubbed down or set alight almost always raises a smile. My favourite race though is without doubt the pacifist, nature-loving Elves, who are basically hippies with pointy ears! An ingenious blend of fantasy and reality, their dialogue and hippy-like tones will have you guffawing with glee.

It's fortunate that the designers went for a spoof, cartoon style, because there's so much killing in Overlord II that more serious presentation might have made it an uncomfortable game to play; after all, you are pure evil, and wiping out or enslaving innocent townsfolk, harmless wildlife and virtually defenceless natives, as well as the less sympathetic Empire, just isn't a nice thing to do. It isn't just your minions that you wield, though; the Overlord himself can kick some serious ass, with a giant sword, axe, or mace among other weapons, and his various magical powers. Hitting X along with other buttons allows you to use your limited magic to kill enemies and even kill innocent townsfolk who are no threat to you whatsoever, falling to their knees and crying out in terror before they collapse and fade away. If you end the attack when they're on their knees though, they become your brainwashed followers (very much like how Krypto and Stubbs recruit allies), who attack your enemies, provide a distraction or just get to work in the fields and at blacksmith anvils in the towns that you have conquered. Other attacks include an ability to supercharge minions or drain the life from a minion to boost your own health in time of need, as well as boosting your whole party and wielding explosive area of effect spells.

You can also possess your minions, which leads to some of the most enjoyable segments of the game - the Overlord is powerful, but he's a heavily armoured brute and a little clunky as he moves around. Once into the body of a minion, you can cross narrow ledges and infiltrate enemy territory, still with your minions in tow; in fact, the extensive section in Everlight where you must sneak into a castle and avoid or take down enemies while you steal the Green Hive from under the Empire's nose is one of the best in the game, exploring every nook and cranny for hidden treasure, releasing captive gnomes and giant pandas to cause mayhem and distractions, and taking down the Sentinel towers that would otherwise stop you in your tracks. It's a stealth section but you have options, and so it's one of the most enjoyable I've come across in a while. It's also a great example of the simple but usually fun puzzles that you're presented with, while in combat, you often have the option to send your minions through narrow cracks to take an armoured enemy formation from the rear, along with the usual barriers that only certain minions can breach and puzzles that require use of a certain type, like reds setting fire to explosive barrels or greens leaping upon a hardened enemy from behind.

There are RPG elements to the game, too; your Dark Tower is a sprawling place with plenty to discover. You can visit your Private Chambers and kit it out to the liking of your mistresses, head to the forge to create new weapons and armour, level up your minions, learn new magic, and more. You can even head down to the Spawning Pits and check in on your troops - and with every individual minion having a name and levelling up with experience, you can visit Death and get him to respawns minions who have passed - by sacrificing other, lowlier minions, of course! The range of upgrades on offer gives you great incentive to seek out all the treasure you can lay your evil mitts upon, and occasional visitors dare to enter your dark domain, with grovelling requests or warning words that lead to new quests to complete and areas to visit.

As fun as the game is though, it's perhaps best played in relatively short bursts; the core gameplay is very samey, as you're basically just exploring landscapes, using your minions to smash everything in sight to find treasure, and kill all those who put up a resistance to your advances. The novelty can start to wear off with extended playing sessions, especially for the less interesting quests, such as possessing or killing one hundred townsfolk in Nordberg and Everlight, and the drudgery of sailing around outside Everlight to place the four keystones back into their mystical locks. While the sailing sections are a nice touch and add some variety to the game, they can feel a little laboured, as your boat doesn't move particularly fast - but even here the game excels in its creativity, with minions diving below deck to man the oars, and two staying up top as a lookout and a drummer ("row, faster!").

There are issues with the difficulty curve, too; it's too easy for a while, then it gets a lot tougher quickly, and with auto-checkpoints often sporadic in their placement, repeating certain sections can be a chore. Oh, and the less said about the incredibly frustrating and hard to figure out Spider Queen boss, the better; I actually turned the sound down as I failed entirely to figure out how to get the bitch off the wall so I could actually attack her, with Gnarl repeating the same useless advice about every twenty seconds. I've been playing games for over twenty-five years now, and if I failed to figure it out then it's a certainty that everyone will struggle, at the very least for a minute or two. How this didn't come out in the play testing I have no idea. Anyway, skip to the next paragraph if you want to try and solve it yourself, or read on for a free hint: the key is to set the fuse on the far side flower bomb and leave it where it is, then immediately drag the flower bomb on the spider queen's side over to the other bomb before it explodes. After this, the rest should be easy enough to figure out.

In terms of presentation, Overlord II is exceptionally polished overall, rarely suffering from the types of issues that a game with AI-controlled allies often falls to. Your minions almost never get stuck in scenery and never fall off ledges (but you can send them to a watery grave if you command them straight into the sea!), and their path-finding skills are excellent when they pick up a heavy object and carry it automatically to the nearest netherworld portal (again, Pikmin style, with a bunch of them surrounding their prize). Even if you do get separated from your minions (sometimes when you have to cross a shallow stream that would kill all but your Blues), they simply return to their spawning pits after a short while. The only issues I encountered came with possessed folks occasionally blocking my path, and getting separated from my minions on automated lifts - the game isn't quite perfect, but considering how beautifully realised its environments are and how smooth and natural the control of your minions is, it's pretty damn close.

Sadly, the same can't be said of the meagre multiplayer offering, which is so tacked-on that even the achievements for it only involve winning ten of a couple of match types. Unlike Red Faction, where a strong single player was complemented by the surprise hit online mode of the year, in Overlord II there are just four maps, one per mode. The most fun is the domination mode, where you use your minions to capture and guard various points on the map, while the pirate gold mode sees you sailing around collecting gold and breaking into your enemy's vault to steal theirs. I barely managed to get a couple of games online for these modes, and had to investigate the two co-op modes - a survival mode in the gladiatorial arena against increasingly hard waves of enemies, and an assault mode where you must take down an AI leader and his troops - via split screen, so good luck finding a game. It's fun enough in short doses and killing other overlords is satisfying but the multiplayer adds little to the overall experience; given the way you can micro-manage your troops, a full co-op mode for the campaign would have been preferable.

Overlord II is in many respects a breath of fresh air in a sea of samey shooters, racers and high octane action games. Seamlessly blending elements of puzzle, RPG and real-time strategy with a decidedly old-school action adventure foundation, it succeeds in providing a gameplay experience that while certainly not perfect, is a lot of fun, with landscapes that are a joy to explore. With rewards for foraging and using your initiative at every turn, and gameplay that is a unique mix of a range of well-established genres, Overlord II is well worth conquering the queues at your local game store to get hold of - just don't try to 'possess' your way straight to the counter; mind control is best left to the evil professionals.

Reviewed by Geoff Holland for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).