Take every horror movie villain of the last 60 years, cram them all into one place and you’ve got the makings of a winning Fangoria fanfest, a ’60s hit song, and this third-person action game based on the Van Helsing movie. The classic hero has swapped his ascot and pathetic wooden stake for a Fabio hairstyle and an elephant gun, dual scimitars, crossbow, grappling hook, and other chunks of demon-decimating hardware. The object: slay assorted hellspawn, including, of course, Frankenstein, Mr. Hyde, and the Wolfman. Vanquish creatures using stylish, acrobatic combo moves and they’ll turn into green crosses you can cash in for upgrades following each frenzied level. Decent graphics and gory (if kinda short) game play will keep most players nailed to the controller, but sometimes wretched camera placement sucks harder than the minions of Dracula at a Red Cross blood drive.

As far as the movie to game genre goes, Van Helsing could have done worse. After the "Enter the Matrix" got us so pumped only to let us down, I am very leery about games developed in tandem with movies. Now, movies developed after a great game....that has been much more successful.