The moment I kind of fell in love with Evil Dead: The Game is the moment that I realized it was actually Sam Raimi Simulator 2022.

That is, I went from thinking the new licensed multiplayer game was pretty much just a moderately capable clone of the Friday The 13th game from a few years back—mixed with a bit of good, old, dead Evolve—until the exact moment that I first played as the titular Evil.

Which is when I discovered the single genius idea that elevates this entire package above those gnarly roots: When you play as the Evil in The Evil Dead, you don’t just play as a bunch of Deadites or evil clones or skeletons.

(Including an energy system that forces you to give your victims a breather before initiating a new burst of chaos.) I have cackled so many times while playing with my fresh meat: Spawning a bunch of Deadites to swarm a team, only to have one back into an Evil Tree Trap that thrashes them, allowing me to possess the pathetic mortal fool so that they can open fire on their buddies.

You always got the sense that Raimi was having just a bit too much fun torturing his old pal Bruce, and the game successfully exports that sensation, encouraging you to be a monstrous bastard even before Evil Ash starts stomping across the battlefield, summoning his skeletal army.