"NO ONE ESCAPES ALIVE"
Mob of the Dead is probably the darkest Zombies map ever. Satanic images, mostly unlikable protagonists, a chilling soundtrack, Body Horror even for the undead, and a general sense of hopelessness.
- To cap it all off, it is all but said to be a "Groundhog Day" Loop, and will keep happening forever. Thankfully, Weasel breaks the cycle...at least until Blood of the Dead reveals that he never did.
- Satan himself is strongly implied to be the source behind the zombies, since Samantha couldn't possibly have been in control of the zombies in this purgatory... Until Blood of the Dead reveals that it was all a pocket dimension granted to the Warden by the Shadow Man himself, but this is cold comfort given the Apothicons are obviously aware of the figure of Satan and have changed Alcatraz to look like his personal playground to further torment their victims.
- The Mystery Box looks like it literally rises out of Hell itself, since the platform it's on is ablaze with a constant fire.
- There are various rules and regulations throughout the prison you could probably find in any real prison, but one that stands out that is clearly not of this world is Regulation 666.Regulation #666: DEAL WITH IT. Do not get too close, they are not your friends. Destroy their brains for quick extermination. If you are bitten, please kill yourself.
- There is also a pit of lava early on in the map, below the first Cerberus head. If this doesn't confirm the mobsters are on the verge of eternal damnation, nothing will.
- When you are flying out of the prison, you suffer a hell of a crushed Hope Spot when the plane crashes into the unfinished Golden Gate Bridge. As the player comes to, you get to see four electric chairs lined up with a huge sign behind them, with the now-iconic line written in blood - "NO ONE ESCAPES ALIVE", as if it's meant to be a final taunt to anyone who tried escaping on the Icarus. You hear an ominous droning as the plane comes crashing down, and suddenly progressively more incarnations of Brutus swarm you, accompanied by the horde, and distinctly lacking any power-ups to help you survive. Ultimately, the only thing the mobsters can do once they run out of weapons to fight is to resign themselves to the electric chairs. Weasel will try to assure the others that it's okay sometimes, but usually your character will defiantly beg for death to hurry up and take them. You then get a P.O.V. Cam of what it probably really is like to die by electrocution, with an ominous score playing before the bridge is struck by lightning that powers up the chairs for you. With the themes of divine judgement, it's easy to interpret this as a taste of what's coming for the other three once Al passes on.
- The screams the mobsters give out when they are subject to the electric chair are terrible to listen to. Al in particular doesn't even scream - he just writhes and squeaks in agony and can't even scream.
- Going to the bridge is also usually when the characters begin to spiral out of control, cursing the heavens for the game they're forced to be a part of. Billy, Sal, and Finn swear they wouldn't change a thing they did, but Sal and Finn will eventually be reduced to begging to be put out of their misery or to be given a chance to make things right. Hearing these hardened criminals either begging for mercy or refusing to give up in Billy's case is nothing short of terrifying.
- Stanley Ferguson ominously reports how in the real world, Sal, Billy, and Finn turned on Weasel, lured him to the roof of the prison, and gutted him, leaving him to bleed out. As grisly as this is, the fact that the three were almost immediately executed for their crime is the cherry on top.
- One of the scariest things about Mob of the Dead is how alone you are. Once it's confirmed that you are in Purgatory, it becomes painfully clear that there is no chance that anyone is coming to help you. Every other map took place in a setting that may have been isolated or even afflicted by the apocalypse, but you at least knew the world was still carrying on and could potentially send help to you. In a pocket dimension explicitly designed to punish you for your sins, in which you are sentenced to repeat the same cycle over and over again? Not so much. For the first time in Zombies, you are truly alone and no one is coming to help you.
- The icing on the cake? Mob of the Dead is the first map in the series to introduce unique round start music. Every round opens with an eerie choir that can chill you to the bone.
- The endgame sees you board the Icarus one last time in Afterlife Mode, while a deadly quiet piano rendition of Samantha's theme plays as you fly off to meet your fate. Once you crash, you then find your bodies already waiting for you. Once you come to, the four are split into two teams - Al, backed up by Brutus and the zombies, and Sal, Billy, and Finn. If you play as Al, the other three have a blood-orange "KILL" tag over them, and vice versa if you're playing as one of the others versus Al. Sal, Billy, and Finn all curse Al for supposedly betraying them and getting backed up by the zombies, while Al swears he has no idea what's going on and is forced to flee and fight off his former allies, who are now determined to kill him again as they did in life. This is the first time the player characters have truly turned on each other, even for a game mode where character banter is a mainstay, and the fact that it led to either eternal damnation for all or three of them just makes it worse.
- Ultimately, the final, hateful bloodbath of the ending of Mob of the Dead ends one of two ways - Al is able to overpower or outlast Sal, Billy, and Finn (who fall to the undead), breaking the cycle and presumably granting him the ability to pass on peacefully, at the cost of the other three dying for real this time, and taking their place in hell proper. That's the good ending. Otherwise, Sal, Billy, or Finn succeed in getting their bloody revenge on Al once again, their cruelty prevailing. And they just go back to repeating the cycle of Mob all over again, presumably doomed to repeat it for all eternity, and just as susceptible to getting to this point once again, only to squander their chance at finality and peace.
- To compound all of this, what does the game tell you at the end of the Easter egg that actually ends the match? Game Over as usual, right? Nope. To add to the finality of either the eternal cycle for all four characters, or the damnation of three and the salvation of one, it's "LIFE OVER".
