Slitterhead Review

I stand atop an rental advanced, having a look down on the bustling streets of Kowlong as commuters shuffle round underneath my ft. Like a superhero in a position to make a grand front, I step off the ledge. However as I fall, wedged into the frame of a deficient place of business employee, I jump out of him and into one of the vital onlookers beneath. As an alternative of a caped crusader touchdown on a unmarried knee to thundering applause, I sign up for the refrain of screams gazing this stranger splat onto the pavement.

One of the crucial first issues I spotted once I were given my fingers on Slitterhead was once the fulfillment you’ll be able to earn for inflicting 100 casualties, a bunch I surpassed tenfold by means of the tip. In Keiichiro Toyama’s new sport, which is in part a non secular successor to the cult vintage Siren collection, you play as a disembodied ‘spirit’ who controls passersby to make use of as cannon fodder within the combat towards large, parasitic creatures who mimic and feed on people.

It’s horrific, however the crux of Slitterhead is its moment-to-moment motion. You’re now not a helpless dad stumbling during the snowy the town of Silent Hill with a lead pipe in hand, however a small defense force of civilians armed with razor-sharp golf equipment conjured up from their very own blood. It’s a surprisingly formidable sport that rings a bell in my memory of a time when this trade was once a ways bolder.

Experimental In The Highest Techniques

Slitterhead is like selecting up a forgotten PS3 gem in a second-hand retailer on a whim. And now not simply because NPCs appear to be potatoes and the motion is just a little floaty, however as it harkens again to a time when publishers had been extra occupied with thrilling new concepts and sport mechanics than photorealistic graphics and traits.

Outdoor of Nintendo and indies, that is more and more uncommon at the moment.

Slitterhead isn’t looking to keep up-to-the-minute with the motion or survival horror style and the way they’ve advanced over the past decade. It’s Toyama taking the sightjacking of Siren (the place you’ll be able to see thru enemy eyes) to the nth level, permitting you to take keep an eye on of virtually each NPC you come back throughout. It’s a super thought that totally reinvigorates battle, retaining the momentum going as, even while you’re knocked down, you’ll be able to simply leap to the following particular person and the following and the following and stay on going.

The important thing to Slitterhead’s recent and unique really feel is a battle machine that it feels pre-Soulslike. It’s nearer to an old-school hack ‘n slash sport, the use of the ownership hook so as to add its personal aptitude. With an unwilling military of cityfolk at your disposal, you’ll be able to wail on enemies with puppet after puppet, successful by means of battle of attrition (with a smidge of button smashing). Or, in the event you’re extra considerate, you’ll be able to use your abilities and synergise with different characters to take down enemies extra successfully.

For context, Slitterhead has 8 distinctive playable characters referred to as Rarities, each and every with their very own guns and skills. You all the time make a choice two of those prior to a project, and so they even affect the skillset of the random NPCs you possess. It provides a component of technique, however as they may be able to be upgraded, it additionally keeps the momentum going all the way through the sport as you develop in energy and capacity.

My favorite choices had been Anita and Alex — I’d have Anita summon extra civvies, use thoughts keep an eye on to lead them to assault the enemy independently, after which switch to Alex so I may just hearth off my shotgun whilst my opponent was once distracted. You’ll be able to additionally deflect sure assaults to increase a meter that, when crammed, places you right into a slow-mo, bullet hell trance.

The battle inspires an technology of motion video games the trade has most commonly moved on from, but it surely’s nonetheless each bit as crisp and frenetic as its fashionable cohorts, as a result of the focal point is so obviously put on making the moment-to-moment gameplay really feel just right, now not making each random Tom, Dick, and Harry in the street appear to be they had been ripped out of {a photograph}.

An Enchanting Tale And Environment

The spirit you play as is dubbed by means of Julee (the primary Rarity you meet) because the “Evening Owl”, and it’s a becoming alias. There’s a undeniable airy mystique for your personality, with hushed murmurs and the atypical ghostly word echoing because the written discussion spools out.

While you keep disembodied within the “Ownership” shape, flying round as a gentle golden soul, the arena round you is suffocated in a deep blue, nearly like being submerged underwater. However on the identical time, it’s like worming into the thoughts of a hen, soaring over town and gazing from the rooftops.

The ambience is unnerving and continuously crushingly lonely, however there’s additionally a seediness to the hubbub of town streets. The ‘90s backdrop, cluttered again alleys, garish neon indicators, and endless evening all deliver to existence a corrupt underworld that has been infiltrated by means of the Slitterhead risk. Within the early hours of the sport, we deliver a number of Rarities into our community in order that we will root out the corruption, however the tale is a ways from a elementary, black and white combat towards evil.

Our hunters, who’ve made it their project to kill all Slitterheads indiscriminately, begin to lose their very own humanity. The Evening Owl can trip again in time and convey the awareness in their Rarities with them, however this simplest results in futile gestures that lose sight of the larger image. We see a Rarity kill the similar Slitterhead over and over again, out of senseless rage. It doesn’t trade anything else. However that’s what this slim, centered view results in, as each different personality is driven apart as we hone in on not anything greater than the violent purge of this complete species.

Right through the sport, we come to seek out Slitterheads who merely want to coexist with humanity, simply as we discover Slitterheads who’re manipulative, controlling, and hungry for energy. It’s a replicate held as much as our celebration, fantastically instructed in fragmented missions that see us jumping between days without difficulty. And confronting that urge to easily slaughter our technique to the tip of the sport within the face of such familiarity simplest made for an all of the extra poignant tale.

As for the characters themselves, whilst most commonly voiceless, they are extremely personable. A large a part of that’s the wealthy variety of the group. There’s a Muslim girl, a tender scholar, a intercourse employee, an outdated woman, and a grocery retailer clerk to call a couple of — the concept that you’ll be able to jump between any person to take keep an eye on isn’t only a sport mechanic, it’s baked into the tale. The Evening Owl isn’t on the lookout for the most efficient warriors, he’s tapping into the uncooked possible that’s inside everybody.

The Low Funds Has Its Drawbacks

Slitterhead’s obviously low finances is a large a part of why it appears like a PS3 sport, however that after all comes with as many drawbacks because it does that fuzzy feeling of nostalgia.

There’s now not a lot in the best way of stage selection. You’ll to find your self exploring iterations of the similar few streets and hiking the similar few rooftops. Doing it time and time once more simplest highlights the restrictions Slitterhead works below as you briefly start to pinpoint the limits. Fortunately, the sport doesn’t overstay its welcome, clocking in at round 15 hours, however it will’ve been thrilling to look the admittedly half-baked stealth sections develop in complexity, or to have extra fascinating platforming with the blood jump than simply leaping to the similar few clothes strains and neon indicators time and again.

Likewise, there isn’t a lot in the best way of enemy selection. Maximum bosses fall into certainly one of a couple of classes of Slitterhead, although their designs are other. In a different way, you spend maximum of your time preventing humanoid Slitterhead grunts, bizarre phallic monsters, and once in a while some army goons. You’ll have the tactic all the way down to a science by means of the tip of the sport after having fought such a lot of of the similar enemies. However with such pleasing battle, I discovered myself replaying among the boss fights anyway simply to check out them out with other Rarities, seeing what different synergies I may just muster.

Slitterhead is a surprisingly ingenious sport with a super, novel thought at its core. It’s the precise more or less unencumber we will have to be uplifting, a brand new IP that pushes graphics and traits apart to check out one thing recent. And it does with the intention to nice effects — jumping between characters in battle is way over a gimmick, it turns each stumble upon into an exhilarating frenzy of guts and gore. Upload within the poignant tale and an unsettling setting, from the person at the back of Silent Hill no much less, and Slitterhead is one thing in reality particular. I wouldn’t be shocked if we seemed again in ten years at this as a contemporary vintage.