Have you ever looked up at the moon and wondered, how much would it cost to build a big arse castle up there? Or maybe, is that were Unicorns come from? Or more likely, why the hell am I looking at that thing when I could be playing Killer Is Dead!
Don't worry, no one has ever thought that.
Killer Is Dead is a single player, hack and slasher brought to us from the weird and wonderful mind of Suda 51, probably one of the strangest men in the video game world, sorry Hideo Kojima and John Romero, pipped at the post.
Killer Is Dead is a hub based game that has the player character, Mondo Zapper, travel to the moon and back, literally, performing executions of bad people. All of this comes from his boss, Bryan who is head of the very unimaginatively named "Bryan Execution Firm". Bryan is half cyborg and despite that being a great trait to have, hardly ever gets off his robo-butt, but I guess he did give Mondo a funky cybernetic arm so sending him out on all this missions is probably some sort of payment for it. Mondo is accompanied by Mika, one of the worst "side characters" I have ever seen. She does literally nothing, until you die, and even then its a button tapping mini game to bring you back to life as she sits on Mondo's chest. A bit weird. Even weirder when you find out that her and Mondo live together for no other reason than he saved her once and she couldn't be bothered to go home. No not really, it's something about the way she cooks her eggs, and no that's not a euphemism.
Mondo and Mika set out on many adventures to make the world a better place, or maybe its just to serve his lust for damage and killing, who knows. On these adventures, Mondo comes across legions of enemies called "Wires" that he has to hack and slash his way through, making his way to whatever target his execution firm has thrown at him, despite being the newbie in their team and for all they know could just be some berk in a suit that got his hands on a katana.
Despite there being a fair bit of writing, Killer Is Dead is quite bad at explaining what is going on, I played the whole thing and I'm still not quite sure what happened so if you're reading this and think that I'm having a stroke or something while I write it, I assure you this is what I remember of the game. Throughout his executioners journey, Mondo keeps coming across the name David, but thinks nothing of it until a woman comes to the firm asking for a man named David to be executed for becoming corrupt, overthrowing the moon ruler to take their place and just generally being a dick. Ultimately, Mondo has to confront David on the moon and finds himself uncovering memories of a life gone past, one that seems alien and removed from him.
Now even with Killer Is Dead being a weird game and hard to follow, I'm sure most of you reading this can see the massive plot twist from a mile away, but I'm not going to spoil is for those who don't, I would just recommend you play the game and see how much you can take in before your head explodes, probably in protest but more likely in confusion.
As a change of pace, there are side mission/mini game type things called Gigolo Mode. In Gigolo Mode, Mondo and one of his dates sit in various locations, a bar, a garden, etc and proceed to have a chat. Sounds innocent right, in lieu of the name anyway, but hold your horses as in Gigolo Mode you are tasked with entrancing the women that sit before Mondo. You do this by giving them present after present, ranging from a stick of gum to flowers to jewellery and when the girls look break eye contact with Mondo staring right down their cleavage. Do this enough without being caught and they will give you a present, bow chicka bow wow, not like that though, they give you drills and stuff, still weird though.
Ultimately, Killer Is Dead is a fine game if you want to waste 7 or 8 hours. The writing is a bit off, but I put that down to it being a Japanese game originally. The plot is ridiculous and very hard to follow and none of the characters are likable in any way, they're all just weird and quirky for the sake of being quirky, which I guess I cant really complain about because that's Suda 51's wheelhouse and this isn't exactly his first game.
If you like your hack and slashers like God Of War or Devil May Cry then this might be a bit toothless in comparison but it still has its highlights, like the dream sequences or the colourful, pop culture "inspired" characters, like Alice in the first chapter that lives in a house of constantly changing colourful rooms, some big some small but all of it odd and intriguing, as if it were some sort of wonderland house. If its on sale, or someone throws it at you in disgust, I would say pick it up and play it, but really you're not missing anything by letting Killer Is Dead scoot on by without a second glance.
Don't worry, no one has ever thought that.
Killer Is Dead is a single player, hack and slasher brought to us from the weird and wonderful mind of Suda 51, probably one of the strangest men in the video game world, sorry Hideo Kojima and John Romero, pipped at the post.
Killer Is Dead is a hub based game that has the player character, Mondo Zapper, travel to the moon and back, literally, performing executions of bad people. All of this comes from his boss, Bryan who is head of the very unimaginatively named "Bryan Execution Firm". Bryan is half cyborg and despite that being a great trait to have, hardly ever gets off his robo-butt, but I guess he did give Mondo a funky cybernetic arm so sending him out on all this missions is probably some sort of payment for it. Mondo is accompanied by Mika, one of the worst "side characters" I have ever seen. She does literally nothing, until you die, and even then its a button tapping mini game to bring you back to life as she sits on Mondo's chest. A bit weird. Even weirder when you find out that her and Mondo live together for no other reason than he saved her once and she couldn't be bothered to go home. No not really, it's something about the way she cooks her eggs, and no that's not a euphemism.
Mondo and Mika set out on many adventures to make the world a better place, or maybe its just to serve his lust for damage and killing, who knows. On these adventures, Mondo comes across legions of enemies called "Wires" that he has to hack and slash his way through, making his way to whatever target his execution firm has thrown at him, despite being the newbie in their team and for all they know could just be some berk in a suit that got his hands on a katana.
Despite there being a fair bit of writing, Killer Is Dead is quite bad at explaining what is going on, I played the whole thing and I'm still not quite sure what happened so if you're reading this and think that I'm having a stroke or something while I write it, I assure you this is what I remember of the game. Throughout his executioners journey, Mondo keeps coming across the name David, but thinks nothing of it until a woman comes to the firm asking for a man named David to be executed for becoming corrupt, overthrowing the moon ruler to take their place and just generally being a dick. Ultimately, Mondo has to confront David on the moon and finds himself uncovering memories of a life gone past, one that seems alien and removed from him.
Now even with Killer Is Dead being a weird game and hard to follow, I'm sure most of you reading this can see the massive plot twist from a mile away, but I'm not going to spoil is for those who don't, I would just recommend you play the game and see how much you can take in before your head explodes, probably in protest but more likely in confusion.
As a change of pace, there are side mission/mini game type things called Gigolo Mode. In Gigolo Mode, Mondo and one of his dates sit in various locations, a bar, a garden, etc and proceed to have a chat. Sounds innocent right, in lieu of the name anyway, but hold your horses as in Gigolo Mode you are tasked with entrancing the women that sit before Mondo. You do this by giving them present after present, ranging from a stick of gum to flowers to jewellery and when the girls look break eye contact with Mondo staring right down their cleavage. Do this enough without being caught and they will give you a present, bow chicka bow wow, not like that though, they give you drills and stuff, still weird though.
Ultimately, Killer Is Dead is a fine game if you want to waste 7 or 8 hours. The writing is a bit off, but I put that down to it being a Japanese game originally. The plot is ridiculous and very hard to follow and none of the characters are likable in any way, they're all just weird and quirky for the sake of being quirky, which I guess I cant really complain about because that's Suda 51's wheelhouse and this isn't exactly his first game.
If you like your hack and slashers like God Of War or Devil May Cry then this might be a bit toothless in comparison but it still has its highlights, like the dream sequences or the colourful, pop culture "inspired" characters, like Alice in the first chapter that lives in a house of constantly changing colourful rooms, some big some small but all of it odd and intriguing, as if it were some sort of wonderland house. If its on sale, or someone throws it at you in disgust, I would say pick it up and play it, but really you're not missing anything by letting Killer Is Dead scoot on by without a second glance.
I hope you've enjoyed my look at Killer Is Dead, I'm sure I'll dive into Suda 51's weird universe once again with one of his many nonsensical games soon, but until then keep checking back to Game Changers for more gaming news and updates.
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