Killer Is Dead

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.

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.

Saint's Row 4

Saint’s Row 4

Have you ever wanted to be president? Have you ever wanted to run around a big city breaking everything and everyone in it? Well good news you odd mix of psychopath and patriot with big aspirations because now you can. The saints are back in all their glory and everything starts off this time around with your character busting through a facility, jumping onto a rocket and disabling it thousands of feet in the air before, letting go and free-falling right through the white house roof into your office. Start as we mean to go on and Saint’s Row means to speed through everything with a mix of joy and confusion, barely giving you time to dwell on your most recent dubious act as you smash right into a pile of cars and people. Suddenly, aliens invade and kidnap you and your friends, trapping each of you inside personally tailored nightmares in the form of simulations. After breaking out of your simulation with thanks to you appointed secretary/resident computer nerd, you find yourself on a space ship just in time to watch the earth get blown up. I’m sure you’re reeling from all that breakneck exposition and this all happens in the first five minutes.

 Saint’s Row as a franchise has always been a wacky, off the wall Grand Theft Auto (GTA) clone, and over the years it’s just kept getting wackier. From the weapons you acquire to the people you meet to clothes you can buy, the absurdity runs true through it all. Previous Saint’s Row games had you spraying shit at house, giving a tiger a lift while it rips you face off or fighting a luchador wrestler on mars. Easy to say maturity isn’t this game forte but that’s its charm, the best part about a video game is that you can escape and lose yourself in another world. Saint’s Row 4 is happy to oblige and keeps the madcap trend going, the character building is less extensive this time around and instead of sliders you have a handful of body types to choose from, none of them varying much from the others. You can still have fun with it though, for instance I made my character look like Prince, and there is still enough modification to keep most players satisfied, no matter what image you would like to see ploughing through the city like a tiny Godzilla.

Your overarching goal is to find and retrieve your friends from there nightmares, but that gets swiftly lost under all the side missions you can do. These range from the sandbox standard; finding a guy and killing him, to seeing how much money you can rack up playing in traffic and getting hit by cars for an insurance fraud scam. Watching your character rag-doll through the air, spinning and twirling and finally dropping to the ground with a thud and a splat, is a delight. Saint’s Row is cathartic and very good at it, mixed with a sandbox environment It’s easy to get drawn in; shooting up a gang of aliens and taking them out one by one with a shotgun blast to the stomach, jacking a car and power-sliding into a crowd of computer-generated pedestrians, climbing every building to find the collectibles, then you realize three hours have past and you haven’t even done a story mission yet.

Speaking of story, Saint’s Row 4’s is probably one of the weirdest and with the change in setting comes the opportunity for new mechanics. Still taking place in a city is nothing new, the simulation is what makes this interesting, throughout the game you can unlock abilities such as super speed, super jumping and throwing elemental attacks at your enemies. With the addition of super speed, I felt like cars had become obsolete which upset me a bit, driving around at way over the speed limit was fun and most important of all you got to listen to the radio. Once I got the ability to super jump and glide all over the city, I don’t think I touched a car unless I was zooming by and sending it hurling into the nearest house. The other abilities are useful but not as necessary meaning, they get introduced, used to defeat one enemy type and then are just there for you to play with. Not that I’m complaining, the more ways to cause destruction and panic the better.

While breaking your friends out of their simulated hell’s, each being subjected to a constant loop designed to grind down their will, you start on taking down your alien kidnappers. Along the way we meet some classic characters from previous games while bolstering out your attack force, revisit some old stomping grounds and even delve into unknown territory with certain people. In all honesty, it’s probably the most coherent story a Saint’s Row game has ever had, mile a minute intro not with-standing, and weirdly in this case that’s a bad thing. GTA is good at the linear story and mindless mini games on a backdrop of grey but Saint’s Row knows how to let loose and party while bathed in a rainbow glow. It gives you a couple of tools and lets you run free in the fun-house, smashing things and setting stuff on fire and applauds you for it. Except in Saint’s Row 4’s case, it put on its slightly more pretentious hat with its cleaner, sleeker look and retro game call outs every other mission like it’s just discovered a NES and really wants to share it with you.

If you’re looking for a colourful, crazy, dumb fun sort of game, then Saint’s Row doesn’t disappoint. You can easily sink twenty hours into it and still find more things to have fun with from the clothes customization to causing the game physics to glitch. Towards the end I was suffering a lot of freezing issues and had to keep reloading my save, so I would recommend it but on a current gen console (Xbox one/PS4) or Steam.

Keep checking back for more articles of many games to come.