BAM!
The door flies open and my animal-masked murderer knocks a ruskie to the ground. Before he has a chance to recover, I BASH his face in with my bare hands. I take the knife he drops, and -- having tried this 100 times now, the action assigned to muscle memory -- I fly into the next room, stabbing two guys before they can even turn. One hit, one kill! One hit, one kill!
One drops a shotgun and I grab it, rounding the next corner, unloading shells into two men, pixelated intestines everywhere. Then I retreat and wait for reinforcements to arrive. They cautiously cross the threshold -- BLAM! BLAM! Brains blown against the wall.
I exchange my shotgun for one of their assault rifles -- a sweet 24/24 bullets -- and barrel down the blood-soaked hallway. This time I'm ready for the shotgun-wielding goon behind the glass window. I swerve as I turn the corner, running backwards and spraying lead through the glass embankment. CRASH! I see his blood splash from the periphery of the screen, and...
"Stage Clear." Duh-wuh? The thumping trance music stops... Total silence.
Here I just completed a stage... But the game won't crunch my score just yet. I have to walk all the way back to the start of the level, floor after floor, room after room filled with carnage. Carnage I caused, like some unstoppable god of death. Only I was stopped, repeatedly, one hit one kill, one hit one kill, hundreds of times, until I got the map down to a science, until I applied a laser-like focus and made every action count. And my reward... is a chance to walk among the dead. Dozens of corpses. Decapitated, dismembered. Simple sprites, but somehow more unsettling for it. And outside, beyond the borders of the map, there is no world -- only undulating neon colors, like the background of an Earthbound battle -- and like that game, Hotline Miami hints at something more, something deeper.
Something darker. Your killing sprees are framed by visits to your apartment in '80s-era Miami, where you receive voicemails sending you on random hits. You visit friends after each episode, at VHS rental stores and pizzerias and convenience stores and night clubs. And slowly the world starts to change. Perhaps it has to do with the dark visions you occasionally have, where masked men surround you in an unknown location, giving you questions to ponder, but no answers. And if you check the newspaper clippings in your apartment each day, you'll see the world is aware of your massacres. But what does it all mean?
I'm not here to tell you that -- in all honesty, I'm still finding out, at Episode 13 now -- but I needed to articulate how fantastic this game is, because with it now voting season here at GAF, and time being of the essence, I think more people need to try this game. Incredibly addictive, stylish and atmospheric -- with a brilliant soundtrack to boot -- Hotline Miami is really something special. And if you play it with a 360 controller like I am, the rumble will jolt you silly when a shotgun blasts your back. And then you'll retry... And retry again. A bit farther each time.
Stealth, action, puzzling, and score attack, all woven seamlessly as one, in a world that's warm and alluring even as it paints a bleak picture. This game is amazing. Seriously. I hope this one doesn't get overlooked...
The door flies open and my animal-masked murderer knocks a ruskie to the ground. Before he has a chance to recover, I BASH his face in with my bare hands. I take the knife he drops, and -- having tried this 100 times now, the action assigned to muscle memory -- I fly into the next room, stabbing two guys before they can even turn. One hit, one kill! One hit, one kill!
One drops a shotgun and I grab it, rounding the next corner, unloading shells into two men, pixelated intestines everywhere. Then I retreat and wait for reinforcements to arrive. They cautiously cross the threshold -- BLAM! BLAM! Brains blown against the wall.
I exchange my shotgun for one of their assault rifles -- a sweet 24/24 bullets -- and barrel down the blood-soaked hallway. This time I'm ready for the shotgun-wielding goon behind the glass window. I swerve as I turn the corner, running backwards and spraying lead through the glass embankment. CRASH! I see his blood splash from the periphery of the screen, and...
"Stage Clear." Duh-wuh? The thumping trance music stops... Total silence.
Here I just completed a stage... But the game won't crunch my score just yet. I have to walk all the way back to the start of the level, floor after floor, room after room filled with carnage. Carnage I caused, like some unstoppable god of death. Only I was stopped, repeatedly, one hit one kill, one hit one kill, hundreds of times, until I got the map down to a science, until I applied a laser-like focus and made every action count. And my reward... is a chance to walk among the dead. Dozens of corpses. Decapitated, dismembered. Simple sprites, but somehow more unsettling for it. And outside, beyond the borders of the map, there is no world -- only undulating neon colors, like the background of an Earthbound battle -- and like that game, Hotline Miami hints at something more, something deeper.
Something darker. Your killing sprees are framed by visits to your apartment in '80s-era Miami, where you receive voicemails sending you on random hits. You visit friends after each episode, at VHS rental stores and pizzerias and convenience stores and night clubs. And slowly the world starts to change. Perhaps it has to do with the dark visions you occasionally have, where masked men surround you in an unknown location, giving you questions to ponder, but no answers. And if you check the newspaper clippings in your apartment each day, you'll see the world is aware of your massacres. But what does it all mean?
I'm not here to tell you that -- in all honesty, I'm still finding out, at Episode 13 now -- but I needed to articulate how fantastic this game is, because with it now voting season here at GAF, and time being of the essence, I think more people need to try this game. Incredibly addictive, stylish and atmospheric -- with a brilliant soundtrack to boot -- Hotline Miami is really something special. And if you play it with a 360 controller like I am, the rumble will jolt you silly when a shotgun blasts your back. And then you'll retry... And retry again. A bit farther each time.
Stealth, action, puzzling, and score attack, all woven seamlessly as one, in a world that's warm and alluring even as it paints a bleak picture. This game is amazing. Seriously. I hope this one doesn't get overlooked...
