God and the pigeons are one. Trust in the pigeons.Killer7Genre Action | Publisher Capcom | Developer Grasshopper | ESRB Mature
(author’s note: The slowdown and long load times do not plaque the GCN version. This review technically covers the PS2 version, but the above is the only difference)
There are some games that split user response in two. Generally it can be due to a new, unique way to play, or in the case of some RPGs, the story direction. Killer7 has appeared to do the same. If you are looking into this game and have read the various reviews out there, you have already realized that some people despise the game for having such a simplistic gameplay design. Others realized that this was the only way you could explain the story and keep this wild style of graphics, sound design, and other parts of gameplay. I am part of the latter.
The reason this game is so unique is due to a few factors. If you check out a few of the screenshots, you will see that the art style used to portray the game is wildly different then anything we have seen before. Still, after playing a few hours with this style, it is easy to see that there would be no other form of graphics that would portray the image Suda 51 and Grasshopper were trying to show you. When killing off Heaven Smiles, the game’s central enemies, about 30 holes will open all of their bodies, and blood will pour out of their wounds as if their body was a showerhead of blood. When they finally fall, the body explodes into little colorful particles.
These Smiles, who never stop smiling by the way, are the central figure of the story. You play as the Killer7, a group of assassins all seemingly sharing one body. Harman Smith has seven personalities in addition to his own: Garcian, Dan, Kaede, Kevin, Coyote, Con, and Mask. Our dysfunctional bunch here is the Earth’s main resistance to the Smiles. This is fairly expected, because the man who controls the Smiles is Kun Lan, Harman’s main adversary. While the game starts out seemingly as these two groups fighting, your “assignments” will be to kill other various political figures. All are unique, and range from a man who likes little girls to a gang of Power Ranger-rip offs. In the end, this all ties together to somehow explain the past of the Killer7, as well as some very messed up political ideas. All of this adds up to one of the best stories in video games. Do I fully understand what went on in Killer7? No, not really. I get the overall idea of it, but a lot of details are still confusing. Don’t worry though; it only adds to the mystique that is Killer7.
Well, this story needs a vessel to get to you with. That vessel is the distinctive gameplay, although some say it is too simplistic. Yes, it is simple when you first look at it. The game is almost like a rail shooter. You press one button to go forward, and one will turn you around. At intersections, you choose where you want to go next with the left analog stick and continue down that path. Combat involves bringing up your weapon into a first-person view and scanning whenever you hear the Smile’s screams. This makes them visible and open targets to your gun (or knife) fire.
What really makes it unique is the variety of Smiles, ways to kill enemies, the level design, and the light RPG elements that accompany all of this. You control seven personalities, although Garcian can not be upgraded (and you won’t use him much either). They each have their own weapons that are generally unique: Mask’s dual grenade launchers that require a reload after every round to Con’s automatics that are amazingly fast to Kevin’s knives which have no reload time. Using these weapons, you can target the weak points of the Smiles, which sometimes are shown glowing yellow (in the easiest difficulty) and other times they are fairly obvious and are not directly denoted.
Every time you hit a weak spot, or shoot off a limb, the Smile will spout blood. Blood will be collected, and comes in two forms: thin and thick. Thin blood will be used for healing and special attacks, like charge shots. Thick will be turned into serum at TVs, where you save and can change to Garcian, who you generally only use to resurrect fallen personas. The serum is then used to upgrade four categories: Power, Speed, Waver, and Critical. Mask and Kevin have slightly different upgrades, but they work the same way. Anyway, this is how you shape the characters you like. Say, you really like Dan. However, his arm tends to shake a little when aiming. So you upgrade your Waver to level 3. Now, Dan’s aim is near steady. It is not perfect, but is a lot better than it was. Now, you focus on the other statistics. When you get each of them to level 2, Dan gains his counter attack ability. Whenever a Smile gets too close, you can time a press of the counter button and Dan will grab the Smile and shoot him dead. You get no blood out of the deal, but it helps against damage. These abilities come from certain level requirements. You can get the counter attack, which most of the personas can get, or get a Head Lock-on with Dan, which will automatically target the head of the Smile nearest to you. There are several of these abilities, but you never really know when you will get one, so it’s basically going by luck when choosing upgrades that you get the ability.
The last bit of gameplay to work into Killer7 is the puzzles. You can whittle most of the puzzles to their core, which almost always are finding the right piece and putting it in the right place. Whether it is finding an engraving to open a door or seeing how many transformations a toy has on a poster and then imputing that number into a computer, they all revolve around a key to a lock. Some will get more complicated and force you to backtrack and check things, then go back to the lock and open it with the information you hopefully remembered. Still, you can always look at the bosses as puzzles, because as they are generally human, they each have their own unique way to go down. Sometimes you have to shoot at the precise time in a stand off, or others you just have to find the weak point and exploit it. None are ever really the same, and make for some of the more unique experiences during gameplay.
As I said before, the presentation is probably something you have never seen before. Aside from the colorific regular graphics, the game uses two other styles of cutscenes. Both are actually anime, but the way they are drawn and animated is completely different. They are used in sections also, as one appears in the first half and the other appears in the second. I’m not exactly sure of the reason for this, but it may have been used to switch things around. Anyway, on the music front, everything is a little toned down. Nothing is real eccentric like the rest of the game, except for the disco theme after the gatekeeper, which I personally love. However, where it lacks that “edge” in the music, it gains in the sound design. From the laughs of the Smiles as they explode in your face to the arcade-like kill sounds every time the Smile erupts in blood, nothing is short of uniquely brilliant. Even the voices of the dead ghosts that come back to help, or haunt, you speak in a weird gibberish with the help of subtitles. Don’t worry, the rest of the voice-acting is all real English, and is actually fairly well done.
While it may surprise you, Killer7 can last about 15-20 hours. It only has seven missions, but each one tends to last about 2-3 hours long, excluding the last one. Oh, and there are two different ways to play the game. Technically, they are different difficulties. But the differences are really whether you want to be really challenged or if you want the game to be there for help if you ever need it. On the easier difficulty, most puzzles are denoted on the map with the persona/item to use for it. There are also key locations and things that should be checked out shown on the map as well. Probably the biggest change is the fact that only on the easiest difficulty you will be shown the enemy’s weak points on regular Smiles. That yellow glow I mentioned earlier, it isn’t shown on the hard difficulty. Plus, the enemies are harder. Again, if you start with the harder difficulty, you’ll probably have a tough time getting used to the game.
Aside from the puzzles, the only real flaws you can find in this game are due to the Playstation 2’s hardware. Unfortunately, gameplay will get slowdown when a few Smiles get close to you, or sometimes even with the death of a Smile. There is also about 10 second-long cutscenes between doorways and changing personas. You know that static you get on your TV when the channel doesn’t work? Imagine the camera is zoomed in and the color is hued to blue. Get used to that image, because you will be seeing it a lot.
Overall, I really had a good time with this game. If my score was based on personal fun with the game alone, it would be near perfect. Still, Killer7 is a wildly unique game that won’t please everyone. I definitely recommend renting this title due to the storyline and uniqueness that accompanies most things you do. Trust me; your time will be unlike anything you have done before.
Gameplay...8
Graphics...9
Audio......9
Worth......8
Overall........8 /10+ An experience like no other
+ Schizophrenia has never been so much
- Puzzles are almost all, at their core, key and lock related
? Why must the story confuse me half the time?
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Topic: Killer7 (Read 13238 times)
