Rating
Slitterhead
Set in the densely cluttered streets of "Kowlong," filled with obscurity and chaos, this battle action-adventure game casts players as the "Hyoki," an entity devoid of memory and physical form. His only motive is to eradicate the monstrous beings known as "Slitterheads" crawling around the city, disguising themselves as humans. Roaming the vibrant...
Details
- Released
- November 8, 2024
- Developer
- Bokeh Game Studio
- Platforms
- PC · PS4 · PS5 · Xbox Series X|S
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Slitterhead Reviews
Professional reviews from gaming critics
Slitterhead can be a slow-burn to begin with, but once its combat clicks, this is an action horror game like few others.
Slitterhead won’t be for everyone due to its quirks, it’s a bit clunky and reuses content frequently. But behind its issues lies one of the most unique titles of the past few years. With a great mystery story, impressive world-building for a debut, and a possession mechanic that adds an extra strategic layer to combat. Slitterhead lives up to its pedigree.
Slitterhead's unique premise and experimental mechanics make it a compelling experience, even if it can feel a bit too rough and low-budget from time to time.
Bokeh Game Studio's Slitterhead shows a lot of promise in terms of its unique possession action gameplay, direction, music and overall plot. It’s fun, electric and unlike any other game. New IPs are the lifeblood of the industry and the game is a key example of keeping that saying alive. The reliance on narrative tropes, graphical inconsistencies and dialogue-heavy exposition, however, do keep the title from reaching the heights it seemed destined to climb.
Slitterhead takes an innovative concept and places it at the forefront of the adventure. The possession mechanic leads to a frantic combat system that encourages you to quickly switch between characters to fight formidable foes. This bleeds throughout acting as a method of traversal and stealth. Although a little clunky and lacking polish, the game manages to deliver a truly unique experience that will resonate with fans of action and horror.
Slitterhead – directed by Japan Studio veteran Keiichiro Toyama – feels like a spiritual successor to Siren, Gravity Rush, and Soul Sacrifice all at the same time. This inventive, unusual survival horror is far from perfect, with inconsistent visuals, repetition, and some unrefined gameplay systems. But if you’ve been lamenting the loss of PlayStation’s oddball first-party output, this is the closest you’re going to get to it.
As for the combat in Slitterhead, it's definitely its strongest feature. Changing bodies during a tense boss fight is exciting and adds a layer of strategy that keeps the game from being a simple hack-n-slash. However, the lack of enemy variety and enemy movesets completely remove the need to test out other Rarities since there are almost no weaknesses to exploit. In other words, Slitterhead is a game with heaps of potential but is never fully realized.
Slitterhead has you ghost jumping from body to body as you attempt to kill a city’s worth of grotesque monsters in the process. While combat can function well enough, and the story does get somewhat interesting, a time travel gimmick brings alongside a lot of repeated mission design that really drag
“Slitterhead is the most creative action game that I've played this year, but it's also deeply flawed.”
Though it can be strange and fascinating, Slitterhead ultimately feels empty thanks to dull and frustrating combat and repetitive missions.
After I finished the game after 12 hours, I couldn’t help but think that I deluded myself into thinking that Slitterhead was better than it was. I wanted to like it, I honestly did, but after a certain point, goodwill can only take you so far. Eventually, you just have to accept a game you were looking forward to is actually bad.