The Killer is Dead in Suda51’s latest game of murder, assassins, and harrowing plot devices. Slashing and shooting isn’t usually as brutal or surreal as it is in KiD, which was a wonderful change of pace. You play as Mondo Zappa, an assassin who has just joined Bryan’s Execution Office. Strangely enough this assassination business is paid for by the state, leaving them to fight all sorts of supernatural horrors. This leads to some interesting level designs from an Alice in Wonderland inspired stage to a high-tech music company to even a mansion on the dark side of the moon! Mondo’s clientele are just as unique, providing an interesting episodic narrative with each story tied together by the moon. While the story can seem disjointed at times, surely that’s enough for any businessman to want to get the job done.
Killing isn’t as simple as you would think it would be for a professional assassin. Simply slashing your way through won’t get you very far, but thankfully you have a prosthetic arm that can transform into a plethora of other weapons. Dodging your enemies strikes is also crucial as a few hits from them will almost certainly end your career and perfectly timed evasions result in a stylish combo. Once your combo gets high enough you can choose to have your prey drop health, money, or other useful collectables. Other than that though this combat system is fairly simplistic. My only gripe is that this game desperately needed some form of lock-on button which becomes increasingly detrimental the further you progress. In fact the camera can be extremely unwieldy sometimes panning on its own making it difficult to see. It doesn’t affect boss battles as much as you would think, which are truly the highlight of the game. I would almost say that the big baddies are the most uncanny thing about this game. In fact it feels as if the entirety of the level before them was there so you could stock up before the battle. Even the side-quests seem to be directly correlated to the next duel to the death.
Gigolo Missions are a strange diversion from the regular game that involves checking out a “Mondo Girl” during a date. Failure to look at the right times can result in a hearty slap to the face, while beating the mini game gives you new weapons and items. While this is supposed to be tongue-in-cheek parodying of sex scenes in video games, it could’ve been more ridiculous to illustrate that point. This might be because of how utterly simplistic it is as well. Maybe if this dance of seduction was more engaging, it would have properly conveyed its message. Scarlett is the only “Mondo Girl” that seems to take it to such an extreme, requiring you to complete numerous challenges and find her throughout the levels in order to romance her. She could’ve been the only option and it wouldn’t have affected the game too much. At the very least it is just a side quest, so you don’t truly need to do it more than once to succeed.
If you treat KiD as a spiritual sequel to the Killer series, you’ll get everything you expect from it and more. It’s gross and wonderfully surreal like a Dali painting covered in human intestines. While I have some severe complaints with the camera and Mondo Girl parts, I found the experience overall to be fantastic. The story was almost completely unpredictable, bouncing from disgusting bug monsters to deaf mutated musicians. There’s also a healthy amount of cheesy one liners and breaking the fourth wall, which was hilarious. This is a game for people who might want a break from the norm to play something different, and I highly recommend it.