The Hong Kong Massacre Review (TGWCam)
Imagine if both Hotline Miami, and Superhot had a baby. A game about furious action with glorious amounts of slo-motion violence that would have made prudent Americans in the 1980's absolutely cack their own pants. Now imagine, if Hotline Miami and Superhot were blood relatives, and the baby that had created, was so horribly inbred, it would be rejected from starring in The Hills Have Eyes for being too repulsive, too hideous, and completely and utterly garbage.
That's what THKM is, really. Utter garbage. I'm not the biggest fan of Hotline Miami, in all truth, but I massively respect it as a game. It's very well designed, and the people that like it, generally, love it. And I've played my fair share of clones, including Bloodbath Kavkaz, and in all honesty, I'd recommend that pile of sewage over this, because at least that game could theoretically have some enjoyment value compared to this horrendous assault on the eyes, wrists and patience.
The levels are so poorly thought out, that you'll constantly get caught on random bits of geometry, not that you'll ever work out what bit of the sofa or door is trapping you this time. Or you'll be forced to use the dive mechanic to cross rooftops. Perfectly fine in idea, but in execution, you'll miss the jump and die, you'll slide into the wall and not actually dive then probably get shot and die, or you'll make the jump... onto the ledge of the building you were supposed to get into, now stuck too low to dive into the building you want, leaving your only option... to kill yourself by jumping off the building.
Beautiful. Wonderful.
I can't even begin to tell you about how horrendously poor the enemy placement is without telling you about the visual eyesore that is particlefx.exe. It is utterly ridiculous that your eyes are constantly assaulted by every neon coloured thing in the universe with bloom so high that the Xbox 360 is blushing in the background. Enemies are normally colour coded, depending on weapon. Useful, perhaps in another game, because giant shining lights that burn your retinas, often hide enemies of the exact same colour, leading to entering a room, clearing what you think is everyone, only to find out that a yellow suited arsehat was sitting in the yellow light, whoops lol, restart.
I also can't tell you how many times the AI actively bends the rule of the game to suit them, either. It's a one-hit kill world in THKM, so you and every enemy, simply dies in a single bullet. Absolutely fine, on paper, until the enemies that dodge roll are introduced. Sometimes they do it out of free will, sometimes, it is blatantly obvious that they dodge roll the second you press to fire. Irritating, but it's not like there's specific mandatory challenges that require you to never miss a bullet.
Oh. Oh dear. And then, shortly after the half-way point, enemies are introduced that not only spam dodge-roll like they're playing a soulslike, but can take MULTIPLE HITS. They spray you with abandon glee as their i-frames completely nullify the fourtieth attempt at a miserable challenge.
Games like Hotline Miami absolutely thrive on replayability. On wanting to get better, on learning better strategies and improving your own ability to beat the game into submission. An intoxicating reward/risk cycle until you can clear the entire thing with reckless abandon and look damn good doing it. This game has none of those qualities. It is a poor, weakly thought out game, that once you begin to push to its limits, will frustrate and sadden you to no end.
This is not a labour of love. It is a hideous, inbred baby, and deserves to be unbirthed as so.