Splatterhouse

 Splatterhouse is a re-envisioning of an old franchise of arcade-style brawlers that came out in the arcade, on TurboGrafx-16 and Genesis.
 
Short Review:
 
BAD:

• repetitive and wonky combat
• the camera not too smart
• LOAD TIMES!!
• mask talks so much
• not a diverse cast of enemies
• LOAD TIMES!!!!
• terrible final boss

 
GOOD:

• good atomsphere
• lots of amusing reference
• great for those who like 80s horror and lovecraft
• jenny screaming
• includes first 3 Splatterhouse
• at times can be pretty damn cool looking
• ...short?

 
Longer Review:

This newest title is a modern-style brawler like GoW/DMC.  If you are not a fan of those games or even if you are I'm not sure I would recommend Splatterhouse since its combat is one of the worst of the games I've played this year. After playing games like Bayonetta, Batman: Arkham Asylum, and even less refined Castlevania: Lords of Shadow the combat is a huge step back. It tries to distract/enthrall with its excessive gore, which its like a throwback to fountains of blood in a well-packed room of SmashTV, but its blood-splattered camera cannot cover that it sucks.
The attacks feel unresponsive coming out and then after you start you have wait till attack string is over to reposition and start a new attack. This is true in a lot of games but I felt it was extra slow to respond which is a death sentence in this game since some of the heavier attacks will put you on the floor or staggered. Why is that so terrible? Because unlike the start of this game when death seems basically impossible unless to some unavoidable gimmick or some mishap of the retarded camera ( The camera is bad; you will at some time mostly be screwed by it. ) in the late game being stunned for a second is basically an invitation to be molested. Seems a little dramatic? Well it might be until you are actually experienced a death in Splatterhouse; every death kills you a little bit inside. Not because its hard or even that a lot of the deaths you encounter are bullsharks its because of the LOADING TIME!! This game might have some of the most serious loading time I've ever experience ... ever, ever! I could not install unfortunately but after reading other reviews I gather that it does little to help the life-draining moments where you watch gatekeeper and the key-master fighting it out on your screen.
 
This game tries to vary combat a little with purchasable skills, a variety of weapons, and "splatterkills". The weapons are nice most of the time, when enemies get thick, weapons are more of hindrance because most have a hefty start up time. But they make quick work of enemies which there are a LOT.
The skills you can get though are pretty lack luster, mostly they are upgrades of attacks you already have/get. It feels you could get away without getting most of them and NONE of them make you feel like its a game changer which makes buying most of them after fully upgrading your life and energy bar really just an after thought.
Splatterkills; an embellishment to the senseless carnage of this game. After you damage an enemy enough he will glow red and if you press B near them you will go into a QTE which you can brutal murder the enemy for more "blood" which is also the currency which you buy skills and fills your energy bar. Fun at first but get repetitive and since the skills are so lack luster, I think most will refrain from using them unless they really want the achievements or are low on energy.
 
Anything good to say about the combat? Well, as I already stated for most of this game I never really feared dying in combat, but in the last 3 chapters in the game I felt I actually had to manage my energy more intelligently than before since I had been rather reckless since I feared nothing. This did add a nice dimension to the combat. I did only play through once on Savage (Normal) difficulty , this could be true for a large portion on the game on Brutal difficulty. Even though that might amplify some of the other problems I had since I constantly felt limited in what attack I could use based on start up and recovery making this games combat SUPER repetitive.
 
Even though this game is primarily a GoW-clone, it does have an occasional side-scrolling segments. They are a tribute to the games roots and a fun treat to those who love retro-platforming. Well they would be if dying in Splatterhouse didn't make you consider cutting yourself, LOADING TIME!!!!!
Let this game ship as is, felt like one of the worst decisions in game making history. Its my opinion this game could have cut itself a real audience if not for this major technical issue. If your game wants to have long gauntlets of enemies and some punishing trial and error platforming; when your game will have a decent quantity of deaths, you cannot take for granted the tolerance of your audience. If Super Meat Boy even had 3 seconds of loading time after you died that game would be no where near as popular. I believe it was in the integral part of their design, crucial.

I've harped on this game a lot but I did finish it because it has some moments. I am a fan of the campy 80s horror and the Lovecraftian supernatural what-nots and this game gives you all you'd like of that; nothing original but in my opinion does the same-old same-old pretty well. Even though I think I would have preferred a different cliche ending to the actually cliche ending I got.

There are a couple of unlockables included with this game including the first 3 Splatterhouse games. Which I didn't play extensively but did try and I will say ... might be better games? Creepier at least. As a side note I had not played the original games before playing this, but I did watch a run through of the first game on YouTube and there is a lot of connection between that original game and this game version that probably would make the die-hard fan pretty happy.

There are also an album of racy photos of photos of the main characters love interest, Jenny. As well as journal entries of the main antagonist, which are very "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward". Unlocking those actually did a lot to motivate me through this game. Though not enough for me to get all the entries since that would require an additional play through on the hardest difficulty as well as max ranking the 6 unlockable survival arenas. I'VE HAD ENOUGH. For those who care, it doesn't seem like this game would be very difficult to get 1000 achievement. Seems on 2 play-throughs you would unlock everything and if not definitely so when you finished up the arenas.
 
That's all I have to say, if you read this thanks. Its my first review on Giant Bomb and frankly I know I'm not too great at reviewing stuff. Yep.