In the realm of gaming auteurs, Swery and Suda51 are synonymous with incredible and outlandish presentation. The likes of Deadly Premonition, Killer 7, No More Heroes, and many more all share a style DNA whilst managing to retain their own identity. If you’re a fan of these creators then you’ll be well used to zany dialogue, weird moments, and a requisite amount of jank. Hotel Barcelona feels like the perfect distillation of this collaboration as it oozes style, but requires some perseverance to overcome the initial limitations.
Agent Justine sets out to investigate a mysterious case, only to find herself trapped in the titular Hotel Barcelona and stuck in an unwanted possession by the infamous serial killer Dr Carnival. While they are polar opposites in their intentions and approaches, they are forced to bond over their imprisonment at the hands of an evil witch who is closely connected to both of their pasts. Their mission is made more complicated by the fact that the Hotel is now home to the spirits of the most notorious and evil serial killers in American history.
Hotel Barcelona plays out across two main modes but one is effectively an option select screen given a graphical overhaul as you explore the Hotel to talk to characters and unlock skills and weapons. After you talk to each merchant they are added to your phonebook, so eventually you hardly need to leave your room in between attempts. This may sound like there are a range of characters with which to interact, but in fact there are only four in total. One sells consumables, one weapons, another allows you to apply challenge penalties to access greater bonuses and the last is in charge of character upgrades. This makes the Hotel feel like a surprisingly lonely place, though there is some background flavour text.
There’s a fantastic grindhouse cartoon aesthetic throughout, which features splashes of colour and a cast of over the top characters. The various levels have distinctive styles that reflect the deranged personalities of the bosses too. The Hotel and the levels also feature a myriad of Easter egg references to classic slasher and horror icons from Jason Vorhees to Pennywise. Dialogue takes place through static character images that look destined to become cult classic Halloween costumes in the future with inspirations taken equally from The X Files and Rocky Horror. Music and voiceovers are in keeping with the atmosphere and work well, with Dr Carnival’s gravelly tones being a particular highlight.
At heart, the game is a roguelite 2D action platformer with a focus on close quarters combat and large-scale boss fights. The narrative framing of this repetition is based on the action taking place in Justine’s dreams, a framing that works well with the overall surreal nature of the game. You can choose between three different melee weapon types as you progress, with knives, axes, and whirling sawblades. Each type has numerous unlockable variations that you can buy, giving different strengths and bonus parameters. These range from simple damage buffs to others that gain benefits from specific contexts such as rain or aerial attacks. You also have access to a support ranged weapon that can be used with a cooldown, with a simple pistol being your starting point. Shotguns and flamethrowers are also available later on, so there is an element of strategy in choosing your loadout.
At first you only have very basic combo attacks to take on the many enemies you’ll face, but the permanent upgrade system features multiple unlockable attacks for each melee type. Some of these feel far more useful than others which speaks to a lack of balance, but that could also be due to my own playstyle. The roguelite system means that there is a lot of grinding repetition required to get to the fun stuff. This is a problem as the basic controls are not great, with Justine feeling turgid and clunky to control. Action platformers live and die through their movement and Hotel Barcelona is a far more rigid experience than most. Attacks seem locked in and it is easy to take damage with little to no way of countering it.
Exploration in each level requires you to jump between platforms, fight off enemies and destroy environmental objects for collectable currencies. Dollars, bones, teeth, and ears are the various forms of payment needed for upgrades and consumables which can be frustrating as these are locked to each run so leftovers are lost. With there being a random element to what you collect each time this can make grinding for upgrades a frustrating process. There is a skill that lets you keep a percentage in storage but this is also slow to upgrade.
Bosses are the high point of the game’s combat and are hugely challenging at first. You do have the ability to repeat fights a limited number of times, during which your previous attempts are played out in the form of Slasher Phantoms and continue to do the attacks and damage of that run. This leads to a neat layered approach in which failed runs can make the next one easier, but it’s a concept that never felt as fleshed out as I would have liked. Combined with random elements like weather effects, day and night cycles, and even player size (being giant makes for some comical encounters given the scale of the levels and enemies), there is a welcome variety to runs but the actual combat and level design quickly becomes repetitive.
