Review | Romeo is a Dead Man

[Written by Murilo] In a more mainstream sense, when we think about games with an identity, we usually think about the studio that developed those games, not so much about who the creative director behind them was. When we see a Mario game, we think about Nintendo; when we see a Halo game, we think about Xbox Game Studios or 343 Industries, but there are a few IPs or games that, when we see them, we don’t think about the publisher, the studio or anything else but the director behind it. When we see Kirby Air Riders or Smash Bros., we think about Masahiro Sakurai; when we see Metal Gear or Death Stranding, we think about Kojima, and for me, you don’t need to show me the Grasshopper Manufacture logo or the first 10 seconds of the Romeo is a Dead Man trailer; I thought, “Yep, that’s Suda51, alright”.

And what is a Suda51 game? Besides being a very weird, high-octane action game that’s a nonsensical hellscape of a fever dream. It’s the style and the presentation; it’s something that always screams “That’s a Suda51 game”. And it might not always be good, and it always has a lot of flaws, but in the end, you’ll be happy that you played a game by Goichi Suda. And that’s exactly my experience with “Romeo is a Dead Man”.

So, be prepared and let’s talk about the good, the bad, and the Suda of “Romeo is a Dead Man”.

Things I Liked!

• Gameplay | If you played games like No More Heroes or Lollipop Chainsaw, you know exactly what to expect. Romeo is a Dead Man, like most of Suda51 games, is an adrenaline-fueled action game; it’s more aimed towards a Hack ‘n’ Slash experience, where you don’t think a lot about strategies for how to approach an enemy, and has more of an arcade-y feeling, like a good ol’ Beat ‘em Up, where you react to attacks, then you go full onslaught on the enemies when you have a chance.
  
  The gameplay behind a Suda51 game can be seen in an angle of style over substance and view as its negative, because there’s no deeper mechanics behind the combat, it’s button mashing with some gimmicks that helps you with the Hacking and the Slashing, but, that’s also the beauty behind those games, where the presentation is felt in the gameplay, every kill is celebrated, every combo is cherished, and every item and gimmick that you use, you feel satisfied, it’s “cool for the sake of being cool”, but, you can’t lie that you didn’t feel “cool” while playing.
  
  But some things can make your experience different: you can unlock different weapons; you have a melee weapon and a ranged weapon, and the combination of those and which one you choose for which situation can change the way you see the battlefield.
  
  The gameplay loop is always “new chapter, new exclusive gimmick for the chapter, a lot of enemies, and in the end, a big boss battle”; it’s a very linear experience that has some different things that you can deviate a little and diversify your experience, but it has a very clear structure. Every chapter has a medium-sized map with sections that you can explore and kill a lot of enemies along the way, having a more maze-like feel, where you do a thing that opens a thing, then you go to that thing, that opens the thing behind you, that opens a thing you saw at the beginning, that opens a way to the objective, and then you go to the big boss of the chapter.

• Content | When you are not in a story chapter, you have a 2D pixelated 90s Sierra-Like hub world where you can talk to the characters, upgrade your skills and weapons and do some challenges and minigames, and that’s what makes a Suda51 game, where the Hacking and Slashing can feel a little repetitive sometimes, but his games always have a lot of minigames, gimmicks and things to explore, where the simplest thing, like upgrading skills can have a strategy DOS-Like minigame, just because “why not?”. The highlight is the “Zombie-Farm-Pokémon” gimmick, where you can basically summon Zombies in combat that can attack the enemy or give you some support or assistance, and you can unlock more zombies by collecting “Seeds” and planting them in the hub world, where you can also mix the zombies and upgrade your farm, building your “Pokémon-Zombie-Team” (I know) and use them the way it better suits you.
  
  You also have a cooking section with a “Cooking Mama”-like minigame (I know) and create items that you can use in battle. Or, you can explore space with your spaceship, and there’s some stuff to do there: you can collect ingredients in the space for the cooking minigame (Yes, I know), go to areas that have some side challenges that give you rewards, letting you unlock and upgrade more, or you can just go to the story areas, either recent or finished ones. But you can spend a lot of time doing chores and side missions if you want to open everything, and sometimes, that’s a good way to diversify your experience.
  
  But it’s the journey and the storytelling that changes everything, he is a FBI Space-Time Agent that hunts down space-time fugitives and criminals, but, it’s always somehow tied to Juliet, and it’s somewhat obvious what the mystery is, almost to a level that you feel it’s intentional to feel obvious, but, it’s how Romeo reacts to the situation is the core of the narrative, he has a very innocent and pure personality, giving the player the dynamic of the “friend who is blind by love”, where you can’t do anything but watch him realize what is truly happening, it’s simple, but it’s the way Suda tells the story, that’s tied to the next section: style.

• Visuals and Style | Style is the name of the game for Suda51 gams. In the storytelling and in the gameplay, it’s very nonsensical, explosive, colorful, pixelated, neon-drenched buffet. Suda makes it clear that he is inspired by 90s anime, movies and games that he grew up watching and playing; it’s what makes a Suda51 experience. Every time you think something is making sense, he does something that makes you feel “what?” and makes you stop trying to understand how his mind works.
  
  That’s why he is my favorite gaming director; there’s no one like him. He does what he wants to do, whether you like it or not; it doesn’t matter if it makes sense. If he thinks something is cool to put in the game, he will put it in the game. It’s a ride from start to finish, and it’s clearly a hate it or love it situation. The first hour of the game, if you are enjoying it, you’ll end up liking it, but if you are not feeling it, there won’t be anything that will change your mind. And yet that’s the reason why there’s no perfect 100/100 score for a Suda51 game.

• Sound | The sound engineering and soundtrack are also part of the Suda51 experience; it has a very pop, techno, and experimental-fueled style that also has some chiptune and hip-hop flavor to it, where you have very present background music, but the sound effects are also very “in your face”, like a slot machine with a soundtrack. It blends very well with the presentation of the game.

• Controls | Even being so weird, so different, and so nonsensical in so many ways, all Suda51 games feel good to play. Even with its gimmicks, the controls are very easy to understand and execute; it doesn’t take very long to be good at it. Even when the game throws different gimmicks and minigames at you now and then, it’s never confusing or hard to adapt to, so if you are simply looking for an action game, you’ll be satisfied even with its weirdness.

Mixed & Disliked!

• Level Design | There’s always something in a Suda51 game that annoys you, No More Heroes is one of my all-time favorite games, and I still hate the open-world and some of the side missions, and how annoying is to go for a story mission to another, and in Romeo is a Dead Man, the biggest gimmick that it’s tied to the overall structure of each stage, is the cyber realm that gives the map the maze-like feel, and it can feel misguided, bloated and confusing a lot of times, it feels like it was a solution to make the game longer, instead of freely exploring the map, he always lock a section on the map that you can access by going to the cyber realm, where there’s no combat, changing to more platform and puzzle challenges, and almost always feel unnecessary. And sadly, it is the thing that I’ll have to think about before doing another run of the game, because it’s very present in the gameplay loop.

• Performance | Optimization and clean performance is not the name of the game for a Suda51 game. No matter where you play the game, you can feel a lot of performance issues, like frame dips and some glitches and bugs that are always overlooked; it’s not at a level that ruins the game, but it’s always notable. It’s something we fans of Suda51 always expect: that his games always have issues and are not very polished.

• How long did I play the review before publishing? 25 Hours
• How long to beat the story? 13-20 Hours
• How long to get 100%? | 20-35 Hours
• How many Achievements did I earn before publishing? 31/44
• You’ll love this game if you like these | No More Heroes, Lollipop Chainsaw

Score: 80/100

A weird, unpolished, yet unique experience for fans of Suda51 or newcomers who will become fans of Suda51.

Romeo is a Dead Man is, like most Suda51 productions, a very unique game. In the most basic view, it’s a very fun and weird action game with some very questionable structural decisions and performance issues that don’t ruin the game, but they’re notable; it’s also a good gateway to the Weird World of Goichi Suda, where, if you stay until the end, it will change you. I can’t guarantee if the change will be good, but there will be changes. And if you are a Suda51 fan, you probably already played the game; if not, you will be happy and annoyed, like any game from our favorite weird gaming director. A weird, unpolished, yet unique experience for fans of Suda51 or newcomers who will become fans of Suda51.

[Written by Murilo]