Superhot is a unique first-person shooter from the indie developers at Team Superhot. Its main draw is the concept that time only passes when the player moves. As a result, players have opportunities to think through their actions, taking time to dodge stray bullets and carefully aim their shots at neon enemies.
Although the player is granted more time to think—thanks to the time slowing mechanic—things only slow down, never stopping fully. Actions like firing a gun or simply looking around make time speed up drastically. This lends to a sense of urgency with each new scenario, and to some a fantastic sense of improvisation and accomplishment. It’s an incredibly innovative concept, one which really shines in the first dozen or so levels of its brief story mode. However, by the end of its two or so hours Superhot’s gunplay was already beginning to grow stale. Aside from one or two neat gameplay twists, Superhot sticks to its core concepts and doesn’t do much to keep the player interested aside from throwing more enemies on screen to deal with at once.
The best comparisons to be made for this game might not be to other shooters but instead to games like Super Meat Boy or Hotline Miami. There’s a kind of perfectionist, performance-based repetition to these games and Superhot plays to the same strengths. It’s a shame the experience never quite rivals these games though, as flaws begin to grate on the experience before the story finishes. For one, the restarting of each level takes a few seconds, which is a few seconds more than one might like to wait when they just want to make another attempt at one of the more frustrating final levels.
Another way Superhot really stands out is its sense of style. There’s a stark, nearly monochrome design to its environments which are contrasted with neon red and blue accents from enemies and their weapons. Although they have no discernable features, enemies are hauntingly expressive and crumple in satisfyingly horrible ways before disintegrating into red mist. Most communication in the game is non-verbal, and the limited context of each level is given by words flashing briefly on-screen like “THEY HACKED THE SYSTEM” or “MEETING ADJOURNED.” The strange dedication to action movie clichés is incredibly endearing, and I found myself laughing out loud more than once when lines like “MIND BLOWN” or “DON’T LOSE YOUR HEAD” flashed to accentuate a headshot. To top it all off, levels end with a real-time playback of the completed level while the game repeats its mantra of “SUPERHOT” incessantly. These design choices also combine beautifully with the game’s narrative.
The biggest surprises for Superhot come from its story, which is delivered mostly through a ’90s computer-inspired menu. To avoid saying too much, the main shooting segments are presented as a game which the player’s character is themselves playing, a device which leads to some cool plot moments.
Most will find Superhot a very unique and satisfying experience. Its story is immediately engrossing, and although it may begin to drag by the end of its short narrative, I find I’m drawn back in by the challenge modes which appear after the credits. Some will undoubtedly find the $35 price tag too high for such a short game, but I recommend at least giving it a try before discounting what is a very solid and stylistic attempt in an increasingly stagnant genre.
