As a lover of bizarre games, there are certain names in gaming that I follow rather closely. In fact when thinking about some of my favourite weird titles two names in particular come to mind, SUDA51 and SWERY. With games like Deadly Premonition, Lollipop Chainsaw, and Shadows of the Damned all delighting me in their own messed up way, and when I heard these two creators were coming together to make 2D action Roguelike about serial killers I could hardly ignore it. After a few hours I’ve certainly come away from Hotel Barcelona intrigued, and a whole lot bloodier.
The titular hotel is a luxurious place that has been swarmed by a host of serial killers from all across the US. As rookie marshal Justine it’s your job to take down all these heinous criminals, otherwise you’ll be trapped in the hotel forever. You’re not alone in this quest though, as inside your body you house another serial killer called Dr Carnival. This unlikely duo will need to slice through all the evil drawn to Hotel Barcelona, and slice is the operative word here.
When I first jumped into Hotel Barcelona I was surprised by quite how slow paced the action felt. This is not a Dead Cells or an Enter the Gungeon, it’s a more deliberately paced game complete with blocking and parrying. Justine starts each run with a melee weapon, which has light and heavy attacks you can use to take down various psychos. You also have a gun that deals a teeny tiny bit of damage at range, which will help you finish off foes with risking taking damage.
Most games with less frantic combat expect you to take your time and strategise when presented with a room of baddies, but not Hotel Barcelona. To keep your inner serial killer happy you need to constantly coat yourself in blood, by slicing through enemies and tearing off their limbs. As barbaric as this sounds it’s absolutely worth it, as doing this will grant you various buffs as well as eventually allowing you to summon Dr Carnival himself for a screen clearing special attack. The blood coating you will drip off quickly though, so you’ll have to rush in and get stabbing if you want help from the doc.
Despite a whole host of weird concepts, Hotel Barcelona features all the usual Roguelike trapping you know and love. Like how each area of the game is made up of branching paths, with different rewards assigned to each door like attack boosts or speed buffs. There are also horrendously difficult boss fights who will take all your skill (and a bit of learning attack patterns) to defeat, and it was in these fights I discovered the other special feature of the game.
We’re all used to death in a Roguelike not being the end, but that’s especially the case in Hotel Barcelona. This is because a weird blood clone of Justine will join you on your next attempt at an area, and she’ll perform the exact movements and attacks that you did. Because enemies are randomised this doesn’t necessarily mean your past selves will kill everything for you, but they’ll at the very least attract some attacks and provide some cover while swinging their weapons madly. In boss fights the clones are invaluable, and in fact the only reason I beat the first baseball bat wielding serial killer is because my clone used a special attack immediately on entering the fight.
Between runs you can also make yourself stronger at the hotel, and your clones will still be waiting for you afterwards. This hub area has all sorts of helpful upgrades to unlock, from abilities on a massive skill tree to new weapons entirely. It was actually a bit overwhelming to see how many different currencies there are to manage, even with a bartender who can convert ears into cash so you can upgrade the right bit of kit. There’s definitely going to be a whole lot of depth to the full game when it releases, that’s for sure.
I had a good time with Hotel Barcelona, but it also left me with so many questions. A lot of these are about specific characters (because obviously I need to learn everything I can about Dr Carnival) but I also want to see how the game feels once you’ve unlocked more of the huge sprawling upgrade tree. The more I played Hotel Barcelona though the more I gelled with its combat and bloodlust, and I’ll be thirsty for even more of the red stuff while we wait for the full game to release.
Hotel Barcelona is “coming soon” to PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S|X, and PC .
