If computer intelligence were sophisticated enough to make their own decisions, what would computers be capable of unleashing upon humanity? Would they simulate a reality in which we are enslaved, perhaps unwittingly, to prolong their existence? That is what security hacker Neo discovered in The Matrix. At present, cybercriminals can write and distribute code with the intent of sabotaging hardware or stealing valuable data. Superhot takes the meaning of malware to a new level, or so it seems, where, as the story goes, a friend sends by network a supposedly leaked copy of a new game, superhot.exe, to your (in real life) computer, which is an old DOS machine as indicated by the menus. Little are you aware that you will become sucked into the game the same way as your friend, literally.
Of course, Superhot is not malware (nor related to the film), but the story considers the real-life you to have one installed on your DOS computer in the form of superhot.exe. "Malware" might not be the best word to describe the software in the story, but it is ... something. The first-person shooter is a collection of levels set in seemingly unrelated but familiar scenarios, from buildings and transport to bars and alleys, all in a simulation where everything is made of concrete in the middle of a white void. In each scenario are red glass figures intent on killing you. It takes only one hit to do just that, but what sets this shooter apart from the others is that time only moves when you move; it slows down to bullet time when you stop to analyze your surroundings before speeding back up to real time (sound familiar?). Granted, you might not have the same abilities to manipulate the simulation as Neo, but it's close enough. Most of the time, you start a level without any weapon other than your fists. You must find one lying somewhere or steal it from your enemy by stunning it. Stunning is done by punching the enemy or throwing an object at it, which, depending on the scenario, includes a bottle, electrical equipment, and office items. Stunning an enemy three times in quick succession has the same killing effect as shooting it once. All the objects in the game, including the weapons, are made of black glass and can be shattered in obvious ways. Adding to your troubles, the three firearms you can pick up: a pistol, a shotgun, and an automatic rifle, each with its own advantages and disadvantages, all have limited ammo, so, once exhausted, you may as well throw them at an armed red guy, stunning it and stealing the weapon it drops.
The world of Superhot is rather mysterious, where locales are formed orderly before they disorganize into nothingness the farther one travels from the arena. There is no real story regarding or prelude precipitating why red guys want to kill you in the game or what your aims are besides killing them first. Far more enigmatic is that something, referring to itself as "the System", is tracking your presence, warning you about the intent of superhot.exe as you dive deeper into the simulation, at least figuratively, and slowly submit to the matrix. My giveaways of the plot - which focus on the premise - end here, but you can second-guess how the story will unfold and what further resemblances to the movie you will spot. To add to its lore, every level comes with a secret in the form of a terminal, which you can then use to unravel hidden facts about superhot.exe and the System. At the end of each level, you are rewarded a replay of your last playthrough entirely in real time. It's cool rewatching it since everything actually goes so fast that it would be almost impossible to beat the game if not for the ability to slow down time to dodge bullets as the player calculates their next move, and even cooler since the game encourages us to consider uploading clips that we think are worthy of other people's time with a few button presses, just as I have. The developers were considerate in how they animated and programmed the red guys. Although they cannot jump, pick up throwable items, or discard their weapons like the player character, they can do everything else. The player can tell when an enemy is getting ready to fire their pistol as they raise it at eye level. When they are not scripted to stand still or move from point to point, they are free to roam around the arena and pick up a weapon. They sometimes aim their guns in front of the player, anticipating that they will step in the projectiles' way. When they do, they are shown to point their guns slightly away from the player, allowing the player to know which way to dodge. When an enemy is shot in the limb or head, that part of the body shatters like glass before the entire thing fragments as it collapses to the ground, and its body can still be shot and further shattered, so you had better conserve your ammo and shoot a live target you intend to kill instead of a new shard of glass blocking it.
Bullets and pellets leave behind temporary red trails so that they do not look like nearly invisible black dots. Besides guns and throwable objects, there are also weapons with which you whack your opponents, the best of which being the katana. It swings very fast, easily hacks enemies in half like butter, and can even slice airborne bullets. Gun projectiles are also capable of colliding with each other, but the katana is the surest, coolest means of defending yourself. Eventually, you are granted the hotswitching ability, which you use to leave your body and assume control of one of an enemy by pointing your crosshair at it and pressing the hotswitch button. When activated, it is made unavailable for a few seconds in real time before it can be used again, but it is a very strategic means of escaping danger. I have used it a lot when I needed to avert my demise but still wanted to keep my weapon. To do that, I would throw my weapon at an enemy, hotswitch into its body, and grab the weapon I just threw. If I needed that enemy's weapon instead, I would stun it and then hotswitch into it since hotswitching forces the body to discard and destroy what it was carrying at the time the player switched into it. This type of game appeals to players who do not expect fast-paced action, which is perfectly fine with me because I am one of those players. However, after you complete its levels, you are encouraged to play it again within a time limit. Beating campaign unlocks challenges, featuring the same levels but with a handful of different gameplay variations, including the ones with the time limit, all harder or much harder than campaign. There is even a challenge mode where the levels must be beaten within a time limit in real time, so players looking for some fast-paced action are not totally left out. Beating campaign mode also unlocks endless mode, where the goal is to destroy as many enemies as possible before being destroyed. This mode also has three variations: destroying 20 enemies as fast as possible in real time, destroying as many as possible within a 20-second limit, and doing the same thing within a 60-second real-time limit. In every case, your personal bests are recorded, incentivizing you to replay them. Because of those game modes, your play time does not last just three hours. I estimate that you would spend at least fifteen hours before you lose interest, which justifies its initial $24.99 price tag.
Back in the game's DOS prompt, you have other nice extras to look at, including a text-based mini-game about chopping up a tree on the correct side quickly, which actually isn't half bad. Other than that, once its campaign is beaten, Superhot encourages us to share it with friends and family with the message "Superhot is the most innovative shooter I've played in years!" Unfortunately, I have to turn down the opportunity of declaring it. I am not saying that it is not an innovative shooter, not by a long shot; it approached the FPS genre in ways no shooter in recent memory had done before. However, I think it was too soft on innovation. The basic gameplay consists of killing enemies, dodging sideways, taking cover, and finding weapons, and given the room for all the possibilities that can arise out of the player's powers, and the various strategies needed to survive, I am left a little unsatisfied and thinking I have not seen everything. I thought some of the challenges were also a little too easy. Granted, I had to adjust my strategy for some of the harder levels, but other than that, it ends up being more or less the same. Once you know your strategy, you stick to that strategy, and it undermines the game's important element of strategic thinking, rendering it a generic shooter.
VERDICT:
Reluctantly, I cannot call Superhot the most innovative shooter in years, even though it is original. As much as I want this strategy-heavy shooter to be, the developers seem to have missed pushing its innovation in such a way as to force players to get creative in their strategy, and it need not be accomplished by adding more variety, just by rearranging the level structures a bit. Then again, it coming from an independent studio who priced it at medium, I could have asked for something much worse, and I must not be overtly judgemental. Superhot is the shooter that comes closest to playing like Neo from The Matrix, and even if you have never seen the movie, you at least have not heard of a shooter in years before it that comes close to giving the player such powers within a virtual setting. It should inspire other studios to develop shooters exploring the concept of time, including time manipulation.
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