Game: Killer7

Where do I start when talking about this game? Killer7 is really unlike anything I've played before. So I suppose it would be best to begin by discussing some background information about it. Killer 7 was developed by Grasshopper Manufacture and published by Capcom for the Nintendo Gamecube and the Sony Playstation2 in 2005. If you're unfamiliar with Grasshopper Manufacture, it is the studio directed by celebrated video game auteur Goichi Suda - or as he is also known "Suda51". What makes him such an auteur you ask? Well let's take a look at Killer7 for a few minutes and you'll see what I mean.

The story of Killer7 is strange, very strange. You play as Harman Smith, an assassin who has the ability to take the form of seven other assassins. Harman may be old and confined to a wheelchair but through his seven other personalities he is able to take missions to destroy the Heaven's Smile. The Heaven's Smile are invisible, inside out, giggling suicide bombing zombies and only the Killer7 are able to see them and have the skill required to destroy them. Yes that's right - invisible, inside out, giggling, suicide bombing zombies. If they sound insane, then it would take equally insane characters to fight them and that's exactly what Killer7 delivers. Including Harman Smith, you will also be able to control seven other personalities which include; a magnum toting tough guy, a dual pistol weilding blind teenager, a mexican wrestler, an ex-criminal, a woman who has the power to absorb blood by slitting her wrists, a shirtless knife throwing homosexual and Garcian Smith - the Cleaner. You will also have the aide of Iwazaru (Harman's bondage loving subservient) and the ghost of Travis Bell (the first person Harman killed). By playing through the game, more clues will reveal themselves about the histories of the characters and how they came to be the Killer7 amidst an alternate universe backdrop where political tensions are rising between the United States and Japan. Crazy, no?

The gameplay of Killer7 is sort of a rail shooter where the character is controlled by pressing A to run forward and then pressing R to enter a first-person view when attacking. The player then has to scan to reveal any invisible Heaven's Smile. Once a Heaven's Smile has been detected, the player has to kill it before it rushes at you and explodes. You can kill them by either shooting them repeatedly anywhere on their body until they die or by targeting a specific glowing spot that will cause instant death. For killing a Heaven's Smile you then recieve blood in return. White Blood can be used to restore your character's health or red blood which can be used to upgrade you character's abilities. Unlike other rail shooters like Panzer Dragoon or House of the Dead however, Killer7 allows for full exploration of the levels by having branching paths that the player can explore and return to at their leisure. You will in fact need to do this because as you go through levels killing Heaven's Smile you will also collect items and use them for many of the puzzles that riddle each level.

The graphics in this game are just gorgeous. Killer7 uses flat-shading to make the game look like some early CGI. The art direction also makes good use of light and darkness to add visual contrast within the characters and scenery. When running around in 3rd person mode, the camera angles are set up to look as though you're seeing the game from the perspective of a number of security cameras. This I find all very aesthetically pleasing but my favourite graphical addition is whenever you switch between characters. Switchng is visually represented by the character you're already playing as atomizing in an explosion of blood which then recollects back together in the form of the new character. I swear, I never get tired of seeing it. I would recommend the Gamecube version over the Playstation2 version in regards to the visuals however, because the Playstation2 version's colours are a little washed out looking, the frame rate drops sometimes and there's a noticable load time when switching between characters.

The music is just as surreal as the rest of the game. Sometimes it can be chill downtempo or pounding house music. othertimes the music can be eerie ambient sounds or nothing at all. It just adds an extra level of absurdity to Killer7 when you're killing Heaven's Smile while listening to loungt jazz or something equally bizarre. The voice acting is also quite good in the cut scenes, however the rest of the game uses this unsettling garbled sound for dialogue which you can occassionally make out English words in. I have no idea what sort of filter would have been used to make that effect but it is really fucking creepy.

So that is really only scratching the surface of what Killer7 is. It needs to be played to really be understood - and even then you won't understand very much. However, Killer7 is a wild, weird, visually striking and unique game that I would recommend to anyone who is a fan anime, zombies, shooters, puzzles or post-modern narrative. I would not recommend this game for kids however, because of it's frequent use of disturbing gore, violence and sexual scenarios. (Did I mention Harman spends his free time having masochistic sex with his home care nurse?). If you're an adult who can't stomach these things then you may want to avoid this game as well. Otherwise get out there and play this game because it's like nothing else you've experienced.