Does this hotel deserve a good TripAdvisor rating?
Hotel Barcelona is the long-awaited collaboration between game design legends Swery65 and Suda51. Drawing influences from across horror’s history, you’ll be pitted against everything from alien entities to AI-enhanced sharks, all while stuck in an endless time loop filled with serial killers – and only your deceased past selves to help you.
Swery65 and Suda51’s games have a distinct style that is unlike any other on the market, so it’s great to see them team up for a project. While you can definitely see their influence scattered throughout the game, it is a bit of an odd experience overall.
What we end up with is a 2D rogue-lite side-scroller where you choose what rooms to proceed to in the hotel. Progression works as you would expect from a typical rogue-like, while different rooms will provide different challenges and rewards depending on the doors you choose. It’s a fairly decent system, even if it doesn’t exactly come across as particularly innovative.
I think the problem itself is that the combat can feel a bit clunky and even janky at times. Progression is a bit hit and miss, while the story itself is the real star with the obvious influences from the two gaming legends. It feels frustrating and unpolished at times, which is obviously a downer but that in itself is also sometimes part of the charm of their games.
The visuals themselves look a little bland, which is a bit disappointing. The characters are interesting, but there does seem to be something missing overall. I can’t quite put my finger on it; I just know that it feels like a missed opportunity here.
The Verdict
Hotel Barcelona has some good ideas and can be fun at times, but it isn’t the collaboration between Swery65 and Suda51 that I had hoped for. Maybe some updates to polish up the combat will sway things in favour of the project, but it might be time to check out of the hotel.