Night Slashers: Remake Review (Switch eShop)
When starting for the first time, Night Slayer: Remake presents itself in a 4:3 simulated arcade screen border, where the first character appears on a beautifully drawn scene, followed by terrifying flesh zombies. At this point, we thought, “Damn, this looks cool.” A moment later, the screen switched to full widescreen, revealing it actually makeup and informed us that we were momentarily fooled by the original arcade graphics. In contrast, the painted aesthetic is a huge leap forward.
This anecdote tells you all you need to know about the biggest problem with the remake of Data East’s beat ’em up: its visuals are shockingly tasteless. And no, it’s not a matter of nostalgia. The original arcade game’s far superior graphics are replaced by an art style that looks reminiscent of the stodgy Flash games of the early 2000s. The new characters, which resemble shadow puppets, lack depth and Their overly smooth limbs appear to float in resting animations and slide unnaturally across the floor.
After a while, you start to adjust and let yourself into the game – which is still fun – but, like, ugly game. Snow Brothers remake, it feels like the developer went to a lot of trouble for no good reason. There are options to increase saturation and gamma, which helps a little, and retro filters do very little, with one seemingly ruining the graphics by clumsily pixelating. Additionally, and for some inexplicable reason, visual adjustments from the menu cannot be seen in real time because pausing the game turns the screen black and white.
Night Slasher’s main appeal is its horror theme, mixing ideas from Shelley, Stoker, Universal Studio’s monster classics and of course Romero’s zombie legacy. Typically Japanese, it has a werewolf in it Teen Wolf– American-style baseball jackets, eccentric literary caricatures and plots that are odd enough. It was a fun departure from the gritty streets of the ’80s that typified the side-scrolling arcade genre of the time, and more importantly it always looked great, with trucks barreling through hordes of zombies and body bags spilled off morgue shelves.
And, while the new aesthetic is a step back, this remake still has its positives. When released on arcades in 1993, Night Slashers was censored in Western regions and parts of Asia – but now it’s bloodier than ever. Blood spurted out like a severed artery and bodies melted and splattered under a shower of fists. There’s also a remastered soundtrack to enjoy and it’s mostly good; but if you prefer the original’s hardcore synths, you can easily switch in the options screen. There are now also special rewards unlocked through gameplay, including a series of palette swaps for your team and a custom mode where you can tweak your gameplay by toggling it on and off. certain functions. A brand new character, Liu Feilin, joins the monster melee with a series of beautiful attacks, and four-player co-op is an option for the first time.
Most important, however, are the combat improvements. These include new or redesigned moves that expand each character’s play style quite a bit. You can speed up to throw supernatural projectiles or perform gliding attacks across the screen – and grabs can now optionally and usefully throw attackers forward. If you’re locked under a barrage of fists, you can now escape the pattern by twisting directions, like recovering from vertigo in Street Fighter.
Additionally, enemies that collide with the edge of the screen will bounce, allowing you to juggle them to deal more damage mid-air. You can still do all the fun things of the original, like slam zombies to the ground and stomp on their heads, as well as dash, jump, and create a real monster mash with tap combos basic.
Importantly, the overall revamp of difficulty balancing results in a much friendlier console experience, and this is a welcome decision. The original arcade game is difficult for newcomers and takes time to understand all the nuances of its (admittedly deep) combat. The remake lowers the entry bar, limits enemy recovery, and regularly drains extra lives. You also take less damage when you take a hit, and your super attacks (in exchange for a portion of your health) are much stronger. For some, the default difficulty may now be also easy, but there are options to scale through multiple levels, until you literally face hordes of the undead.
What annoyed us, however, were the very minor slowdowns caused by the game’s pseudo-too-smooth animations and notable shortcomings in the AI. Most enemies seem to be easy to kill with a quick tap combo and line up for takedowns using the simplest method possible. Additionally, with the rock man boss in stage two, if you stand in the center of the sprite, he will often punch right through you. This loose pattern seems to be present in places where it wasn’t originally – perhaps intentionally, perhaps as a byproduct of visual changes and reduced vision of your enemies. We also got stuck on the Game Over screen twice, unable to get out without a hard reset, and this definitely needs a patch.
It’s true that video games are more than just skin deep. Graphics don’t make the game, and that remains true here. With all the changes to combat and the more encouraging challenge, this is a fun game to play if you like horror-themed arcade action, despite its short campaign.
However, when you remake a game that already has a very attractive visual style, it’s important to improve or maintain it. While Night Slashers: Remake fails in this regard, its worst crime is not providing the option to play the new version of the game with the original graphics.
That leaves potential buyers facing a difficult choice: buy this one for the relatively cheap price and enjoy the new mechanical tweaks while ignoring the shabby redesign; Or stick with the original arcade game that looks great and takes on a significantly more challenging level. Actually Johnny Turbo’s Arcade Port of the original being delisted in 2023 might make that decision easier, but you’ll be missing out on the best-looking version.
Conclusion
There are ideas reworked here that are worth noting. For fans of the original, it’s fun to revisit Night Slashers with new characters, new combat options, and redeveloped and friendlier challenge levels. If that’s all, we can recommend this remake as a fun arcade game that tweaks the template just enough to make for a fresh experience. However, the modern visual style is so lazily executed that it’s largely unappealing, robbing the game of its aesthetic charm. If that’s not a deciding factor for you, the price is probably still low enough to not completely scare you away.
