SUPERHOT: Mind Control Delete
Year: 2020
Rating: T
Time Played: ~10+ hours
While I absolutely love the SUPERHOT concept where time only moves if you move, both SUPERHOT and SUPERHOT VR felt short for being full games. It seems the remedy for this was to create the pseudo sequel in SUPERHOT: Mind Control Delete. Unfortunately, this was done through adding Roguelike elements to the core SUPERHOT gameplay, but only in a way that made repeating the levels a gimmick of necessity instead of as a reward for continuing to play.
I don’t mind Roguelikes if they are done well (Loop Hero comes to mind as a good one). This includes permanent upgrades that make the game easier to play just based on how many times you’ve run the cycle. Most of the upgrades obtained in Mind Control Delete are earned through the same set of “play X number of levels without dying” mechanic that the rest of the game has. Granted, these upgrades are helpful to advance through future levels—especially if the right alignment of abilities is presented, like in all Roguelike games. It’s more that they also become a crutch that makes the game easier to play.
There were a few interesting narrative choices for this game that I found both intriguing and frustrating. At a certain point, you have to give up all the abilities you’ve earned through the game, which makes the last few levels extremely difficult, especially if these abilities got you to the later levels. That these were the same set of levels just set on random rotation made it boring by the end because there wasn’t anything new…just new combinations. Still, the “gotta try one more run” gimmick kept me up late some nights just trying to progress to the end.
Same SUPERHOT action but with frustrating Roguelike elements, I give SUPERHOT: Mind Control Delete 3.0 stars out of 5.
