[COLUMN] Slitterhead Makes Me Miss the PS3 Era | by Marty Sliva (Patreon)

Sometimes, you play a game that feels like it somehow became unglued from time and arrived from a different era entirely. This is often done purposefully in the indie space to recall a very specific moment in gaming history, as we’ve been seeing recently with the wave of survival horror throwbacks like Crow Country and Signalis that are inspired by the late-’90s boom of the genre. Or last year’s Hi-Fi Rush, which had Dreamcast DNA running through its veins.

But other times, it genuinely feels like a game was made, accidently got misplaced for the better part of 20 years, and then was suddenly unearthed to be experienced by our modern eyes. Slitterhead, the new action-horror experience from Bokeh Game Studio, is one of those games. It feels like a forgotten PlayStation 3 game in the absolute best possible way.

I dearly miss the Sony of the PS3 era. Well, let me rephrase that—I dearly miss certain aspects of the Sony of the PS3 era. Not the hubris-filled Sony that showed off giant enemy crabs and a $599 console at E3 2006, but rather the Sony that took big risks and invested heavily in strange ideas that could sit right next to their burgeoning AAA franchises like Uncharted.

I miss the Sony that allowed us to explore a post-apocalyptic landscape as a pomeranian in Tokyo Jungle, casually snap pictures of wildlife in Afrika, and just vibe out as a lonely ghost in Rain. I miss the Sony that worked with third parties to platform unique ideas like 3D Dot Heroes, El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron, and Nier. I miss the Sony that incubated indie teams and helped deliver gems like Journey, Sound Shapes, and The Unfinished Swan. While I like most of Sony’s big modern franchises, I just wish there was more to them than those.

While Slitterhead is a third-party game that’s also available on Xbox and PC, playing it on my PS5 over the weekend brought back those feelings of PS3-era Sony, and I couldn’t be happier about that.

Slitterhead is the first game from Bokeh Game Studio, a team founded by Keiichiro Toyama and composed of many folks formerly of Sony Japan Studio. Toyama cites being inspired by Fumito Ueda’s move to gain independence and form his own studio after making Ico and Shadow of the Colossus as an impetus for carving the path to Bokeh. And while Toyama’s name might not ring a bell, his work certainly does, as he was the director of the original Silent Hill, Siren, and the Gravity Rush games.

Slitterhead takes place in Kowlong, a take on the urban sprawl of Hong Kong’s Kowloon Walled City, a setting explored recently in 2022's Stray. The claustrophobic alleyways, vibrant neon lights, and sweaty masses of humanity packed in like sardines call to mind the films of Wong Kar-wai, an inspiration that Toyama directly cites. That last part is most obvious during the post-mission conversations, which unfold like a stylish take on visual novels.

You play as a spirit named Night Owl. Though you initially lack any memories of your own, you’re able to possess the body of nearly anyone roaming the streets of Kowlong, including some known as Rarities with unique abilities alongside being conscious during their possessions. This is all in the goal of unraveling the mystery of the titular Slitterheads, a group of monsters who wear human disguises, stalk the city for their next victims, and then turn into hideous abominations before devouring them.

Anyone who’s played Toyama’s previous games will feel right at home in Slitterhead. The supernatural mysteries and Akira Yamaoka score call back to Silent Hill. The different playable characters with unique abilities, as well as the mechanic to literally see through the eyes of the monsters as they stalk their victims, feel like a direct evolution of Siren. And the free-flowing flight across an urban sprawl when in spirit form made me remember the good times I had with Kat in Gravity Rush. The feeling of authorial intent is baked into every decision across Slitterhead, both good and bad, which is something that feels lacking from the mammoth design-by-committee machines of so many modern AAA games. 

Slitterhead currently has a 62 on Metacritic, which yeah, I kinda get. The game is often janky, the combat takes a while to really click, the production values during the post-mission interstices might be frustrating to some, and it lacks many of the quality of life features that we assume games in 2024 should all have. But like a lot of hidden gems, those flaws feel like a filtering system to see if you’re willing to meet the game down at its level, and if you are, that’s where it starts to shine.

It’s a firm rule that games with possession are rad, even if they’re bad. Driver: San Francisco, Geist, Super Mario Odyssey, Ghost Trick, Mindjack—all rad games, regardless if they’re GOTY masterpieces like Mario or whatever the hell Mindjack is. And Slitterhead is certainly somewhere in the middle there.

I love how much care and detail are presented throughout the game’s interiors. I constantly found myself forgetting about whatever my current goal was as I got lost in poking around various apartments, shops, and clubs. Seeing how a family made the most of its cramped living quarters, marveling at the various food and tchotchke stalls in the market, and ping-ponging my way up to the rooftops by grappling on clotheslines and neon signs all make Kowlong feel alive, despite this not being a traditional modern open-world game.

Slitterhead’s missions unfold as bite-sized levels—remember those?! You can replay them to poke around for secrets you may have missed, and there’s also a time-travel mechanic that has you revisiting previous events to try and change the outcome. In a way, its throwback design philosophy reminded me of Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon. It doesn’t feel like there’s a million things to collect off a checklist or a ton of empty space stretched out to deliver an open world. Like those aforementioned PS3 gems, it doesn’t feel like it’s treading the path of modern industry trends, but rather forging its own.

I am certain that as time moves on, Slitterhead will be viewed as a cult classic. Its glaring flaws won’t be ignored, but instead, the focus will shift to its massive swings and design ideas that we just don’t often see anymore in the modern gaming landscape. Years from now, it’s the kind of game your favorite YouTube essayists will be making banger 40-minute videos on, declaring it a misunderstood classic right alongside recent games like Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess, Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club, and Wanted: Dead. So, you can either get aboard the Slittertrain now (there’s plenty of space!), wait for those videos to start trickling out and join the masses, or simply just continue following Second Wind because clearly, we’re already ahead of the curve when it comes to spotting a future cult classic nice and early.