The Torch Spotlight: Superhot

Way back in August of last year, a game called “Superhot” was made for 7DFPS. For those who don’t speak in acronyms, that’s “7 Day: First Person Shooter“. It is a game jam where people and developers have 7 days to make a brand new first person shooter game. Unity and  Hexels gave their engines (Unity was free and developers could get a discount for Hexels Pro) to the jam and it all went under way. A bunch of friends from Poland got together, took the Unity engine and developed their game. “Superhot” has a simple concept. “Time Only Moves When You Move“.

 

 

You play as a protagonist thrown in at the deep end. Your opening shot was an enemy being slowly flung through a stack of boxes. As you haven’t moved yet, he slowly drifts to the floor as he deteriorates into nothing. Or is it she? Or an it? The game had, and still has, a particular visual style. The enemies are just red human figures. No face. No clothes. Just a red figure with sunglasses. As they die, they fall to the floor with the rag-doll physics we all know and seen before but these guys slowly evaporate into nothing, leaving only their sunglasses. That might of been an artistic statement on how the sunglasses wearing protagonists, like Duke Nukem, are still just flesh under the glasses and they will all fade into nothing. Or the evaporation was only set to the bodies and not the added polygons, i.e. the sunglasses.

Or it was a glitch. Either way I think I’m reading to much in to it. The game was released to highly critical acclaim. The press adored it and the YouTubers loved it. I’m ‘technically’ both and I loved it. Here’s the proof:

I even set a challenge to only me that no one was saw but that can be ignored. The the game was then taken to Steam Greenlight one day and then it was approved. It really was that quick. It was approved in a weekend, making it the fastest green-lit game game in the services history. In the last eight months it has been refined and polished. The graphics have taken leaps and bounds. And with the promise that much more will be added to the game (more levels, more guns, more enemies) I can’t see why you shouldn’t back the game.

The demo was something that I have never played before. The time manipulation mechanic is something to behold by itself. But with the graphics and art style layered on top, the demo it still it something I go back to and play even now. The idea that there will be more is tantalizing. This is defiantly a kickstarter that you should look at. I say invest. Your defiantly going to get a fantastic game out of it. A simply awesome game to be.