A cut above the rest.
Friday the 13th: Killer Puzzle has slashed its way onto the Nintendo Switch. Between engaging puzzle mechanics, a delightfully lovable murderer, and hilarious action all on a beautiful screen in your hands, it is unquestionably the best way to experience Blue Wizard Digital’s isometric horror title.
For those who have played Slayaway Camp, the developer’s previous puzzle game, Friday the 13th: Killer Puzzle is nearly identical in its execution. Assuming the role of Crystal Lake’s notorious man behind the mask, you must cut down anyone in your path – literally. Controls are locked into a grid-like system, limiting your movement to four basic directions. The catch is you keep moving in a single direction until you come teenagers to gut or even the environment. This is the only way you can really change directions and set yourself up for future kills. Apparently, being a masked killer isn’t as mindless as it appears on the silver-screen; your approach here is very, very methodical. And it all ties in to the game’s brilliant design.
Each of the game’s maps are set up in such a way that you sort of gather in which order you should be slaughtering your prey. Early on the puzzles are pretty simple and obvious. But as your progress, the game throws a ton more mechanics at you to mix things up. such as light switches that will allow you to sneak up on unsuspecting victims without startling them, portals, bear traps and campfires which you have to avoid, and even kitty cats which you absolutely cannot harm under any circumstances. Fortunately you have your dead mom to help along the way if things get a bit too complicated – and they will – even for a brilliant idiot such as myself.
At any point in the game you can tap your mom’s decapitated head to ask for hints on how to finish a complicated level, or outright ask for the entire solution – a feature that I found myself leaning on a little too much. But aside from lending her expertise, Pamela has also got a bit of a funny bone as she will lighten the mood by cracking jokes about your environment or your future victims.
Jason Voorhees should not be this likable. Yet somehow, Blue Wizard Digital managed to take one of horror’s most recognizable killers and transform him into something delightful – adorable even. I would be friends with this Jason. He likely wouldn’t be friends with me on a count of murder, but still. This is a darling distortion of the hockey-masked brute that haunted me as a young boy, and I simply cannot get enough.
With over 100 maps to slaughter countless of innocents through, costumes to unlock, Daily Death and Murder Marathons modes to satiate your blood-lust long after the main chapters are complete, Friday the 13th: Killer Puzzle is by and large the definitive horror game experience on the Nintendo Switch, especially at at budget priced title.
The Verdict:
Game provided by Blue Wizard Digital for review.
