A Fever Dream of Spacetime and Shakespeare
There are some games that like to play it safe; to play it straight. They believe the audience expects a certain pathway for a story to follow: someone’s village burns, or they suffer a major loss in Act One that propels them on a mission of revenge or a quest to find some ancient artefact. We know the narrative beats, but that doesn’t mean the journey is bad. Sometimes, it is amazing and unique even within these constraints.
Then, there are other games that do something you never expected or could ever have imagined – delivering a story, visuals, and gameplay that break all the rules.
Welcome to ROMEO IS A DEAD MAN.
Grasshopper’s Signature Madness
If you are a fan of developer and publisher Grasshopper Manufacture, you might already know what to expect from ROMEO IS A DEAD MAN. Their previous work, such as No More Heroes and Lollipop Chainsaw, were often strange fever dreams, and this game is no different.
Just a quick example: when you choose your difficulty level near the start of the game, you don’t just get a menu with text options. Oh no, you get a choice of chocolates, with white chocolate being the easiest level, milk chocolate being the medium level, and orange being the hardest. Brilliant.
The Resurrection of Romeo
The story puts you in the shoes of Romeo, a cop in a small American town who has a crush on a girl named Juliet. When he and the sheriff find a body on the highway, they go to investigate, but the body suddenly turns into a devil, kills the sheriff, and rips Romeo’s face off. His crazy grandpa then appears from space and time, kills the creatures, and stabs Romeo in the eye, turning him into a sort of half-robot, half-living killing machine.
Now known as ‘Deadman’, Romeo goes to work for the FBI on a spaceship as a Space Time Agent. He travels the universe looking for criminals and hunting down different variations of his true love, Juliet. I have actually made this sound a lot more straightforward than it really is. The story is mad, funny, and full of wonder. It swaps genres, narrative delivery, and presentation styles on the flip of a coin. I think it is amazing storytelling, full of creative choices that feel like they were made by the mind of Willy Wonka. Some might find it a bit too much, but for me, it is the soul of the game.
Multiversal Combat
The gameplay swaps around just as much as the story, shifting from third-person action to top-down RPG elements and introducing other mechanics, such as steering a spaceship. The bulk of the game takes place in third-person during the action sections. Here, you enter an environment armed with two types of weapons: melee and ranged. These can be upgraded later by collecting energy throughout the levels, and new weapons can be unlocked. The combat is fast and furious, aligning closely with something like the Devil May Cry series.
Generators, VR Puzzles, and Boss Battles
The gameplay loop is fun to begin with, involving tasks such as collecting items or, at one point, restarting generators in a mall. There are also moments where you enter a VR version of the world, exploring the map to unlock areas in the real world. There is always a boss battle at the end of each of these worlds, and they are varied in their design in terms of attacks and moves. However, I did sometimes get a bit weary of the loop and didn’t find the fighting quite as fun by the end as I did when I first began.
The game changes constantly, though, and that is what keeps it interesting and unique. The spaceship section, for instance, is a top-down RPG reminiscent of the 90s, complete with pixel visuals. Here, you explore, meet a weird crew of characters, and perform tasks for them, like getting them to sign forms. It is a rapid change from the 3D world, but it all sort of works in this dreamlike state. I am always a fan of ambition, even if not every single element lands perfectly.
Aesthetic Ambition
The visuals of ROMEO IS A DEAD MAN are sublime at times. When the game transitions into animated cutscenes presented in a comic book format, it practically shines off the screen. Then it mixes strange, wacky elements, blending 1950s animation with a Tarantino movie vibe; it is amazing. I wasn’t entirely convinced by the sudden shift to 90s retro graphics in the spaceship; it is okay, but it wasn’t my favourite part of the visual experience.
Sound-wise, the game is brilliant, featuring some amazing tracks that mix rock, soul, and seemingly every other genre of music. The voice work in the cutscenes is solid throughout.
A Wild, Mythical Swing
ROMEO IS A DEAD MAN put a smile on my face, from start to finish. Its story is fantastical and mythical while giving us, the audience, a huge, cheeky wink. I liked the unique take on Romeo and Juliet and the many variants of the characters, as well as the creativity on show and the willingness to try new things. That said, I found the action a bit repetitive after a while, left longing for the story progression rather than just going into another room to take down foes.
But overall, I am so glad that ROMEO IS A DEAD MAN.
Important Links
ROMEO IS A DEAD MAN – Suda51’s Wildest Action Game In Years Is On Xbox, PlayStation, PC – https://www.thexboxhub.com/romeo-is-a-dead-man-suda51s-wildest-action-game-in-years-is-on-xbox-playstation-pc/
Suda51 and Grasshopper Manufacture Unleash ROMEO IS A DEAD MAN in 2026 – https://www.thexboxhub.com/suda51-and-grasshopper-manufacture-unleash-romeo-is-a-dead-man-in-2026/
Buy from the Xbox Store – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/romeo-is-a-dead-man/9mxhh4jl4g76
