Fans of slasher horror films will love the terribly fun puzzle game, Slayaway Camp: Butchers Cut. Loosely based on all the old school hack and slash movies that we’ve all come to love, Butchers Cut is the ultimate version of the game now available on the PS Vita.
The premise is incredibly interesting. Each world is set in a different “movie” and completing all the levels will bring you to the end of each film. In honor of the era that made these films being honored popular, each world can be entered at a video shop by choosing the “movie” that you want to experience and then popping it in. With tons of “movies” to play through over 300 levels, there is enough content here to keep you busy for quite some time.
As you progress through each tape you earn gold that can be used to purchase everything from new killers to move sets. With tons of unlockable content there is no shortage of things to spend that hard-earned gold on. You can also use your gold on helpful hints or to skip especially challenging levels altogether. Thankfully you’ll earn enough coins throughout the game to use for both purposes. It’s good to keep a nice little stockpile of gold in case you come across an extra challenging spot that you just can’t get past.
Gameplay
The gameplay is simple yet challenging. You play as the killer moving around a grid in order to slay every unsuspecting victim spread across each level. The trick is that you can only move in one direction at a time and will continue to move until you run into something, whether that be an inanimate object or fresh meat for you to slash. Some levels early on in each stage just require clearing the grid of people and moving to the end goal in order to move on to the next map. Others get more complicated as you move along and require it to be done under certain guidelines (such as in a certain number of moves).
They found a way to make the game fairly deep considering there really is only one move that you use throughout the game. You’ll find yourself replaying levels over and over as you try to plan out your next few moves ahead to make sure that you can complete the level meeting all guidelines and stipulations.
Graphics
It’s easy to look at Slayaway Camp and see it as a Minecraft rip-off but, upon further investigation, it goes much deeper than that. Each level has a unique design to it and each killer and victim has a lot of simplistic detail to them and also that each “movie” has a unique and distinctive look. With a wide color palette, you’ll be surprised at how good the game looks on the slowly getting outdated Vita screen, especially the launch model that we used for our review.
Recommendation
Slayaway Camp: Butchers Cut is the best version of the game and having it available on Vita makes the mobility of it even better than you’ll find on mobile devices. Fans of the Horror genre will love all of the minute details that were put into this game and though it relies on the same mechanics and simple design throughout the game. It rarely gets old and even when you’re stuck you can use gold to move ahead. This is a hidden gem and one that should not be missed on Vita.
*Slayaway Camp: Butchers Cut was provided to the reviewer by the publishing company but this fact did not alter the reviewer’s opinion*
Check out our Review Guide to see what we criteria we use to score games.
