Since the theme of the game is a gritty futuristic dystopia: there are apartment buildings, mansions, secret facilities and at one point even a few movies sets that you navigate through. Environmentally: much of what you see will be expected, minus a few standout scenes that I won't spoil the surprise of. This game earns its M rating as well with buckets of blood spilling out of each enemy that you slash with your sword. You're given control of a samurai sprite and navigate areas going from left to right fighting a variety of different enemies. Graphics- stylized 8-bit graphics is the name of the game here. None of them are necessarily difficult to master as well, for example: the dash mechanic relies on timed button presses rather than just brute-forcing presses to traverse through a level at max speed, you can still mash all you want but you'll lose out on valuable speed which comes in handy when tackling the certain parts of the game like the speedrun challenge. Everything from directional movements to the dash mechanic has nuances that you can learn to your advantages that can make your experience going through this game much more enjoyable if you take the time to learn them. This game doesn't rely on a large number of inputs to play it and instead opts to have a well thought out design.

Minor spoilers will be detailed below so if you're already intrigued by my brief synopsis, stop reading and go download the game while it's still on gamepass! Easy to Pick up Controls- Starting off you may feel a little sluggish moving around and you'll definitely make a few mistakes while learning how to better control your character but after a few minutes they'll feel natural and intuitive.

I can talk about this game all day but I'll keep the review to a digestible size by discussing some of my favorite points.

Woven into the game is a surprisingly gripping dystopian world that you are plunged into and a trip through your character's psyche as you uncover the truth of who you really are and what your past consisted of. Throughout Katana Zero you'll be clearing rooms of enemies from a 2D point of view, relying on your faithful Katana and various objects around the levels to annihilate any grunt who stands in your way. Katana Zero is a neo-noir action platformer game with a focus on extremely tight, fast-paced, instant death combat.

Katana zero speedrun