Wanted: Dead is publisher 110 Industries’ debut title, and sixth title from seasoned developer Soleli, comprised of former Team Ninja staff who worked on the likes of Dead or Alive and Ninja Gaiden. It’s a hybrid slasher shooter, wrapped in 80’s cyberpunk aesthetics and mid 2000s mantra. I followed this game from very early on, captivated by the aesthetic, music, and Vivienne’s Late Night Chow. Wanted: Dead had my attention; so, on Valentine’s Day I jumped in, what else could I possibly want to do that day?
The promise of Wanted: Dead is to take us back to the glory days of sixth gen character action titles, but had it been released in that era, it feels more akin to Bungie’s Oni and less so Ninja Gaiden and Devil May Cry.
Wanted: Dead starts off strong, a heavily stylised FMV sequence gives you the rundown on the world and its rules. However, this is about as much story as you’re going to get during the fifteen hour runtime. You’re then introduced to protagonist Hanna Stone, and her gang of misfits. Supposedly these are all war criminals, operating as part of the “Zombie Unit” for the Hong Kong Police as part of a rehabilitation program. Unfortunately, you’re never made aware of these crimes or in fact what war they actually fought in. This could be looked past however, as I am one which prefers character over backstory, but Wanted: Dead also fails in this regard.
The Zombie Unit completely lacks any character in terms of growth and personality. Doc is the medic of the group (the only one with a gameplay functionality), Cortez is mute, and Herzog is the pervert. None of them grow, have anything interesting to say, and their voice performances lack any sort of direction. Everyone in the game mostly speaks in a very monotone voice, which is fine during cutscenes, however, in moments of chaos and action it’s very disjointed.
You can’t really rely on your squad during gameplay either, oftentimes they refuse to shoot at enemies, or miss completely, only seldom taking the initiative to finish off an enemy or two. Doc will revive you once per checkpoint (in most instances) should you eat enough lead, but that’s the only benefit any of them bring. The game would functionally be the same without them.
But hey, this is an action game, gameplay is the only thing that matters right? In that case Wanted: Dead is fine it’s perfectly serviceable but above all else, fun. You’ll need to employ a mixture of melee and gunplay to make it through each stage. Melee combat feels great and is visceral thanks to a wonderfully gory dismemberment system. Get your combos right and arms, legs, heads, and torso will be split asunder courtesy of Hannah’s Hanzo Steel. While most melee games employ light and heavy attacks, Hannah’s moveset includes a standard sword slash, and pistol interlude. This provides opportunity for a number of unique combos. Hannah’s pistol can stagger enemies who can push through your melee attacks, so if you want to keep the hits going you have to spice up your attacks.
Once you deal enough damage, you can perform a finisher, of which there are hundreds of, and have a fair few context sensitive animations. These include shoving an enemy against a wall and finishing them off with a bullet, taking their gun and ending them with it, or making sashimi out of their newfound corpse. They are all visually interesting and the dismemberment system really makes you feel powerful. There’s also a gameplay benefit as if you’re quick enough any damage you may have taken can be regained via a swift finisher.
Gunplay is more standard however, Hanna is equipped with a standard assault rifle, ammo is limited to discourage players from blasting their way through. Your rifle is helpful to take out enemies hiding on ledges, or to deal some damage before sweeping in for a melee attack. Hanna’s rifle is also useful against stronger enemies such as Heavies, they move slow and are equipped with a minigun, but deal massive damage when they hit. As well as Ninjas which come in a couple flavors. Some dual wield their katanas, and throw kunai, and others wield a single blade and have a smaller health pool. Should you not want to play the parry game, which requires you to time your guard with their attack, should you have the ammo you can fill them with lead to take them down without risking your health or stimpacks.
Boss fights are the least enjoyable of the action, either being frustrating, too easy, or indecipherable. Two of the four bosses bore less challenge than the gauntlet leading up to them and the others were marred with questionable design choices, leading to frustration. The second fight for instance is one where the main boss attacks you at the same time as dozens of smaller enemies. The other fights which could have been interesting, including a fight with clones(?), doesn’t provide much of a challenge and plays like you’re fighting standard enemies. The bosses also lack any sort of character.
No More Heroes introduces bosses with unique designs, personality, charm, and mechanics in less than a minute each fight. Wanted: Dead’s bosses are by contrast far from that. The only information you get sometimes is a sparse document about the boss after you fight them. They have nothing to say before the fight, no unique gimmicks, and perhaps the worst sin, no unique boss music.
Which brings onto another gripe, the soundtrack. With the musical talent of Giorgio Moroder on board, it is bizarre Wanted: Dead doesn’t make use of its musical library. There are plenty of unique tracks on deck produced by Moroder and sung by Stefanie Joosten (who plays the Gunsmith in game), however you can only listen to these songs in between levels in the Police HQ. Levels are accompanied by generic dull synths, guitar riffs, and nothing to accentuate and uplift the action. It makes little to no sense why the OST is so lackluster in gameplay when there are great tracks including covers of songs such as She Works Hard For The Money present in game.
Wanted: Dead isn’t all action, there’s a few moments of downtime between levels including Karaoke, Ramen eating, a retro shmup dubbed Space Runaway, a crane came to get collectible figures of the cast, and a practice range to hone your skills. Karaoke and ramen are functionally the same, not too dissimilar from the Karaoke minigame in the Yakuza/Like A Dragon series, the twist here being having to hit two button presses simultaneously. Strangely, Karaoke has only one song available from it whereas the Ramen eating minigame has multiple dishes for you to dine on. An odd choice to say the least.
These distractions do provide some levity especially after you get your ass handed a few times and need to decompress and are a fun distraction, if the content focus is questionable.
Ultimately, Wanted: Dead feels like a bag of missed opportunities, I liked the game, it has a solid gameplay loop and decent side content, but I will never return to it. The levels are visually uninteresting, the story is non-existent, the characters are far from memorable, but the hacking and slashing holds up. It’s not worth the full retail of $60 USD but I would still recommend it, at a steep discount, to people missing that sixth gen jank.
That said, we seem to be entering the 2000s nostalgia era, and Wanted: Dead doesn’t stand alone. Titles such as the recent Hi-Fi Rush and Evil West feel more like lost gems whereas Wanted: Dead does little to elevate itself past its competition both in the present day and the past.
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