By Khloe Wilkerson

Being dead in most video games means failure. In Romeo Is a Dead Man, death is only the beginning. Some video games gently invite players into their worlds; others disorient them on purpose. This game does both. From the moment I started playing, I could tell it wasn’t interested in being comfortable or predictable. 

Developed by Grasshopper Manufacture and directed by Goichi Suda (Suda51), the game immediately throws players into a universe that is violent, absurd, emotional, and constantly shifting. As I played, I found myself repeatedly adjusting my expectations, because just when I thought I understood what kind of game this was, it would change its tone, structure, or rules entirely.

The story opens in Deadford, Pennsylvania, a decaying town that feels stuck in time. Playing as Romeo Stargazer, a sheriff’s deputy, I was first introduced to a life that felt small and uneventful.

That sense of normalcy disappears during an early patrol scene when Romeo and another officer come across what appears to be a dead body lying in the road. I expected a routine investigation, but the moment the other officer approaches, the body reveals itself as something monstrous. It violently consumes him. 

When Romeo follows, the game abruptly shifts from grounded realism into full horror. Romeo is attacked and begins to morph into something inhuman, and before the transformation can fully take hold, his grandfather intervenes, stabbing him through the eye with a strange mechanical device. It’s a shocking moment, and as a player, I immediately understood that Romeo’s existence would now sit somewhere between life and death. He survives, but he is no longer fully human. Nor is he truly dead.

After this moment, Romeo becomes “Dead Man,” sustained by experimental technology created by his grandfather, who soon dies but continues to exist as a voice in an embroidered patch attached to the back of Romeo’s jacket. As I progressed, I found this relationship surprisingly emotional. The grandfather’s constant commentary felt less like a standard tutorial system and more like a lingering presence, reminding both Romeo and the player of what has been lost. 

As time fractures and Juliet, his girlfriend, disappears, Romeo is recruited into a space-time law enforcement organization that operates like a cosmic FBI. Much of the game involves tracking fugitive zombies across different eras while also searching for Juliet, who is now Romeo’s forbidden love. 

Over time, her true nature is revealed to be monstrous and deeply tied to the collapse of reality itself. I found the game’s portrayal of love especially compelling, since Juliet is not a source of comfort, but one of danger, obsession, and emotional instability.

One of my favorite elements of the game was the ability to pilot Romeo’s ship and physically travel between different locations and universes. Flying the ship never felt like a simple loading screen; instead, it made the world’s depth and Romeo’s role as a space-time agent feel real. Choosing destinations, navigating through space, and launching into missions helped the game feel expansive.

In terms of gameplay, Romeo Is a Dead Man feels fast and intentionally chaotic. Combat emphasizes constant movement over careful defense. Romeo uses a mix of melee weapons and firearms, allowing you to switch between two depending on the enemy type. Melee combat focuses on chaining light and heavy attacks while dodging. While it isn’t overly complex, it feels satisfying when executed well. Gunplay becomes essential against stronger enemies, especially those with visible weak points. One enemy that stood out to me was “Every Day Is Monday,” a massive, grotesque, headless creature that felt nearly impossible to take down using only swords. Once I targeted its glowing weak points with firearms, I realized the fight wasn’t as bad as I thought.

Missions take place across a wide range of environments, including city halls, shopping malls, warehouses, forests, and abandoned buildings overrun by Rotters (the zombies). Between missions, Romeo returns to his ship, a 2D hub where players can regroup, interact with the crew, and prepare for the next assignment. One mechanic I initially underestimated was the Bastard system, which allows players to grow and summon friendly zombie allies. At first, I ignored it, but later in the game, I realized how valuable these companions could be. Using a Bastard to heal me or distract enemies often made difficult encounters manageable, and experimenting with different combinations added more depth than I initially expected.

As I progressed, I kept encountering televisions scattered throughout the world, each showing the same man calmly eating a steak while speaking directly to Romeo. What he says is often vague, sometimes sounding like advice and other times like cryptic nonsense. These televisions also act as gateways, allowing Romeo to enter Subspace, a strange in-between dimension used to navigate blocked paths and hidden areas. I found these moments subtly unsettling with the normalcy of a man eating a meal, feeling disturbingly out of place against the violence and chaos surrounding Romeo.

One of the most memorable moments of the game occurred during the asylum sequence. By that point, I had grown comfortable with Romeo’s power, so losing access to all my weapons completely caught me off guard. The game suddenly shifted into survival horror, forcing me to sneak through dark corridors, avoid deadly creatures, and solve deeply unsettling puzzles. I genuinely felt tension during this section, especially during the jump scares. The time-loop structure kept the sequence from becoming frustrating, and hearing Romeo’s grandfather shout hints from the patch on his jacket made the experience feel strangely personal. When the loop finally broke, and my weapons were restored, the return to action felt earned rather than repetitive.

Visually, the game constantly surprised me. Drawing heavily from comic books and anime, Romeo Is a Dead Man uses bold outlines, exaggerated animations, and dramatic lighting to create a world that feels illustrated rather than realistic. I was especially impressed by how the art style shifts between chapters, with each major section adopting a different visual identity to match its tone. Some environments feel grounded and familiar, while others fully embrace abstraction through neon-lighted geometry and distorted spaces that emphasize the instability of reality. The recurring televisions became a visual motif I began to associate with uncertainty and transition.

The Space-Time Pharmacies also play an important role in shaping the experience. These locations act as save points and fast-travel hubs, restoring my health and healing items while spawning nearby enemies. While this design choice fits the game’s themes of repetition and fractured timelines, it occasionally made progression feel repetitive, especially in more linear sections. Still, the lack of harsh penalties for dying encouraged experimentation rather than punishment, which I appreciated.

The game’s audio design effectively reinforces its atmosphere. The soundtrack shifts between high-energy combat music and eerie, minimal tracks during quieter moments, allowing for more of an emotional response. Voice acting, particularly from Romeo’s grandfather, added personality and emotional weight to the narrative, while exaggerated sound effects made the combat feel impactful and stylish. 

Looking back on my time with Romeo Is a Dead Man, I found it to be a game that challenged me emotionally as much as mechanically. It can be confusing, uneven, and occasionally competitive. However, those frustrations never outweighed the game’s ambition. When it fully

commits to its strangest ideas, it excels, and I often found myself thinking about its imagery and themes long after I stopped playing.

By the end, Romeo Is a Dead Man left a lasting impression on me. It is bold and unapologetically strange, but it uses those qualities to tell a story that only works because it is a video game. While it may not appeal to everyone, players willing to embrace its chaos and emotional weight will find an experience that lingers far beyond the final scene.

Bronx native Khloe Wilkerson is in her second year of high school. In Middle School, she won our college scholarship twice in a row after completing our games journalism and narrative classes. 

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