Katana Zero is a 2019 platform game created by the indie developer Justin Stander. Set in a dystopian metropolis, the neo-noir storyline follows Subject Zero, a katana-wielding assassin with amnesia who can slow down time and predict the future. Zero unravels his past while completing assassination contracts. Katana Zero features side-scrolling hack-and-slash gameplay in which the player attempts to kill all enemies in a level without being hit, using Zero's abilities to manipulate time, dodge attacks, and take advantage of environmental hazards. In between levels, the story is told in sequences where the player converses with non-player characters through dialogue trees.
Stander began working on Katana Zero in 2013. He had previously developed freeware games, such as Tower of Heaven (2009), and conceived Katana Zero as his first commercial game. Using GameMaker Studio 2, Stander sought to make a difficult story-driven game that did not force the player to wait through dialogue and cutscenes. He focused on attention to detail and looked to films such as Sin City (2005) and John Wick (2014) for story inspiration. The development was prolonged and Stander worked mostly alone, although he recruited artists to design the visuals as well as musicians Bill Kiley and Thijs "LudoWic" Lodewijk to compose the synthwave soundtrack.
Katana Zero 1.0.5 Download
DOWNLOAD 🔥 https://tlniurl.com/2yGccL 🔥
Katana Zero is a 2D platform and hack and slash game presented from a side-scrolling perspective.[1][2] Controlling the player character, the katana-wielding assassin Subject Zero,[3] the single player completes assassination contracts for a psychiatrist. Zero can run, jump, wall kick, pick up and throw items, attack using his katana, and dodge.[4] Zero's ability to slow down time and predict the future allows the player to activate a slow motion effect, enabling them to predict enemy movement easier, although use is limited by a meter that gradually refills.[5][6] The game features eleven levels,[7] which use Zero's precognition as a framing device; the player's attempts to complete each level are presented as possible scenarios Zero has foreseen.[1][5]
Levels are split into several rooms, and the player must kill every enemy in a room using their sword, throwable objects, such as lamps and pots, or environmental hazards, such as lasers.[4][7] Aside from occasional bosses, each enemy dies in a single hit.[1] Certain levels feature unique game mechanics, such as a stealth mission in a nightclub,[8] a motorcycle chase,[9] and an alternate player character.[4] Any damage results in instant death for Zero, requiring the player to restart from the most recent checkpoint.[7] Katana Zero has been frequently compared to Hotline Miami (2012),[8][10] as both feature levels filled with enemies, one-hit kills, and require players to determine their chosen route strategically.[11] Outside of the main game, there are two additional game modes: hard mode features more difficult levels with new enemy varieties, reworked bosses, and additional challenges; and speedrun mode challenges the player to complete every level in the fastest time possible, with the options to modify enemy behavior and skip cutscenes.[12]
Katana Zero follows a neo-noir-style storyline, with psychological horror and black comedy elements,[13] set in a dystopian metropolis after a war.[2][5] Subject Zero is an amnesiac veteran with precognitive abilities.[14][15] He assassinates drug dealers for his psychiatrist,[8] who acts as his handler.[16] The news media ascribes these killings to a serial killer known as the Dragon.[13] Zero experiences recurring nightmares of a child, who he identifies as himself, in a hut. A scientist runs in, warns the child to hide, and is shot moments later by a soldier.[17] He discusses his nightmares with the psychiatrist, who supplies him with a drug as treatment.[18] Zero also befriends a young girl living next door to his apartment,[7][13] and he becomes attached to her.[15]
In between levels, the player converses with non-player characters (NPCs), such as the psychiatrist, the girl, and a Russian psychopath antagonist named V, who admires Zero's lethality.[5][7][13] In a real-time dialogue tree system, the player chooses responses during conversations and can interrupt an NPC's dialogue at any time.[16] Their decisions determine how much exposition is presented and how Zero is characterized;[1] for example, Zero comes across as rude if the player repeatedly interrupts.[19] Although they do not change the overall plot, players' dialogue choices can affect certain events, and one boss fight can only be activated by making specific decisions.[16]
Zero and the psychiatrist's relationship becomes strained as the psychiatrist grows increasingly disagreeable and Zero suspects he is withholding information about the assassinations.[7][20] After the Dragon, a separate swordsman with clairvoyant abilities similar to Zero's, dismembers and abducts V,[21] Zero learns about his own past as a supersoldier and that the drug he had been taking, Chronos, both gave him his abilities[22] and causes users in withdrawal to become trapped within their minds.[23] Zero, tired of being manipulated, kills the psychiatrist. The girl goes missing[24] and the story ends on a cliffhanger.[13][15] A flashback reveals Zero's nightmare is a memory from the war, that he is the soldier and not the child, and that the Dragon was his comrade.[25]
Katana Zero was developed over six years by the indie game creator Justin Stander under the studio name Askiisoft. It was Stander's first commercial game; his previous projects, such as Tower of Heaven (2009), had been smaller freeware games. After seeing the success of Terry Cavanagh's VVVVVV (2010), Stander concluded audiences only pay attention to indie games if they are being sold. Cavanagh, like Stander, had started off making freeware games, but none were as successful as VVVVVV. Katana Zero originated from Stander's desires to create a larger project that could be sold commercially and tell a story.[10] He began working on it in 2013 as a hobby during his sophomore year at McGill University.[26] He used the GameMaker Studio 2 game engine and spent the first two years building simple prototypes.[27][28] The game was a means of expression for Stander outside schoolwork and he spent most of his time at college developing it.[26]
After Stander graduated in 2015,[26] he developed Katana Zero full time.[10] He worked on multiple projects alongside it as a precaution since he felt the chances of success were slim.[29] The total budget was US$60,000, which Stander noted was quite small for a game of Katana Zero's scope.[10] He stated: "Most of it was just not paying myself at all and cutting down costs in my own life to do nothing but work on the game."[10] Stander worked largely on his own, although he recruited help for the art and music.[30] The game was initially developed for personal computers (macOS and Windows).[4][31] Stander decided to develop a Nintendo Switch version immediately after the system was unveiled because he saw it as a good console for indie games.[30] GameMaker made it easy to port Katana Zero and the long development meant it was already well optimized.[30]
Stander wanted Katana Zero to feel cinematic and sought to subvert expectations: "As soon as you think you understand how this game is going to play out, then I just try to completely shift it on you... as soon as [you're] comfortable in [something], I try to shift things up. And I do that several times throughout the game. I really mess with the player."[32] To maintain variety, he incorporated many enemy types, environmental traps, alternate level pathways, and set pieces. A minecart pathway inspired by Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) took over a month to create.[32] Stander looked to indie games that feature "tight, fast-paced, instant death combat" for inspiration,[34] such as Trilby: The Art of Theft (2009) and Gunpoint (2013).[33]
The art style was inspired by the neon lighting aesthetics associated with the 1980s.[34] Recruiting artists proved challenging; Stander called himself "a terrible artist", and for two years no artists worked on the game.[10] He found artists through the online independent developer community TIGSource, but said it was difficult to recruit high-quality pixel artists who would commit to the project. Many would only work on it for weeks or days before quitting for various reasons, such as other commitments or feeling their style did not match.[10] Stander used the neon lighting to blend the artists' different styles.[10] He considered being able to get an artist team to finish the game mere chance and credited the artists with motivating him to finish.[10][26]
Stander said telling a story was a large part of his motivation to develop Katana Zero, wanting to celebrate his favorite tropes and provide his own spin on them.[10] The script is credited to Stander and Eric Shumaker, with additional writing by Sterling Nathaniel Brown and Ian Goldsmith Rooney.[25] As Stander developed Katana Zero focusing on one element at a time, he only had a basic plot summary by the time he finished outlining all the levels. Elements Stander conceived early on included a protagonist who was "sort of trapped in their situation, because those always make for good main characters in action games," and a disagreeable psychiatrist whom players would dislike.[16]
Katana Zero is a pastiche of films Stander enjoyed.[33] He was inspired by the Eastern culture of samurai cinema and wanted a vulnerable yet lethal protagonist similar to those from Korean revenge thrillers.[34][10] Film influences included Oldboy (2003) Sin City (2005), Drive (2011), and John Wick for their "invincible-yet-human" protagonists and "stylistic violence set over a dark, grimy, neon coated setting,"[33] as well as Seven Samurai (1954) and the films of Quentin Tarantino.[30][34] The story structure was inspired by Hotline Miami, in which the player character is directed to kill by mysterious phone calls, and its themes include drug addiction and mental health. Stander hesitated to deal with such topics as they had never affected him, but after some research, felt he could treat them respectfully.[16] Stander said the script was rewritten around 30 times.[26] 152ee80cbc
gta v play online without download
free download hidden object games for pc