Dog, easily recognisable with two pointed, upright ears protruding from his head, has a sad story -they all do- which trickles out through text logs that can be found on the overworld’s branching map. Those who found themselves deep-diving forums to understand the brain-bashing meta narrative that Superhot let unfold between the bouts of frenetic chaos, Mind Control Delete doubles-down on the original’s deep lore, introducing a lot of fascinating concepts as well as invulnerable boss-like characters, presumed lost and corrupted at the program’s hands, that spawn at random into maps and pursue you, with their own mastery of the program’s cores, in a heart-pounding twist on the formula. Another new enemy, all-red including its gun, makes this an impossibility and ratchets up the challenge in those split-second decisions that rest at the heart of the Superhot experience. One of the most satisfying moments in Superhot comes when you exhaust your last round on a red, only to pluck its gun from mid-air and resume the slaughter. Another has shrapnel embedded in its head and, like a time bomb, explodes, sending bullets in all directions. Usually entirely red, one of the new enemy types will be made of the same indestructible surfacing as the world itself, bar for one vulnerable limb which demands tremendous anticipation on the player’s behalf. bears down and you feel the weight of their steadfast hope to delete you. Though still humanoid in appearance, different kinds of red will invade the node as the A.I.
Mind Control Delete doesn’t stop at just empowering the player, the reds, too, have come into this expansion with a few new tricks. That and roguelikes have a habit of getting old quickly and Mind Control Delete goes dangerously close to becoming an exhausting endeavour.
#SUPERHOT MIND CONTROL DELETE LEVEL 3 MAP TRIAL#
It’s tremendously fun to toy with the countless possible ways to play Mind Control Delete, though the roguelike nature of it feels at odds with the spirit of Superhot which, to me, was an exercise in trial and error, as well as the pursuit of the perfect run once you’d learned the spawn chart of the map. If you’re lucky, the game will deal out complimentary hacks to you such as ‘defall.hack’ which, upon slicing a bullet out of the air, returns every discharged bullet back to the red who fired it. My personal go-to was the Recall core, which not only gifts you a katana for each level but also lets you summon it back to you. After starting with the More core, which grants you an extra heart, you quickly obtain others. The baseline experience for each node is determined by the core you opt for. Of course, the hacks help create a sense of irresistible power and there are a lot of them so it’s easy to synergise between them on the run which helps each attempt feel unique.
It’s a one-and-done deal and failure at any point reverts you back to the beginning, leading to a lot of tense, white-knuckle finishes. There are no individual levels as players must conquer several ‘nodes’, made up of several bite-sized, roguelike scenarios each.
Unlike the linear path to integration Superhot had players endure, Mind Control Delete plays out along a more branching path. It’s not as though Superhot had become outdated, but this shot in the arm keeps it unexpectedly fresh right out of the gate. Mind Control Delete leans into a clever, self-aware gamification of itself, giving the player two hearts and hacks, modifiers that buff the player, to give players a serotonin hit masked in-game as a ‘sense of hollow progression’. In the first game, riding time’s ebbs and flows to shatter the red guards of each level was the crux of the experience. Mind Control Delete is a standalone expansion that expands on the elegant simplicity of Superhot. Mind Control Delete takes Superhot, bends and contorts it into a roguelike take on what made the original a memorable trip of mainframe machinations. It’s also about succumbing to the program itself, all under the thin-veil illusion of control, its meta-plot rich with fourth-wall breaks and mind games. Superhot is a game about seduction where, externally, the player can’t resist the pull of the core loop that stops and starts time itself with your every input. On the surface, it’s a game with no plot and offers nothing to take away from the experience. Outgunned, outmatched and against seemingly insurmountable odds, Superhot is a game that constantly had you back against the wall.
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