For a game that seemingly played a large spark of outrage "video games causes gun violence" rhetoric in 2015, this game kinda sucks. There's a reason why this game itself didn't carry the flame for that conversation. Hatred is historically interesting and aesthetically compelling, but as a game it's mediocre to bad.
Spoilers for this 11 year old game.
TL;DR:
[b]Would I recommend this game?[/b] Only to people who find the hardcore emo aesthetic pleasing. In general, no.
[b]Is this game enjoyable?[/b] Maybe under the influence. I know I'd play this game on psychedelics. If you're the type of person to watch LiveLeak videos for funsies, or like the aesthetic within the trailers, then you'll probably like the plot and art of this game; but if you actually played it, you'd hate it.
[b]Should this game get any attention today?[/b] No, not really, it's novelty wears off super quickly, just like its relevance.
[b]Was it worth the $1.19 I got it for?[/b] Are paintings in real life worth millions? That's for you to decide for yourself. For its art, kind of worth it for me. Outside of art and [u]as a video game, it sucks, so much.[/u]
[h1] The Good [/h1]
Destruction, aesthetics, and gameplay loop. In no particular order.
It's the kind of junk-food that you know is crappy. It's clunky, janky, and bug prone, however it's satisfying enough. The sound effects, the destruction debris, and the semi-satisfying explosions are what make it addicting. The smaller half of the destruction as a whole are lackluster or feel crippling.
The atmosphere, tone, language, art direction, and the art style isn't super unique, but rather done perfectly for what it is. Character design-wise he's a bit boring, and the constant one liners are terrible, but outside of the game and in music, it's pretty cool. This game's aesthetic has had a cultural influence beyond the game itself. "Hatred" actually shows up else-where, like the band of artists "Shadow Wizard Money Gang," who cover different mediums, from fashion to music, from animation to photography. *[i] I am going somewhere with this.[/i] Within SWMG's album "Symbolism," a collaborative album between the group and BBY GOYARD, they heavily sample this game. Though this review is for a video game and not the album, the album is worth listening to if you're into experimental, punchy, electric rap and production. That being said, the art is inspirational and the aesthetic is often sought out after.
Often described as "aimless" for each level and being a negative for many, I find that I think it's kind of the point of the game. You play as a villain who aims to kill as many as he can, carelessly and with no regard, walking down a random road to shoot people is what "the antagonist" (that's one of a few names he has) would want to do. Where he decides to go only becomes clear when A) he needs to escape, [spoiler] and B) he finds out about the nuclear power plant. [/spoiler]
Whilst being fun enough to enjoy about 5/8 of the time, the greatest thing it has going for itself is it's art style.
[h1] The Bad [/h1]
Literally everything else.
Plot-wise it's terrible, the 2nd half of the gameplay is horrifically bad, and the way the devs and their marketing strategies went for this game would make anyone just sigh and forget about its existence.
Why does the guy hate humanity so much? The whole plot is short sighted, and I think that's the point. What did I really expect? Some sort of master plan or some extravagant human ability that this guy has, who then successfully does some "Israel-like" genocide ([spoiler]which he does by blowing up a good chunk of New York,[/spoiler] killing a whole lot of people... However, why not go the whole 9 yards?) The dark plot is not something I directly looked for, but rather looked for the aesthetic of.
Was it enjoyable? Nope!
Again, gameplay-wise, it has some sort of fun aspects to it and being reflective of the plot, but the jank, the AI, shooting, simply walking around, and much more, feel terrible. AI cluster together, but they [b]*heavily*[/b] maintain personal space with each other. Enemy spawn waves are huge which is a good thing, but they spawn all at once and brainlessly rush you. Shooting feels like nails on a chalk board. Movement wise you're drunk, and yes there is a drunk mode which makes you feel more drunk, you're constantly running into walls next to doors, you run into the wall before automatically jumping over obstacles, and driving is hideous.
Marketing can be summed up with "all attention is good attention." Obviously there is no way anyone would sell this game in any good light, just read the section above in this review and you'll notice I'm stretching everything to the max. The principle of this philosophy of all attention is good attention allows for the worst kind of people to thrive with, often adopted by the worst person you can think of. It was gonna be a given for a game like this, but it's still a valid point that needs to be said for this review.
I'm also not sure what to expect here either, how do you market a snuff film to the masses? I guess by doing it well enough? [i]Maybe people will see the artistic value of murder and depravity.[/i]
[h1] The Very Ugly Conclusion [/h1]
Yeah, I don't know what you or I expect from this game. I only bought this game for myself, 11 years late from release, because....... I got no clue. It's 2 dollars. This game shocked a lot of people. I can now say "I played hatred, the only adult rated game for it violence, and language for some reason." Only remembered this game existed because of a terrible dream a night before, and felt like I had to experience what 2015's internet populist talked about for 2 weeks. I had fun regardless, but I can easily see the next trans girly remembering this game existing and not having fun.
For most people: Try it. Refund it. Reflect on it.
