Video Game / Slaughter (2023)

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Russel, on the trail of his missing partner and best friend whom was last spotted in a city-sized prison outpost, infiltrates its walls only to be knocked unconscious and taken to the cells, where he needs to fight his way out.

• Bond Villain Stupidity: Russel is knocked unconscious and hauled into a cell... without restraints. And there's a kukri embedded in a wall not far away. Take a wild guess how he escapes.
• Car Fu: The final stage, after Russel finished refueling the lone jeep, where he then speeds through the prison city's streets, running over inmates and crashing through fences as he takes his leave.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Loads and loads of it.
  • This is Ray Sparks' first game as a solo programmer and VenomizedArt's first output in general, and it shows. The interior design is repeatedly recycled, gameplay elements from the sequels (like the Back Stab move or presence of Assist Characters) are absent, and enemy designs are severely lacking (there's only one character model for the melee enemies, for instance).
  • Russel in the first game is presented in a far more heroic light, refusing to shoot at asylum inmates by stating "they're unarmed and it's against protocol", compared to the Anti-Hero Russel is known for in the sequels.
  • Russel himself doesn't have dialogue, though he does monologue with subtitles popping up onscreen. They hired a VA only in the third and fourth games.
  • Rebel, and the gang leaders Russel allies himself with in the later games, are entirely absent - the whole game is about Russel's solo escapades through a rioting city.
  • Using aiming mode turns the game from a TPS to a First-Person Shooter where Russel's entire hand holding a firearm takes up the screen's lower corner. This doesn't happen in any of the sequels.
  • If Russel needs to move objects around (see Pressure Plate), he'll physically lift and carry them and is unable to use firearms while doing so, leaving him vulnerable to enemy attacks. In the sequels moving objects is a matter of simply pushing them.
  • No special gameplay modes are available, unlike the sequels.
  • The game is much, much shorter that its sequels, and spans only two areas (every single stage except the last is set in a prison, the final one is in the streets).
• Gas Mask Mooks: The Uzi-wielding enemies wears gasmasks, while the first boss, Bouncer, is a trenchcoat-wearing brute whose face is obscured by another gasmask.
• Hold the Line: The last stage requires Russel to guard his escape vehicle, which is being refueled and somehow needs to take up over a minute, where every single mook-grade enemy he encountered prior will attack. Once the time's up, Russel simply needs to return to the vehicle and he's out in no time.
• Lumber Mill Mayhem: The prison's court area somehow contains a lumberyard. One of the compulsory areas Russel must cross is the sawmill room, where circular blades travels along the floor and can damage Russel on contact.
• Mêlée à Trois: Subverted - halfway into the game, the military arrives to deal with the riots, and Russel watches as an APC unloads a few soldiers - one who guns down a random prisoner. For the rest of the game it's a three-way brawl between Russel, the inmates, and the military, but whenever Russel shows up expect onscreen enemies to target him instead.
• Pressure Plate: Russel occasionally needs to carry battery generators around and place them on port points to trigger exits.
• Prison Riot: The entire game takes place in the middle of an intense one, with all the guards killed as inmates runs amok... and Russel is caught in the middle of the chaos. After obtaining weapons and killing his way out, suddenly the military intervenes by sending soldiers to kill everyone.
• Psychopathic Manchild: Second boss Babyface is a huge man with the mind of a little kid, greeting Russel with a warm wave of his hand when Russel enters. As Russel waves back, Babyface then reveals he's holding a huge meat cleaver and attacks.
• Sawed-Off Shotgun: Russel can obtain a compact shotgun more than halfway into the game, and shooting enemies from up close will send them flying several meters backwards.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Attempted by Babyface, who flees through a back door after Russel defeats him in a boss fight. Unfortunately, the military is on the other side with intent of wiping out the rioting prisoners, and for his efforts Babyface earns himself a Boom, Headshot!

Few months after the first game's events, a distress call is received from behind the colony's walls from Dave Wilson, an inmate who's supposedly a government agent investigating the colony's activities. An elite commando squad led by one officer Harter - the new player character - is assigned to investigate. Inevitably, Harter is separated from his team in the middle of a riot.

• Assist Character: Harter can release his fellow commandoes either restrained in cells or getting tortured by prisoners. They'll help him out by shooting at enemies, at least until Harter reaches a new area and part ways.
• Barefoot Loon: Several of the asylum inmates goes around shoeless, even in stages set outdoors where they're clearly running on asphalt.
• Bear Trap: These shows up as an obstacle, only in the second game, where stepping on one of these drains Harter's health and slows him down as he tries freeing himself (and leaves him exposed to any enemies who might be around). First seen in a new corridor Harter enters, and sees several of these traps littered across the floor, one which is closed and contains a prisoner's severed foot...
• Chainsaw Good: Undead wields a huge chainsaw as a weapon during his boss fight, which chews away one-third of Harter's health if caught in a close-range slash. He's also surprisingly agile for a relatively skinny guy holding a massive weapon.
• Distressed Dude: Harter's fellow commandoes may be well-trained, but they're still caught in an ambush with most of them captured by inmates requiring Harter to release them.
• The Dreaded: The muscular inmates wearing welding masks are treated as such. Harter receives this warning in an email from his superiors, before facing them:
  If you see one of these... RUN!
• Not Quite Dead: While exploring the asylum, Harter re-enters the same section Russel explored in the previous game and finds Babyface from the previous game, seated in the same area he was defeated and supposedly killed in and holding a key in his outstretched hand. As Harter tries picking up the keys, Babyface (now renamed "Mickey" for reasons unknown) suddenly jerks awake. Turns out he's still alive... despite having a bleeding hole where his left eye was blown out the previous game and a returning boss.
• Oddball in the Series: Probably a holdover from the first game's Early-Installment Weirdness, but this is the only entry featuring a different player character, a soldier named Harter (though Russel was mentioned in a Continuity Nod moment - in a file that calls him "that dude with a mohawk"). Russel returns in the third and fourth game.
• Pivotal Boss: Tsantsa actually Wilson, the Final Boss, is fought in the steel mill's highest section with a circular railing around him, and he controls a twin-barreled Gatling gun that spins on an axis. Harter needs to run circles and take cover as he shoots back.

Russel is unexpectedly back, this time on a solo mission where he voluntarily infiltrates the Penal Colony after his new partner, Matt, failed to report to headquarters. After getting knocked unconscious by punks and a rendezvous with a man called Nick who proclaims to be a neutral weapons-developer and a mysterious contact masked man only known as "Rebel", once again Russel is caught in the middle of an out-of-control Gang War.

• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: There's one built underneath the colony's surface, that Russel and Rebel needs to navigate their way across while taking down the hordes of gangsters that made it their hideout.
• Back-to-Back Badasses: Whenever Rebel is recruited, the player controls either Russel or Rebel, and the AI controls the other character. They tend to kick plenty of ass side-by-side while watching each other's backs. The addition of Norman and Matt makes them a small army.
• Bolivian Army Ending: Russel, Rebel, Norman and Matt managed to board the activated subway after kickstarting the generator, where they then leaves the colony... but it turns out Tsantsa, who's tailing the gang all along, suddenly appears in a cutscene and deliberately cuts the brakes loose causing the train to derail. The crash is only heard as the credits start rolling, but the sequel reveals everyone to still be alive.
• The Faceless: Rebel's mask never comes off his face, and his hood stays on the entire game. Though the fourth game does finally reveal how he looks like near the end...
• Guest-Star Party Member: While Russel is the default character, three others can be added and recruited, in order Rebel (a gang enforcer who claims he's on nobody's side), Norman (a war-veteran caught in the mess) and Matt (Russel's partner that he's searching for). They will go on missions together kicking ass side-by-side, with the player controlling one and the AI controlling the other two or three.
• Incredibly Durable Enemies: The third game introduces those bare-chested brutes armed with huge, melee weapons (spiked clubs, gauntlets, etc) and they can soak up plenty of bullets despite their clear lack of armor. They're easily among the most durable melee-based enemies the whole game.
• The Mall: In the third game it turns out the penal colony somehow has a shopping mall, except it's abandoned like every structure on the island and used as quarters for the gangsters. Russel and Rebel needs to wipe out everyone in the building, with Russel lampshading he "don't think it's the right time to go shopping".
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Rebel is only known as such, and he doesn't reveal what his real name is. Again, until the sequel.
• Power Fist: There's a new enemy type in the game, a giant prisoner brute whose body is strapped with high-powered batteries attached to a pair of mechanical gauntlets they're wearing. These guys attacks exclusively by punching and can expectedly absorb a lot of damage before dying.
• It's Quiet… Too Quiet: Russel infiltrates the prison quarters after killing some punks in the streets, and realize the whole place is suspiciously empty. After several minutes of exploring and searching, Russel name-drops the trope.
• Sinister Subway: The colony's subway and final stage. It's dark, dank, abandoned, and Russel and crew needs to find a way to activate the only remaining train and direct the rails towards an exit.
• Static Role, Exchangeable Character: After recruiting Rebel, the player can control either Russel or Rebel in stages - the AI controls the other character to tag along behind, occasionally helping to take down mooks. You can even change the current playable character by sliding the player icon. The player has to lead of course - remain where you are and the other character will hang around idly by. This can be repeated after unlocking the survivor known as Norman.
• Throat-Slitting Gesture: Tsantsa makes one of these gestures in his re-introduction cutscene to intimidate Russel and indicate he means business.
• The Vietnam Vet: It's not immediately obvious, but after Norman is unlocked and playable for several levels, he reveals himself to be a 'Nam veteran.
  Norman: I sleep badly, you know... nightmares about Vietnam. After one operation in the 68th, it haunts me every night.
  Russel: In the 68th? Remind me how old you are?
  Norman: Shut up. We're at war, soldier. There's devils around every corner!

"I'm having this dream again. It feels like I'm heading somewhere..."

Russel makes a comeback... in a crashed vehicle in the middle of the desert, with no backstory provided how he got there and what actually happened. And then he wakes up and realize he's back in the colony, locked in chains within one of their cells. But someone dropped a key, a kukri and a pistol from a skylight and tells Russel to free himself.

• The Alcatraz: Revealed in a much later stage, turns out most of the fourth game is set on a prison built atop a rig in the middle of the Black Sea.
• Amnesiac Hero: Apparently, the car crash Russel suffered in the prologue gave him minor memory loss where he doesn't remember Rebel from the previous game (who turns out to be the unknown person who dropped a key into Russel's cell). Though he still remembers how to kick ass.
• Bloodier and Gorier: So much. Enemy mooks simply explodes into a fine spray of red with close-range hits from any stronger weapon, prisoners turns easily into Ludicrous Gibs with no provocation, and stages in the aftermath of shootouts tends to be carpeted with dismembered chunks of flesh.
• Continuity Nod: One of the files Russel can obtain is the dossier of Rick Harter, the second game's protagonist. Whose fate is unknown after his game concluded, though the dossier claims "Necessary measures are being taken to eliminate him".
• Conveniently Timed Attack from Behind: The final cutscene has Rebel held at gunpoint by two prisoners, about to shoot him. But Russel arrives in time and blows away their heads using two shots.
• Darker and Edgier: Besides the color palette being a literal example (seriously, the filters has the color grading of Chernobyl) the backstory is also far more serious than the previous three games. It begins with Russel's capture by enemy mooks, with a further revelation that his ally Rebel has been double-crossed, his potential allies from the previous game are all gone, every inhabitant within the mental asylum for the psychotically dangerous are on the loose and there's far deadlier enemy types threatening to kill everyone in the game.
• Deadly Gas: The final stages concerns a gas leak that spreads out of control in the prison's lower bowels, requiring Russel to obtain a gasmask to proceed.
• Deadly Rotary Fan: A new obstacle in the deepest, darkest cells of the colony, rotating turbines which can rip Russel to shreds easily.
• Falling Damage: The fourth game contains high ledges and sharp drops that's enough to cause damage to Russel's health if he lands the wrong place. The screen even gives a Flash of Pain in the process.
• Mêlée à Trois: Russel and Rebel against the rioting prisoners, and a third party of criminally-insane, highly-lethal psychos called "freaks" who attacks everything in sight. The freaks are in fact introduced in a Mook Debut Cutscene clawing apart a few regular inmates.
• Mission Control: Rebel isn't playable in this one unlike the previous game, his role has been reduced to communicating with Russel via radio every now and then.
  Russell: As you enter the archive, contact me. I will tell you what to do next.
• Weaponized Headgear: Claws aside (see below), some of the freaks also wears helmets with three sharp rotating propeller blades opened in a Y-shape. These enemy types will deliberately attempt headbutting Russel.
• Wolverine Claws: The Freaks wears clawed gauntlets, and will rip apart everything in their way.
• Your Head A-Splode: Try firing a shotgun from less than a meter from a mook's face.