Samurai Slaughter House is a physics-based combat sandbox from indie developer Tab Games, and it’s looking to shake up the genre with some seriously stylish visuals which the studio calls “half inspired by manga and half traditional Japanese ukiyo-e paintings.”
It’s still early days for Samurai Slaughter House; the ambitious single-player title is promising a large “metroidvania-style open world” where you collect items, power up your character, explore towns, and interact with NPCs. It’s slated to release on all SteamVR headsets and Oculus Quest in 2022, but also the next-generation PlayStation VR too whenever that arrives—we still don’t know.
Taking to Reddit, the game’s creator explains that its core gameplay loop revolves around killing mythical Japanese monsters, called yokai, and grinding them up at slaughterhouses to turn them into crafting items. You’ll be able to accomplish goals with brute force, stealth, and creativity.
Check out some of the black and white action—dotted with more than a splash of crimson gore—in the game’s latest trailer below:
Tab Games’ sole developer Justin Rosete says that, although it won’t have “a crazy amount of depth,” he’s aiming for an experience somewhere between The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and the original Dragon Warrior games.