Superhot is a 2016 independent first-person shooter video game developed and published by Superhot Team. Though the game follows traditional first-person shooter gameplay mechanics, with the player attempting to take out enemy targets using guns and other weapons, time within the game progresses at normal speed only when the player moves; this creates the opportunity for the player to assess their situation in slow motion and respond appropriately, making the gameplay similar to strategy video games. The game is presented in a minimalist art style, with enemies in red and weapons in black, in contrast to the otherwise white and grey environment.
The game originated as an entry in the 2013 7 Day FPS Challenge, which Superhot Team expanded into a browser-based demonstration that September. Widespread attention from the demonstration prompted the team to develop the full game, using Kickstarter to secure funding to complete the title. Superhot was released for Linux, macOS, and Microsoft Windows in February 2016. Versions for the Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Nintendo Switch were released in May 2016, July 2017, and August 2019, respectively. A rebuilt version of the game to better support virtual reality, Superhot VR, was released for the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, and PlayStation VR headset devices. A sequel, Superhot: Mind Control Delete, which utilizes roguelike elements such as procedural generation and permadeath, was released in 2020.
The game was met with positive reception, with reviewers considering the title to be an innovative take on the first-person shooter genre.
Gameplay
Superhot sets the player in a minimalistic environment, taking out hostile attackers that are trying to kill them. Weapons picked up by the player have limited ammunition and break easily, requiring the player to rely on defeating enemies to attain new weapons, or making melee kills. Taking a single hit from an enemy bullet kills the player, requiring them to restart the level. Though the game mechanics are typical of most shooters, time only progresses normally when the player moves or fires a gun, otherwise time is slowed; this is described in the game's tagline, "Time Moves Only When You Move".
The game originally was a three-level prototype browser game. In expanding to the full game, Superhot Team created a campaign mode across approximately thirty-one levels, estimated to be as long as Portal. The full game includes additional weapons, such as new kinds of firearms, explosives, melee weapons, and improvised weapons like billiard balls that can be thrown at enemies, and introduces AI enemies that have similar awareness as the player and can dodge the player's bullets. One significant change from the earlier prototype is that the player does not automatically pick up a weapon when they pass over it but must enact a specific control to do so, enabling the player to selectively choose and use weapons, or grab weapons dropped by enemies. The full game enables the player to jump and as long as the jump button or key is held, the player can slow down time to plan and perform actions, enabling aerial gun combat.
In addition to the campaign mode, the full release of Superhot includes an "endless" mode, where the player survives as long as they can against an endless wave of enemies. A "challenge" mode allows players to replay the campaign mode levels but under specific restrictions or requirements, such as completing the level within a limited amount of time or only using a specific type of weapon. The final game includes a replay editor to allow users to prepare clips to share on social media websites.
Superhot VR A new set of levels was developed for the virtual reality version of the game. The player's avatar reacts to the player's body, head, and hand movements. In keeping with the "time only moves when you move" concept, in-game time only progresses when the player makes deliberate movement with their body; turning their head to assess the situation, or making small twitches to the body do not cause time to progress. The player's avatar can only move in a small space from their location on the level (mapping to how the player moves around themselves); after defeating a small wave of enemies, they grab onto a virtual object to jump them to a new location within the level. Replacing the hotswitch ability is a "mindwave" allowing players to telepathically kill an enemy while unarmed. Following the campaign, the player unlocks a similar endless mode as the non-VR title.
Superhot: Mind Control Delete
The sequel retains the original time-manipulation mechanics, but wraps the game into a roguelite framing, as well as adding power-ups.
Superhot JP A Japanese-themed Superhot title, Superhot JP, began development by GameTomo in 2018 with support of the Superhot developers. It is initially planned for a Japanese release for PlayStation 4 and Windows, but other regions and platforms may follow.
Plot
The Superhot narrative works in several metanarrative levels: the player plays a fictionalized version of themselves sitting in front of their DOS prompt, getting a message from their friend who offers them a supposedly leaked copy of a new game called superhot.exe, claiming that the only way to access it is with a crack. Launching the game immediately thrusts the player into a series of seemingly unconnected levels via different points of view, all based around killing hostiles, after which the game glitches out and disconnects. After this crash, the player's friend sends an updated version of the .exe file, apparently a new version of the game that fixes the "glitches".
As both the player and their friend play through superhot.exe, it becomes apparent that the player's presence in the game is monitored by whoever is responsible for the game – referring to itself as a "system" – and demands they cease playing via various methods, such as ominous threats showing the player's in-game residence, and altering the player's messages to their friend to urge them to stop playing, eventually harassing the player's friend into giving up on the game and engineering a fallout with them. As the player goes through more and more levels, each apparently targeting specific locales, the system's warnings grow more ominous, telling them the player is unaware of the consequences of their actions, eventually forcing the player to walk to their own in-game house and to their in-game player character, a figure wearing VR headgear, and punch themselves into unconsciousness. Upon doing so, the "game" glitches out, and the player character wakes with a severe head injury. Afterward, the system warns the player once again to stop using Superhot, and forces the player to quit the game entirely.
Inevitably, the player will start up Superhot again, and the system concedes to the player's insistence to keep playing, fully encouraging them to play more and more. Now under the system's sway, the player begins a rampage through city streets, cutting through enemies to get closer and closer to a massive laboratory that houses the system itself. There, it guides the player into uploading itself into the core as numerous enemies attempt to stop the player. Once done, the player becomes part of the core, joining numerous other minds absorbed by the core itself into a transhuman hivemind. The core forces the player to shoot their original body/player character, finally making them one with Superhot.
Post-credits, the core/hivemind informs the player that they are to spread interest in superhot.exe by recommending it to as many people through social media and Steam reviews, specifically instructing the player to use the words "Superhot is the most innovative shooter I've played in years!", the same words the player's friend used to recommend them the game.
Development
Superhot was originally developed for the 2013 7 Day FPS Challenge, held that August, in which teams of programmers were given a week to develop complete, functional prototypes of games. Superhot director Piotr Iwanicki stated that he was in part inspired by the Flash game "Time4Cat", in which the player controls a cat trying to collect food on a busy road intersection; time only moves when the player moves the cat. The team also took inspiration from the music video for the 2013 song "Bad Motherfucker" by the Russian band Biting Elbows, which shows a special agent from a first-person perspective escaping from a hostage situation through parkour and gunplay. They combined these ideas for their Challenge prototype. The name of the game is based on how the two words "super" and "hot" best represent the game being "positive" and "intense".
The Challenge prototype only featured three levels across three computers, which, to meet the deadline, the team strung together in three separate applications and called the game episodic. They then refined it and released it as a free browser game in September 2013, whereupon it received extensive attention from players. They also submitted the game through the Steam Greenlight process, and within five days, it was successfully approved for later distribution by Valve, making the game the fastest to be approved through Greenlight at the time. Iwanicki stated that the positive reaction to the web demonstration was a result of players looking for any variation in the standard formula of first-person shooters, which had not really changed since the development of Doom. Iwanicki commented that while some have called Superhot a puzzle game, he feels it is an action game. Unlike a puzzle game where there is typically only one solution and the player is rewarded for finding it, Iwanicki considers Superhot to be about having the time to adjust to one's instincts and improvise a strategy for completing a challenge.
In May 2014, the development team launched a Kickstarter campaign to make Superhot a full release, including improvement of the art design, new levels and challenges, and support for the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset. They had planned on starting a Kickstarter campaign to fund publication after their Steam Greenlight approval, but they first wanted to polish the game more before offering the crowdfunding opportunity. This included tuning some of the gameplay, such as adding a katana that could be used to cut oncoming bullets in half. When they tried to launch the Kickstarter campaign, they found that the platform did not support their native Poland at the time. This gave the team more time to improve the game while locality issues were resolved, and it allowed them to continue building the art assets for the Kickstarter promotion. The Kickstarter campaign met its fundraising goal within the first day of going live, allowing the Superhot team to identify additional stretch goals, including improved animations and replay mode. Luke Spierewka, a programmer on the team, believed the success of their fundraising was in part due to the availability of the browser-enabled demonstration that allowed potential funders to experience the game's concept hands-on. The campaign ended with more than $230,000 in pledged funding, allowing the team to add in New Game Plus mode. Cliff Bleszinski designed a level for the game because he pledged for the Kickstarter tier that allowed a backer to co-design an arena stage.