Developer: DeadToast Entertainment

Publisher: Devolver Digital

Sometimes, the trailer is the best part of the movie.

You wake up on a slab in a dilapidated warehouse, with no memory of who you are or how you got there. A talking banana named Pedro shows up and tells you he’s your friend. He also tells you that the warehouse – and the world outside – is full of bad people, and that those people really need to be killed.

Ok banana, what ever you say!

So begins My Friend Pedro, one of the most anticipated indie releases of 2019. And while it’s a good game, it never reaches the promise of its premise or its incredible marketing campaign.

Bullet Dance

This game is all about insane, over-the-top, Matrix-style gunfights.

Switch it up with dual pistols

Slow-mo carnage

It plays very differently from most 2-D side-scrollers, and the developer adapted a first-person shooter control scheme to make this work. The right trigger (ZR) shoots; the left thumbstick controls movement while the right controls aim; the face buttons handle jumping and reloading; and the left bumper and trigger control both dodging and split aim (which allows you to shoot in two directions at once). It feels strange at first, but you quickly get used to it.

Jumping is slow and floaty, for a reason: you need that control in the air to execute aerial kills like the ones in the pics above.

And finally, clicking the left thumbstick down toggles bullet-time slowdown on and off, a handy feature when you find yourself surrounded by a half-dozen enemies who really want you dead.

Repetition: The Name of the Game

This is a very repetitive game. All the levels share similar basic layouts, which are designed to enable you to bounce off walls and perform spectacular, cinematic kills.

It’s all evenly-spaced blocks and one-cube spaces stacked on top of each other. The backgrounds may change, but the basic architecture stays the same.

This repetition carries over to the gunplay itself. The first time you do a super-slo-mo split kill will be awesome; the ten thousandth time you do it will get old, especially when you realize that the game is doing a lot of the work for you. The game features aim assist that can be turned down but never off, and if you spam the dodge button while in bullet time, you become practically invincible. Kills look spectacular but don’t feel all that rewarding.

There are some breaks in the action, however. One boss fight takes place on a motorcycle, and another level has you jumping off a skyscraper and fighting while in freefall. Both are welcome breaks from the regular action and add some much-needed variety to the gameplay.

The game makes a strange turn later on which definitely breaks up the monotony but also leaves you scratching your head. More on this later.

Endless, Nameless, Lifeless

The enemies are some of the most lifeless antagonists I’ve ever seen in a video game. Forget for a minute that many of them are weird clones of each other, like this dude in the ugly t-shirt and his apparent twin brother:

The big problem is that these enemies don’t do much of anything except stand around and wait to die.

What you see in the above screen is five enemies standing still as statues. They don’t move, they don’t patrol, they don’t have any kind of animations whatsoever. Once you get close enough, they spring into life, but before that they look like what they are, which are human-shaped targets. You feel like you’re fighting mannequins instead of people.

Here’s another shot of enemies literally waiting to die.

These five dudes crouch there, motionless, until you come close enough for their AI routines to activate. Seeing this over and over really kills the suspension of disbelief you need to get into the game.

Decisions, Decisions

My Friend Pedro makes some very odd design decisions, especially in the last level, when the game stops being a shooter and turns into a puzzle platformer:

Turning the game into a puzzle platformer?

I didn’t really mind this, but I found it odd. This whole game is built around running and gunning, and yet here are whole sections of levels where you go through without firing a single shot.

A second odd decision was the inclusion of a sniper rifle:

Again, I didn’t mind this, as the sniper rifle became my favorite weapon in the game. However, this weapon, which allows you to pick off enemies calmly and safely from a distance, negates the up-close brutality that is this game’s calling card. Why create a weapon that flies in the face of your game’s play style?

Funny, But Not Ha-Ha Funny

This is a game about a murderous psychopath who takes orders from a talking banana. Therefore, you’re probably expecting a lot of humor. And…well…

There are a lot of attempts at humor, but they often fall flat. It’s as if the game knows that it’s supposed to be funny, and tries really hard to check that box, but it just doesn’t work.

And there is one part of the game that also tries to be funny but just comes off as wtf-am-I-watching weird. I won’t tell you the whole context of the level, but here’s a preview:

Do you wanna get weird?

The lack of effective humor is a missed opportunity.

Into the Trailer

If you’ve seen trailers for this game, you’re probably expecting to hear Pedro talk with a smooth Latino accent and to see awesome animated cutscenes. Spoiler alert: neither of those things happen.

An awesome animated cutscene from the trailer that never happens in game.

This creates an awkward situation where the trailer tells you that this is one kind of game, but when you download it you get something else. I have no idea who created this trailer, but it feels as if they understood the specialness of the game’s concept more than the devs did.

Length

This is a very short game. Most players report beating it in under four hours, though if you’re really plodding along you can stretch it to five. I think it took me about four hours to beat, although I wasn’t really paying attention to the clock. There’s not much reason to play the game once you’re done, unless you’re trying to get S-rank on all levels, so paying twenty bucks for a three-to-five hour game can feel like a questionable investment. Your mileage may vary.

Visuals

Maybe it’s because of the Switch’s lower-resolution screen, but this game simply doesn’t look as good on the Switch as it does on the trailers. I can’t make a comparison between the Switch version and other versions as I don’t have any other copies of the game.

I can say this: the graphics aren’t great. This game looks like what it is: a Unity 3D game made on a very limited budget. The main character looks okay, and you really can’t mess up a floating banana, but the low-poly models of the other enemies and key characters just look rough. I know that it’s an indie game, but indie games with lackluster visuals are slowly going the way of the dodo. My Friend Pedro looks good enough to get your attention, but only just.

Sound

Musically, the game is fine. The soundtrack consists of electronic music that’s pretty catchy and that fits the game well. You won’t find them all that memorable, but they get the job done.

The sound design is decent as well. All the weapons sound fine, and other effects (like the cars in the motorcycle sequence) sound good as well. Again, nothing here will really stand out, but it works in the moment.

The only part I don’t like about the design is the lack of voice acting, and again that’s only because the trailer had me expecting it. Pedro does most of the talking in the game, but the only sounds he makes are Banjo Kazooie – like mumbles.

Final Verdict

My Friend Pedro is a good game that could have been a great one. Given how well the game is selling (Devolver Digital announced on Twitter that it’s their biggest launch of all time), it’s more than possible that there will be a sequel. Any sequel to this game should be well-financed, and that extra money will, in theory, help create the version of My Friend Pedro that currently only exists in the trailers. Those who have already seen the end of the game’s story will wonder how on earth this game could have a sequel, but when your protagonist is a murderous lunatic who takes advice from a banana, anything is possible.

Therefore, I give My Friend Pedro by DeadToast Entertainment and Devolver Digital my score of

Click the score to find more games ranked ‘7’.

If a banana told you to shoot people would you do it? You know you would you crazy son of a ****. Tell you what you thought of My Friend is Pedro and if you think it’s lived up to the hype. Let us know on Twitter or come and join the SIF Discord.

Whilst you’re here make sure to check out Musume’s review of Katana ZERO.

Like this: Like Loading...