There's a lot to like in Hotel Barcelona, a roguelike from veteran developers SWERY and SUDA51: a cursed hotel, the spirit of a serial killer, a timid U.S. Marshall out for revenge, copious amounts of blood (not much gore), and levels inspired by classic horror movies. However, a handful of rough spots keep Hotel Barcelona from hitting its full potential.

The game starts with a quick narrative intro. You are Justine, a U.S. Marshal on an escort mission. An accident occurs, the car is trashed, and everyone else is dead. You wake up at the titular Hotel Barcelona, where you learn that you share your body with the spirit of a serial killer (Dr. Carnival). An evil witch, who was also responsible for the death of your father, has trapped you in the hotel along with other unfortunate souls. If you want to survive, you'll have to embrace Dr. Carnival's skills and eliminate a band of serial killers before facing the witch.

If that sounds like a bit much, don't worry. The plot and dialogue could use a bit of polish (it seems like something may have gotten lost in translation/localization), but the story isn't the real draw. There are threads of an intriguing morality play, but it feels more like a first draft with an amusing set of background characters than a fully fleshed-out story. Tim the Closet Monster is awesome, though. I'd hang with Tim anytime.

The core of Hotel Barcelona is the three-level loop that has you fighting off bad guys, defeating bosses, and using your new loot to level up and purchase new weapons. It's not an overly complex game design, but it does a solid job of keeping you engaged — once you've managed to level up a bit.

Hotel Barcelona's biggest issue is that it doesn't provide a smooth on-ramp for new players. Even on the easiest difficulty setting, the early game is rough because you haven't unlocked any abilities yet. Justine's skill tree isn't optional. It's also not about specialization. Almost all of the skills are necessary to fully utilize Justine as a killing machine. When you start the game, even your basic combos are locked behind the skill tree. As a result, the early game feels like grinding rather than building up experience.

Parrying is one of the key game mechanics in Hotel Barcelona. It's one of the first skills you can unlock, but it starts with a very short window. You can upgrade it three times to extend the parry window. This is a perfect example of something that shouldn't be locked behind a skill tree. It's a mechanic that is so core to the game, it is part of your post-fight performance rating after each boss encounter. Once you get Justine's skills unlocked, you can finally start playing Hotel Barcelona as it was meant to be played.

Weapons, like skills, are unlocked and leveled up as you play. Because leveled-up weapons are stronger, it's very likely that most players will stick with the initial loadout until they reach the endgame, where it's easier to quickly level up a new weapon. Much like unlocking the skill tree, once your weapons are fully leveled up, running through Hotel Barcelona feels like a proper power fantasy. It's a night-and-day difference from what each weapon feels like when you first start using it.

Short-range weapons consist of knives, axes, and buzzsaws, while long-range weapons include handguns, shotguns, flamethrowers, and projectiles (like Molotov cocktails). The base versions are purchased from an in-game vendor. Every time you defeat a boss, your equipped weapons gain a level until they're fully maxed out. While there is some strategy to choosing weapons based on the buffs they can apply, I usually made my choices out of comfort rather than optimization. The flamethrower is just fun to use.

Hotel Barcelona's optional casino is run by a Tim Curry fan who looks like he watches "Rocky Horror Picture Show" every night. The entrance to the casino is randomly placed each time you start a new level. The casino allows you to spend keys on reward chests and spend money on a chance to upgrade your weapons or change their attributes. Chance is the operative word. More often than not, it seemed like I would lose at the casino rather than winning. This can make the costume achievement a bit of a grind because you'll need to keep opening reward chests to get them all.

Each of the three main levels is designed with multiple alternate sections, so your specific path through the level changes based on which exit door you select. Each exit door has various properties — restoring health, providing a stat bonus, or a reward challenge — that are applied when you move to the next section. This would ideally encourage players to experiment and change up their path on every run, based on what bonuses would serve you best at the time. Unfortunately, this choice is directly opposed by the desire to preserve your phantoms.

Phantoms are one of Hotel Barcelona's neatest tricks, in part because they initially seem like a gimmick. Once you level up Justine a bit, phantoms can be an extremely powerful addition to your run through a level.

The best way to describe a phantom is to think of them like a ghost car in a racing game — only these ghosts can interact with the world. Phantoms always follow the exact same path you did when you were initially controlling them, so if they attack empty space, nothing happens. If an enemy happens to be at the business end of a phantom's weapon, it causes full damage. You can even mix and match weapons between Justine and your phantoms, since your phantoms are just a replay. For example, I used a flamethrower on a few runs and then switched to a shotgun. My phantoms were laying down flaming justice, while I used the shotgun to finish off the damaged opponents.

Because they are recordings and cannot adapt to new circumstances, you lose your phantoms if you take a different route through a level. As a result, there is a strong incentive to keep to the same path versus mixing it up and getting creative. It's a case where the game's various systems almost seem to be in opposition. While it can lead to some forced choices (do you opt for the path that keeps your phantoms in play, or do you take the door that restores 50% of your health at the cost of all your phantoms?), I almost always opted to keep my phantoms. They are a fantastic advantage when facing off against Hotel Barcelona's bosses.

Perhaps the biggest issue holding back Hotel Barcelona is the fact that you cannot cancel out of an existing action. Games like this rely on precision controls because you need to be extremely nimble to avoid enemies while attacking and parrying. For the most part, Hotel Barcelona works, but it sometimes feels like you're fighting the controls rather than the enemies in the game. It's not all the time, but it's often enough to be frustrating. The same can be said for the lack of an invincibility window when Justine takes damage. As a result, she can take multiple hits without being able to recover or respond. With enough playtime (and by disabling VSYNC in the video options), you can account for most of these issues, so it's not a big problem for genre fans, but it is something that's likely to turn off casual players.

In addition to the three main levels, Hotel Barcelona also includes a fourth final level and three optional boss fights that must be unlocked. Unlocking the optional boss fights is creatively done. One is unlocked by beating an in-game pinball game. A second is unlocked by beating a challenging obstacle course in a bonus level. The third is unlocked by watching in-game VHS tapes for clues and then playing a retro-inspired minigame and entering the correct password. Once you unlock the optional boss fights, you can return to them whenever you choose, which makes for a quick way to level up your weapons.

All of the levels and bosses are inspired by classic horror movies and their associated tropes. Some are more obvious than others, such as Jason from the "Friday the 13th" franchise, Sil from "Species," and Samara from "The Ring." Alien eggs and entombed humans are background references to the "Alien" franchise. Horror fans should enjoy identifying all of the different references and homages to their favorite films.

For those who appreciate an extra challenge, Hotel Barcelona's bondage mode allows you to selectively disable certain abilities before you start a run. For example, you can prohibit melee attacks or disable dodging. As a reward for completing the challenges, you unlock additional weapons. There are two achievements associated with trying bondage mode, but it is otherwise completely optional. You don't need to play it to complete the main path through the game.

While most of Hotel Barcelona is single-player, it offers both co-op and PvP options. Co-op allows you to join another player's game as a phantom, while PvP allows you to invade another player's game as a bad phantom, with the goal of killing the player. On the surface, it sounds like a fun mechanic, but in practice, the invasion mechanic could use some work. For one, matchmaking can be rough because there is no party system. I sometimes waited upwards of 10 minutes to find another player. The bigger issue is the lack of level normalization. I found myself being invaded by much stronger players who were almost impossible to defend against. When I was the one doing the invading, the same was true. It wasn't usually a challenge to take out the player I was invading. It would have been much more fun if we were evenly matched.

That lack of fairness makes the invasion mechanic feel pointless outside of achievement hunting. I found myself switching my Xbox to offline mode simply to avoid being invaded.

Hotel Barcelona has a handful of flaws, but if you're willing to stick it out, there is a gem of a game underneath the rough surface. While I would've liked to see more polish and a few more levels to explore, the core gameplay loop is solid. I continually went back to Hotel Barcelona for "just one more run," even after I'd beaten the main story. It's also a good choice for busier gamers with limited play time, since a single run can be completed in a 15-minute setting. Hotel Barcelona is not a game for everyone, but if you're a fan of cheaper, quirky titles (like me), this is your jam.

Score: 7.0/10