City Hunter – PS5 Review

We’re on a strange run of retro ports with all sorts of unexpected games getting the re-release treatment on PS5, but City Hunter has to be one of the oddest yet. Originally released by Sunsoft in 1990, this run-and-gunner was only ever available for the TurboGrafx-16 (known as the PC Engine outside of America) and in Japanese.  Thankfully, this version adds a much-needed English translation.

The game was based on the classic manga series of the same name, a series of comic stories that ran from 1985 to 1991 before being collected in graphic novel volumes, before being adapted in an anime TV show, a couple of movies and this game.

You play as the series’ main protagonist, Ryo Saeba, a crime-fighter in Tokyo who is dedicated to taking down bad guys and chasing women. In the manga, he’s best known for his skill with firearms, and that plays a massive part in the game, as wherever you go, you’ll be shooting people almost constantly, especially on the game’s new ‘Hard’ mode, an addition for this port that substantially increases the enemy count.

The game is set across four levels (you can play the first three in any order, with the final level being unlocked after), and these all play much the same way. You run around a large scrolling area full of corridors and doors (doors that usually lead to more corridors), jumping and shooting your way through endless baddies. You’ll need to check every door because behind one of them will be the next thing you need – a key, a card, a conversation. Something that the game decides you need to progress, but never tells you what it is, and certainly never tells you where it might be.

This leads to you running around aimlessly, trying to stay aware of your position in the level as you assess which doors you can enter and whether there is anything of use inside. What’s even more annoying is that rooms that you’ve previously checked out can have objectives in them later on. It’s just super-archaic old-school design, really dated to the period when City Hunter was originally made.

This is made worse by the fact that enemies can, and often will, stand right by the door and attack you almost instantly when you emerge through it. It’s cheap and frustrating, but mercifully, this remake adds a quick rewind feature that lets you turn back time for a limited period (it seems like around 20-30 seconds of gameplay). That’s invaluable, especially on Hard, feeling more like a necessity than a cheat.  Especially as the Hard mode tacks on a new ending where you have five minutes to find the exit and beat the two ninjas guarding it; something that would be borderline impossible without rewinding. Thankfully, the game’s trophies aren’t locked out if you use it, which is a smart decision.

What’s less smart is the control setup. Despite having a control screen in the menu, the controls can’t be redefined and are almost comically bad in terms of how they’ve been configured. is your jump button, and that’s the right choice, but everything else is daft. for shooting (instead of ) is annoying, switching up weapons on the touch pad is ridiculous, and the settings menu is mapped to .

Despite all of this, the actual running and gunning is pretty good and feels better than a lot of console games from the period. It can be annoying when you’re trying to duck next to a ladder, which will get you damaged in no time in a firefight, and often jumping off of a platform will see you hitting the ceiling and doing a dead drop rather than the arc you were planning, but it plays okay when not having to negotiate the environment.

The most impressive thing about the game is the presentation. You get the usual beefy retro tunes, and they’re okay, if a little repetitive, but the visuals are actually pretty decent in terms of quality. The design isn’t great because the game is just so samey looking, but the visual quality is good, looking pretty close to how arcade games looked at the time.

Ultimately, the thing that sort of kills the game is that awful level design, though. It’s punishingly unhelpful and almost impossible to map out in your head, especially the final one that will see seven doors all placed next to yourself, a layout that crosses over and mirrors parts of itself and objectives that boil down to just finding the right door to open. With a guide, you could beat it in ten minutes; without one, you’ll find yourself running up and down identical corridors like you’re in some sort of retro version of Silent Hill.

It’s a shame because there is some enjoyment to be had from the game, but level design like this is an unwanted relic of retro videogaming, and gamers shouldn’t be forced to partake in it. That said, Romeo is a Dead Man did it, so that proves that bad level design still exists. At least in Japan.  And at £20 for what is a barely enhanced ROM, albeit with some museum features such as a music playlist and image gallery, it doesn’t really represent great value for money.