What Are The Best Games Like Katana Zero?

Katana Zero released on April 18, 2019, and rocked players with its gameplay that featured the ability to slow time, rewind time, and even deflect bullets with a samurai sword. It was everything a samurai fan could ever want, delivering on an epic and thrilling experience.

But as a fan of Katana Zero’s awesome mechanics and intriguing story and setting, you may be wanting more. While DLC is planned for the game (and an implied sequel), it is unclear when either will be released. For players looking for more games like Katana Zero in gameplay, style, setting or all three, here are a few fun games that share these qualities with it.

10. RONIN

RONIN Launch Trailer

Ronin follows a motorcycle helmet-wearing, katana-wielding warrior seeking to assassinate a mysterious group of very wealthy looking figures. The game is a one-shot-kill side scrolling action game with a twist: turn based combat that revolves around leaping and swinging off of walls and ceilings. You must choose wisely when to strike and when to evade in order to claim victory. 

Why this game is great:

• A fresh take on the genre that leads to interesting scenarios. Levels are a combo of a combat puzzle and reacting to the enemies' plans.
• While the art style isn’t particularly impressive, it is tight and appealing in its simplicity.
• Gameplay that rewards players for learning and being creative with the physics and mechanics of the game. 

9. RUINER

RUINER - Boss Bounties (Trailer)

Ruiner is a quasi-top-down shooter where your main weapons are the ones you take from your enemies’ corpses. It takes place in a cyberpunk style city complete with filthy streets, neon signs, and a main character whose face is essentially a television screen that occasionally reads “KILL YOU.” You’ll go on blood fueled futuristic rampages through back alleys and sci-fi buildings of all kinds in an attempt to gain your freedom from the forces controlling your fate.

Why this game is great:

• Combat flows well and is satisfying as you blast and smash through enemies with shotguns, plasma rifles, and the like.
• There are plenty of skills and upgrades to acquire, allowing the player to choose from many options in combat.
• The cyberpunk setting is a great fit for the game’s setting and adds an awesome flavor to it.

8. Dead Cells

Dead Cells Release Date Announcement Trailer

Dead Cells is a roguelike 2D action platformer that revolves around the arsenal of weapons available in the game. It features everything from katanas to hammers to lightning bolts to grenades, and so much more, each with their own unique flavor. 

As the player you will dash, climb and roll through a variety of environments, like poisonous sewers, a town ripped through by a plague and a crumbling clock tower that touches the clouds while you slash past each enemy in your path… or run away from them in a desperate attempt to live.

Why this game is great:

• A huge number of unique and awesome weapons that are satisfying to use and offer a variety of playstyles and strategies.
• Tight controls that are easy to learn; you will be weaving your way through the levels in no time. 
• A very simple yet satisfying upgrade system that rewards you for almost any amount of progress you make on each run of the game.  

7. Furi

Furi - Bernard - Official Gameplay

Furi is an energetic boss gauntlet game starring a lone samurai-type protagonist… who also has a gun. 

The player will fight their way through boss after boss, each with a strange yet intriguing and cool design and fight unique to them- no two feel alike, and there are no regular enemies in between. Everyone is a boss. Your job is to kill each one and unravel the mystery of your imprisonment with nothing but your sword, your gun, and your skills.

Why this game is great:

• Gameplay that is tricky to master but has tight controls and is incredibly rewarding when you succeed. Each boss keeps it fresh with their own fight styles.
• An art and animation style featuring bright colors, visually stimulating and appealing locales, and distinctive and quirky bosses.
• A semi-forgiving fight system that gives you multiple chances to succeed at each stage of the boss makes the game less frustrating but still challenging. 

6. Celeste

Celeste Launch Trailer

Celeste follows a girl and her supernatural adventures while trying to climb to the peak of a snowy mountain. It’s a beautiful platformer that hinges on the player using their available movement tools to solve environmental puzzles, all the while tempting them with little extra challenges that test the player’s ability to be creative with their skills.

Why this game is great:

• Beautiful visuals that just make you want to stop and take it all in.
• Addicting gameplay that’s both incredibly fun and challenging.
• Does a lot with a simple premise and controls- each level has a lot of variation that keeps gameplay from being stale.

5. Hotline Miami

Hotline Miami - Can You Keep A Secret? (Trailer)

In the psychedelic, top down, insta-death, super bloody shooter that is Hotline Miami, you play as a nameless hitman of sorts, gunning down rooms of thugs at the behest of an equally mysterious voice on the phone. 

Each level is like a puzzle that you have to solve with guns and other random weapons that you find. Sometimes your attack can be carefully planned out, but at times you may have to run in guns blazing to get the job done. 

Why this game is great:

• Combat is satisfying, rewarding, and engaging.
• The plot, while elusive in nature, is intruiging.
• The game has a ton of personality in its style that reaches even as far as the scoring screen. Everything is brightly colored and wobbly, as if the background itself is on hard drugs.

4. Heat Signature

Heat Signature Launch Trailer

Heat Signature sees the player zipping through space and boarding enemy ships in order to complete various objectives ranging from stealing some cargo or hijacking the entire ship. The game provides you with various high-tech gadgets and weapons to achieve the end goal of liberating the galaxy from a war raging between four factions.

Why this game is great:

• Quick and fun missions ensure there is always something to do.
• Cool gadgets and guns allow you to get creative while hijacking ships.
• An awesome premise that makes rewards satisfying, whether they are from stealing a ship’s cargo, buying new weapons, or capturing a space station for yourself.

3. Gunpoint

Gunpoint Gameplay Demo

Gunpoint is a noir themed game starring a spy taking freelance jobs to break into high security buildings. It combines 2D side scrolling action with puzzle elements, allowing the player to literally rewire levels to reach their goal. 

Why this game is great:

• Rewiring levels allows the player to complete levels in very creative and unique ways, choosing their own approach and playstyle.
• Beyond just rewiring levels, there is an arsenal of classic spy gadgets at your disposal. 
• An upgrade system allows players to emphasize the skills they use in levels and customize their gameplay experience. 

2. Axiom Verge

Axiom Verge Trailer

Axiom Verge is a modern Metroidvania game (resembling even more so the genre-titular Metroid) that boasts an array of interesting weapons. The player will explore the depths of a strange and almost haunting sci-fi environment as they blast through abominable aliens, robots, and robot-aliens. 

Why this game is great:

• A super cool design theme and style that permeates the weapons, enemies and setting. 
• A variety of weapons to choose from while blasting aliens away.
• A special glitch gun that adds a unique touch to the game, allowing you to interact with the enemies and certain pieces of the environment in a new way. 

1. Mark of the Ninja: Remastered

Mark of the Ninja: Remastered Launch Trailer

Mark of the Ninja sees the player take control of a ninja with tattoos that grant him heightened senses and stealthily take on an entity threatening his dojo. 

The game emphasizes stealth and rewards players for keeping to the shadows; but the choice of whether to assassinate everyone in your path or pass through without a single trace is up to the player. Swing from lamposts to scaffoldings across urban skylines as you slip past guards- or introduce them to your blade.

Why this game is great:

• Smooth and super stylized visuals with fluid movement that makes kills even more satisfying.
• Lots of player choice between the tools and techniques that you use and the way that you play (i.e. choosing to kill everyone, no one, or some people).
• Rewards the player for being stealthy and planning out their movements, like a true ninja.