Gori: Cuddly Carnage is putting all of its cards on the table. In marketing, it shows players a game that promises gore and viscera splattered across a cutesy canvas - hyperviolence, platforming challenges, and a desolate setting. Games that tote violence as their key factor have been coming thick and fast for years now, but the recent DOOM reboot series has proven that streamlining is possible, even in a genre that could just as easily have grown stale.

Now, as Gori steps onto the scene, it intends to deliver on its varied inspirations to make a platforming, high-speed, high-octane violence simulator splattered in slime and gore. As Screen Rant took to Gori's opening levels, it became clear that the game is living up to its name, though it might need time to clean up an act that's as messy as its aesthetic in places.

Cutesy, Chaotic Visuals In A Spattered Mess

Cute Characters Designed As Grim, Pained Horrors

It's hard to ignore Gori's multi-faceted visual style, especially when poking around in its strange world. The game takes place in a world ravaged by deadly Ultra Pets, animal replicas designed by Cool-Toyz Inc that would never need feeding or bathroom breaks. Infected by a maddening virus, it's up to Gori to take them down, equipped with a bladed hoverboard and penchant for violence. It's a simple concept, but frankly, that's all a game that demands sheer brutality needs, especially when the goal of Gori: Cuddly Carnage is to hack and slash through as many nasty baddies as Angry Demon Studio can filter onto the screen.

This combination of adorable creatures and hyper-detail offers a horrific tinge to everything, and though the neon that bathes Gori's cyberpunk cities might rob them of their chance to make the player sincerely afraid, the design of the beasts are genuinely fantastic. The game's visuals subvert the cuteness it seems to be aiming for, but in doing so, it wipes cuteness in its entirety out. Not even Gori himself is free of this - Cuddly Carnage is grim and foul.

There's an injection of comic book aesthetics here, too, as the game defers to page-turning flashback storytelling in its cutscenes and onomatopoeic blasts of SPLAT! and SLASH! as Gori carves through foes. This adds even further to the gonzo visuals of the game, and though it sometimes amounts to overwhelming visual noise, the bright flashes of combat make the game what it is, making Goria purposefully overwhelming battling experience. Bosses are genuinely grim, too, with the main antagonist's half-removed face and menacing, toothy grin making him ripe for a cameo in a player's nightmares.

Hacking & Slashing Gameplay Across Multiple Levels

Slippery Slashing & Desperate Dashes

The key to Gori's success is, of course, its gameplay. Thanks to its promises to put power in players' paws, reflected in its dramatic trailers, a lot rides on its actual moment-to-moment experience. Players are tasked with carving through thirty-to-forty-minute levels set in abandoned cities and stretches of giant arcade machines reaching out of the ground, tested by hordes of unicorns and horrific monsters along the way. Gameplay intends to be fast, slick, snappy and satisfying, giving players the chance to carve through foes and feel like a furry powerhouse.

Gori strikes a middle ground between high speeds and sheer halts by nullifying extremes on either end - Gori will always be moving because that's simply what's most fun, but boosting and traversing can still feel slightly unsatisfying. In large combat arenas, getting around can feel like time wasted with such high-paced intentions, and special moves that you'll perform in attacks can feel a little loose. This is a problem that is solved by locking onto foes, but it's a system that can't quite intuit what you're trying to lock onto at all times, meaning you're often better off without.

Taking on many weaklings is far more exciting than a few toughies, which is frustrating in a game that seems keen to show you its many new Unicorn varieties.

Escape chases and platforming sequences are where Gori shines thanks to fun level design even in spite of some clunky grinding mechanics, and smaller arenas fighting less brutal foes makes you feel like the most powerful cat who ever lived. But as the stakes rise, foes become immune to certain attacks, leading to a frustrating lack of combat variety, and standing in one place wailing on a mini-boss defeats the purpose of your hyper-powered hoverboard. Taking on many weaklings is far more exciting than a few toughies, which is frustrating in a game that seems keen to show you its many new Unicorn varieties.

Story - Unnecessary or Infallible For A Horror Game?

Games This Violent Don't Often Put As Much Pressure On Their Narratives

A game like Gori: Cuddly Carnage would be expected to forego any kind of narrative intricacies thanks to its genre's willingness to cast them aside, but with a world this fascinating, it takes the opportunity to explain how Gori found himself on a search for his owner with only a sweary hoverboard and monotone AI for help. The game puts a lot of pressure on this story, as trying to skip any cutscenes pertaining to Gori's past will lead to your hoverboard F.R.A.N.K trying to stop you, but for the most part, you can do without it. The characters are here now, and as the fun of Gori lies in its hyperviolence, it's not entirely as crucial as the game would have you believe.

As a small unit of main characters, there's pressure for each of them to be charming - but as F.R.A.N.K yaps through the game, yelling censored expletives as he goes, he runs the risk of becoming irritating. The silliness novelty wears off quickly in this world awash with absurdity, and depending on your tastes and humor, interactions between F.R.A.N.K and Gori could become grating as they fill the silence with meows and profanities. The game's characters could be your friends, or they could directly oppose Gori's experience.

Final Thoughts on Gori: Cuddly Carnage

Gori Offers Violent Release, But With Some Growing Pains

Gori: Cuddly Carnage tries to do a lot, and for everything it nails, there's another facet of gameplay that needs refinement. The game comes packed with a thunderous soundtrack that fuses hard-hitting Drum N Bass with sweaty guitar riffs that douse the game in a great atmosphere, but frustrating dialogue, slippery combat and an unsatisfying boost mechanic push against it. It's hard to say yet if Gori is trying to be too much at once - but a look at this early build indicates it might be.

There is still time for these improvements to be made before the game launches, and if they are, Gori could be a real darling for players craving some ultraviolence before the launch of DOOM: The Dark Ages. There are plenty of great ideas waiting in Gori: Cuddly Carnage, and if they can be massaged into comfort, then it could be the next game built for total catharsis. Failing that, it could need some catharsis itself.

Screen Rant was invited to attend a Gori: Cuddly Carnage preview event for the purpose of this article.