Nitro Family

A couple's little son has been kidnapped by an evil corporation. They go on a long journey that covers most continents to find their son. This is the plot of Nitro Family, a Korean shooter that turns 20 this year. I bought it in a supermarket in 2000s. Not having finished it in 2000s (because it's long and dumb and you don't know when it all ends), I finished it in 2013. Now I'm almost done, I'm on the final level called Las Vegas. It took me months to get to Las Vegas.

The game is very very long. There are about 7 levels with 20 locations. Some locations are unique, some are copypasted, but they're designed pretty thoroughly. Outdoors locations are scenic and intricate. Inside locations can be copypasted and claustrophobic. There's a level inside Hoover Dam that is claustrophobic and nightmarish.

You're an armed man and your wife Maria sits on your shoulders. She sits on you all the way. The only thing she can do is cut throats. You can get close to the enemy and Maria will cut its throat. Sometimes she does some other stuff and your role is to defend her from enemies, but that happens about 4 times.

I think the whole game is marriage propaganda. They're so wholesome and love their kid and their family bonds are strong. Some decorations on locations are weirdly sexual, but they have no time to fuck, all they do is collect HP and kill. The gameplay is this primitive. It's just neverending murders.

Probably the only interesting aspect of gameplay is adrenaline rush mode, which you enter after killing too many guards or survivng after serious damage. For about 30 seconds you go into slow-mo where all your shots bring 2x damage. This mode is important in bossfights, you also can jump very high after adrenaline rush. On some levels you can sniff gas that makes you jump incredibly high.
Talking about substances, you can come across a dangerous drug named "Happy Family" which you shouldn't take.

The enemies are only partially people. Sometimes they're weird mutant monkeys. When they're people, they are corporation's mutant guards, and they look dirty and drugged. The corporation sells unique patented drugs worldwide, drugs are a recurring theme here. Zombies first occur on the final Nevada level, where they look like unarmed alcoholics. But they vomit at you and vomit is harmful. It's hard to kill them, and if Maria cuts their head, they don't really die. There are giant monsters that look pretty terrifying, like giant baby-zombies. They're low at IQ and you can't kill them until the middle of the game. Most of the times you just run from them. The most unpleasant enemies are drones because it's hard to kill them.
Some enemies are cloned, some appear realistically and some just materialize from thin air. But they all are grotesque and funny.
There's also a girl named Lisa, who looks like a drugged bimbo popping up at every location. She is the only living creature in the whole game who doesn't harm you, as she sells you weapons. There are five slots for weapons and seven weapons total. She also provides advices that are useless.

The bosses are all beatable in medium difficulty mode, however I had a hard time on one level where the bossfight was with two human bosses in some mecha machinery.

The first level is somewhere in South America. When the game gets to Asia it gets scenic, but also difficult. There's one mountain landscape in China where I was stuck for 3 days. After China, there's a level that's located in Russian Vladivostok, appropriately called Bloodivostok (that's where drones first appear). This level is hell. It takes place around Vladivostok's railway station which I googled, it's designed pretty similar in the game.

There's no room to breathe, it's all just action with few cut scenes. The couple often communicates with Louis, head of evil corp who sits in HQ in Las Vegas. As I finished the game before I remember they get their kid (who is named like Indian or Native American), but I haven't finished it yet as I'm writing this. I think the game is very good and addictive but it's so bloody, it's probably not good for my psyche.