First-person games tend to be limited in variety. The vast majority of them are shooters, and for good reason – first-person shooters are easy to make and modify (compared to other types of first-person games). Shooters also are mostly easy to play, in the sense that many of them share a similar control scheme. Some first-person games try to bend the shooter formula a bit, but few overhaul it entirely.

Zeno Clash is one of those games that try to redefine the first-person game experience, and while it’s problematic in some critical areas, it’s got a good amount of innovation and entertainment value. Zeno Clash is billed as a first-person fighting game. First-person games that focus on close combat are not new – Mirror’s Edge, the Condemned series, and the first Bushido Blade game come to mind as other examples – but there’s been few enough such games that Zeno Clash seems like a breath of fresh air. In Zeno Clash, you play Ghat, a fugitive who’s been falsely accused of murdering the leader of his clan, called Father-Mother.

At first the plot may seem like a standard “clear your name” story, but…well, as you might have figured out by the murder victim being named “Father-Mother,” let’s just say it gets really weird, really fast. Sometimes it gets confusing, but at least it’s compelling enough to give you a good context to punch lots of fools in the face. Backing up the weird plot are even weirder visuals – let it not be said that Zeno Clash doesn’t have a unique visual style.

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