While keeping its narrative legacy intact, in Serial Cleaners we greatly expand on the ideas of the original game, Serial Cleaner. Instead of presenting players with simple puzzle-like levels, we decided to present them with a set of tools and abilities to choose from – and improvise. Let your imagination run wild, and you’re sure to find your own way to cover up those nasty crimes!
Whether you want to sneak or sprint through a level, drag evidence around, or cut it to pieces, we have you covered. The game becomes much more open-ended with a host of contextual interactions and more involved law enforcement. While the overall complexity increased, the focus of our original game – wiping the scene – was still there and felt better than ever.
Four different cleaners mean four unique perspectives. While Bob relies on his good trading tricks, adapted and enhanced with the new environment, we bring to the game three new and different gameplay styles. There’s Psycho’s brute force, Lati’s agility and perception, and Vip3r’s cutting-edge tech skills. Each quest ties into one of the cleaners and unfolds part of their tumultuous story over the course of a decade.
Choosing the 90s as our time frame opened the door to being a exclusivist for us. Basquiat-style wacky street art mixed with our fresh take on hit crime thrillers, Tarantino classics and B-rated action movies allows us to portray the decade 90’s like a decade before – full of bright colors optimism… and dirt underneath it all.
All of this has to be accompanied by the right music. It’s the raw mismatch of ’90s punk, the sound of many of the genres that defined the end of the last century – from East Coast hip-hop, to industrial metal and a whole swath of electronic music. From Beastie Boys and Wu-Tang Clan, through Orbital and Prodigy, ending with Nine Inch Nails and Sets. Each of the cleaners represents a part of that musical tapestry, which makes their respective musical scores unique to them.
Such an eclectic aesthetic requires someone with expertise to understand what resonates with the 1990s. That’s why we partnered with the amazing Joshua Eustis (Telefon Tel Aviv). , Nine Inch Nails, Puscifer and others).
What makes Joshua’s work truly magical is that his ideas don’t just draw on existing popular hits, but try to recreate the ecosystem of musical styles rooted in different cultures. subculture of the 1990s. All styles are related and influence each other in distinctive ways, resulting in a diverse, distinct but unmistakable aesthetic of the decade – a Josh has only qualified to reproduce since then, he has lived it.
Serial Cleaners is a strange crime story with a bold twist on the savvy guy’s fantasy. As you clean up after NYC’s wrongdoers, you’ll get a glimpse of the sins that have become ingrained in the city’s tissues. But what is it? You are a professional, one of the best in the trade. You are here to solve the problem. No matter what the case, no matter the cost.
Isn’t that so?
Serial Cleaners launches on PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 4 on September 22.