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Killing Room - TV Tropes

  • ️Wed Feb 19 2025

Killing Room (Video Game)

Don't mind the smell, it's just the burning flesh of the previous contestant from the second floor.

Killing Room is very cruel reality show from 22nd century that uses human suffering as entertainment for rich people. Trust us, it is really funny, at least for the audience.

But the players, on the other hand... should you complete the game and find the last exit, shall happily walk away with the ultimate cash prize of 1 billion dollars.

If you survive.

Killing Room is a First-Person Shooter developed by Alda Games, the company's foray into the FPS genre (and the gaming industry in general), using a premise inspired by the arcade classic Smash TV, but with gameplay in first-person.

Set in 2150, the titular "Killing Game" is the highest-rated reality show of all time, one where contestants consisting of mercenaries, soldiers, police personnel, bounty hunters and all-round badasses in general, attempts to infiltrate a high-security tower filled with assorted mechanical monstrosities and ascend one floor after another for a prize of a billion dollars at it's peak.

On October 20, 2150, one man sets out to make a difference.

  • Blatant Item Placement: Possibly justified due to the premise (it's a reality show where you're actively competing for your life), but you tend to come across closed fridges and lockers between stages which contains health pickups, armor, extra ammo, and assorted goodies before you enter the next area. The game even reminds you "don't forget to collect the special items".
  • Cephalothorax: The first boss, after dealing with the low-level Flying Face enemies populating the early floors, is a giant floating face with dual Arm Cannon for limbs. Later on you fight a Two-Faced version of the same boss who periodically flips its face front and back while battling you.
  • Deadly Game: The titular "Killing Game", if the title doesn't give you a hint already. You sign up, enter the tower and transcend one level after another to complete the game for a massive cash reward.
  • Defeat Equals Explosion: The game has one death animation granted for all enemies, including bosses - keeling over when their health is spent, and then exploding.
  • Early-Installment Weirdness: Being Alda's first game, it runs on realistic, 3D animation before the company adapts to Polygonal Graphics in their later games - their later entries in the First-Person Shooter genre, like World War Polygon: WW2 Shooter, The Walking Zombie and The Walking Zombie 2 has graphics looking nothing like those in Killing Game. It also runs entirely on an Excuse Plot before later games would provide at least some backstory to justify all the action.
  • Excuse Plot: You have guns, you must kill everything to proceed, you get a massive monetary reward if you make it to the top. What plot?
  • Exploding Barrels: Shows up in some rooms, where you can shoot them to wipe out groups of enemies together. Thanks to the high-tech setting, you can even grab and throw barrels before shooting them for making a strategically-placed explosion.
  • Feed It a Bomb: The Sand Worm monster can be taken down easily using this trick - the room it's fought in conveniently contains numerous barrels, and since you can use your tech to lift and throw objects, you simply lift a barrel and aim for the mouth the moment the worm sticks it's head out, and shoot when it snatches the barrel with its maw.
  • Flying Face: Most of the game's early enemies are hovering robotic faces, who can spit projectiles from their mouths.
  • Guns Akimbo: You can wield two Uzi at the same time. And it turns out each Uzi contains two magazine slots by default, so you're firing with four times More Dakka than normal Uzi in conventional FPS games.
  • Hand Blast: The humanoid enemies attacks you by firing beams from their hands a distance away.
  • It's All Upstairs From Here: You kill your way from top to bottom. Level transitions are elevators for good measure.
  • Kill Enemies to Open: The very premise of the game - every single stage takes place in an enclosed room with only one exit, either filled with enemies or a boss (sometimes both), and you can only exit and proceed to a higher floor after killing everything that moves.
  • Master of Unlocking: Subverted - you can collect lockpicks made from wires, but you'll need to time the unlocking process lest if you end up breaking the pick.
  • Multiple Endings: The ending text which details your post-victory fate is different depending on on your Karma Meter, with about 5 variations (Very Bad, Bad, Neutral, Good, and Very Good). Do Well, But Not Perfect is in effect; you come out quite a bit worse in the Very Good ending compared to the Good or even Neutral endings.
  • One-Hit Polykill: A possible move you can perform on most enemies, since nearly every mook-grade opponent will explode after getting their health depleted. Wait for them to gather in a group and blow up one right in thee center, then watch the fireworks as the red words "DOUBLE KILL!" or "TRIPLE KILL!" pops up.
  • Sand Worm: One shows up as a boss... of the third floor. It's unexplained how did a tunneling monster pop up from beneath the earth when it's above ground level.
  • Snowlems: Subverted; the game isn't winter-themed, but there's a stage where all your enemies are robotic snowmen (with giant gaping maws filled with bloodied fangs) for some reason. It ends with a King Mook snowmen whose maw can blast you with a Freeze Ray.
  • Weaponized Offspring: The sand worm boss, after tunneling in and out of its area, will occasionally leave behind smaller (dog-sized) worm offspring that can also attack you.
  • A Winner Is You: Complete the top floor and you're rewarded by a giant neon "YOU ARE VICTORIOUS" against a black background... followed by a single paragraph detailing your post-victory aftermath and scrolling credits text.