Hotel Barcelona is one of my favorite games of 2025. It’s also far from the best; everyone should try it, but a lot of players won’t like it. If its weirdness clicks, and you’re willing to overlook its faults, it’s among the most compelling and unforgettable roguelites of the year.
This is mainly due to its creators, who have a wild portfolio. Hotel Barcelona is developed by White Owls Inc., an Osaka-based indie outfit led by Hidetaka “SWERY” Suehiro, writer of cult classics Deadly Premonition and D4: Dark Dreams Don’t Die. He’s adapted an idea from Goichi “Suda51” Suda, the man behind Killer7, No More Heroes, and Lollipop Chainsaw. Hotel Barcelona is just as packed with weirdness, light horror, and pop-culture references, playing out like a 2D action-adventure platformer with elements of The Shining and Friday the 13th.
Let’s set the scene: you’re Justine, a federal marshal, staying at Hotel Barcelona on the border of West Virginia and Pennsylvania. You speak with imprisoned serial killer Dr Carnival, who lives in your head. You want the breakfast buffet, but you’re instead tasked with “taking care of all the vile criminals who’ve gathered here” and destroying the witch in charge, because she probably murdered your dad.
It could’ve all been so different. You initially collected the Exterminator, a cocaine-fuelled mercenary, and his girlfriend to do the job instead. However, as you approached the hotel, you crashed into cultists, the girl went the way of Christopher in The Sopranos, and the Exterminator was exterminated via blunt-force trauma.
Instead, it’s now on you to transform into your more sexualized and hyper-violent alter-ego Bernstein, who’s powered by Dr Carnival, to explore the grounds in and around Hotel Barcelona and kill evil foes. You’re supported by the likes of Tim, a monster in your closet who gives you upgrades; a bartender who sells you items for ears; and a Tim Curry fanatic who runs woefully unrewarding casinos in each horror-infested area. There’s also a haunted pinball table, which is nice.
Now that we all agree that this premise makes perfect sense, Hotel Barcelona doubles down on its fever dream by offering nothing in the way of a tutorial, aside from a half-hour introductory session that purposefully sets you up to fail. It serves up deceptively simple skirmishes before burying you with its first, baseball-themed boss — one that the game clearly wants no one to beat on their first attempt, thanks to zero upgrades or explainers, and a very obvious conversation that follows. Back to the start you go, and the difficulty immediately ramps up.
The lack of hand-holding makes Hotel Barcelona a bit research-heavy, as you scour menus to learn the controls and upgrade system, and figure out the rest on the fly. It thankfully follows a classic format: you have light and heavy melee attacks, a ranged weapon, and an ultimate attack; you can also block and parry, and double jump, which I only realized after half an hour. Each level is broken down into multiple room choices at the end of each mini-stage, offering its own buffs and bonuses: one-run ability upgrades, locations, or trials.
Like Balatro, Hotel Barcelona challenges you to try your hardest, fail, upgrade, try again, fail, and eventually succeed, after failing a dozen or more extra times. Its normal difficulty is well-balanced, though you soon consider dialing it down to easy to learn things on your own terms, especially as you grind its low-reward stages and learn its bosses, even though they don’t feel like the trials they’re clearly designed to be.
Hotel Barcelona’s combat and platforming mechanics aren’t especially refined; don’t expect the pinpoint precision you get from Hollow Knight: Silksong, Ori, or Super Meat Boy. It adopts a more hack-and-slash approach — fitting, given the story — that’s more focused on getting the job done, rather than killing with style.
Even though you unlock plenty of combos and moves along the way, chances are that you won’t really use most of them. Success is based on timing and prioritizing immediate or ranged threats, so you find yourself hammering the same buttons to take out multiple enemies from above, or juggling stronger foes. There’s still a lot of skill to this, especially as you rise through the four difficulty levels, but you’ll rarely consider more complex moves.
Similarly, Hotel Barcelona offers plenty of weapons and customization options. Still, I never found myself diverging from the initial loadout, because I’d already leveled them up, and I was too busy spending money on upgrades. The cost-benefit analysis just didn’t make them seem worth more than permanent buffs. I’m sure that better players than me will find an ultimate combo to help them smash Hotel Barcelona’s bosses for S grades on the highest difficulty, but I’m not that kind of player.
Platforming is not Hotel Barcelona’s strong point, but this isn’t immediately obvious — early stages and bosses are relatively linear, but as the game expands, focusing more on navigating areas against the clock, it becomes a little more stressful. Its lack of precision is underlined by Hotel Barcelona’s initial ending (no spoilers), which leans heavily into movement under pressure.
Yet for all these small issues, Hotel Barcelona isn’t short on style and surprises. Like Deadly Premonition and Killer7 before it, some things just don’t make sense. The story twists and turns to the point that it nearly collapses in on itself, but it’s consistently entertaining. It’s also rewarding to those willing to dig deeper into its world, with optional bosses — including a particularly brilliant retro throwback — and other unlockables.
Hotel Barcelona is all about style over substance. Give it an hour, and if it resonates, you won’t be able to put it down — even if it repeatedly insists on putting you down.
