Serial Cleaners: The game about cleaning up behind Tarantino

Created: 08/26/2022, 17:02

By: Janik Boeck

Serial Cleaners puts you in the shoes of a mafia fixer in 90's New York.

The game draws inspiration from Tarantino.

You clean up behind him.

Cologne – With all the big AAA titles coming out, it's easy to forget the small games.

Sometimes real pearls escape you.

Serial Cleaners is one of them.

With a unique art style, a well-mixed soundtrack and ingeniously simple gameplay, the indie title was convincing in the preview at Gamescom 2022, as ingame.de from IPPEN.MEDIA reveals.

Serial Cleaners: why make it complicated when it can be ingenious?

What is Serial Cleaners about?

Serial Cleaners is the sequel to the 2017 indie hit Serial Cleaner.

The title alone is proof that naming video game sequels can be both simpler and more creative than simply clapping a number after the name.

As in the first part, Serial Cleaners is basically about cleaning up chaotic crime scenes in New York in the 1990s for the mafia.

Serial Cleaners: A crime scene is in an apartment © 505 Games

That's what's special about Serial Cleaners:

Unlike in the first part, this time you don't just play one, but four characters.

Bob, the Putzmeister from the predecessor, is back.

Next to him Vip3er, Lati and Psycho swing the mop.

All characters have their own traits and special features that need to be considered and used tactically when cleaning up murder scenes.

You have to be careful in different levels that the pole duck doesn't get you.

Want more Gamescom 2022?

Right this way

Stray Blade – Souls games are finally becoming more accessible

Blacktail preview

Park Beyond - amusement park without borders

USK doesn't care about Dead Island 2 - Exclusive interview

Serial Cleaners is inspired by Tarantino and other great filmmakers of the '90s.

The soundtrack is also mixed together from music of this decade.

The art style then gives the whole package the final touch – also inspired by the look of old film rolls.

This, coupled with the intuitive controls, results in a game that is both simple and awesome.

Serial Cleaners: The Mafia Fixers of the '90s - Covering up crime can be fun

It's disturbingly satisfying:

every crime scene in Serial Cleaners has its own quirks that make the level tricky.

You have to use the skills of the Serial Cleaners cleverly and tactically in order not to get caught.

Frighteningly, cleaning up a crime scene that Tarantino couldn't have made bloodier is unsettlingly satisfying.

Serial Cleaners: The mess is about to become more visible in the snow © 505 Games

Psycho, for example, saws up the remains lying around in a snow level with a chainsaw and throws them into the nearby choppers for branches because he thinks: That's the least that's left.

But you don't necessarily have to put the parts in.

You also have the option of sinking them from the 3-point line in true Steph Curry fashion.

Then you forget that you have to clean up the mess afterwards.

But it's not bad at all, because it's a lot of fun after all.