In Hotline Miami, each stage begins in your house, where you take a cryptic call, stating which building you need to go to. After you leave your house, you are placed by the door of the building and given the choice of what animal mask to wear; each with its own unique abilities. Then in you go to wreak havoc; eradicating all gang members in the building. Over the course of the game, you are presented with different building layouts and over multiple floors.
There's various types of mêlée weapons and guns which you can use, in addition to your fists. Mêlée attacks are silent and won't attract nearby enemies, whereas guns are noisy and attracts attention. Guns have the range advantage though and can quickly dispatch numerous enemies within seconds. You can also throw the gun long distances to knock enemies to the ground. In a similar fashion, you can use doors to knock down enemies. When an enemy is lying on the ground, you must execute him to finish him off, otherwise they will get back up, pick up the nearest weapon, and come straight at you.
You have the ability to lock on to an enemy although I didn't like this feature. It is mapped to the middle mouse button which is my scroll-wheel. I also couldn't find a way of losing the lock other than killing the enemy.
Taking one hit is instant death, and this puts you back to the beginning of the floor. It becomes a game of trial and error, and as you begin to learn the level, you will quickly pick up the pace and play with less caution. Each floor can be completed in around 30 seconds if you know exactly what to do.
Killing enemies quickly gives you a combo which is good for those who like to compete on high scores. Mixing up your killing style in addition to the rapid pace is key to achieve this.
The violence is actually very brutal for a game so graphically simple. Blood is splattered with every kill, with a cringe-worthy thud as your character staves people's heads in. Sometimes, your victims are clinging on to life, trying to crawl away leaving a blood trail in their struggle.
Enemies have brilliant vision and will even detect you if they have their back turned to you (although in this case, you seem to have about a second advantage before they react). The AI is simple and predictable though, so often enemies can be lured out for easy kills. Enemies won't react to dead bodies, so they continue on their predictable patrol route regardless of suspicious activity.
Some levels have a boss fight which are often awkward and unfair. There's a set strategy to take down the bosses, and that isn't playing to the game's strengths.
After you defeat the final boss, there's some bonus missions where you have a knife and three throwing knives, and cannot pick up weapons. Again, this isn't playing to the game's strength which is giving you the freedom to choose how you defeat enemies and plot a path through the level. Instead, you end up trying to exploit the AI to gain the advantage, so these levels aren't fun at all.
The story is vague and pretty cryptic, but it seems the main character starts losing his sense of reality as he commits more massacres.
Although the music is great, you will hear it too often, so I found myself gradually lowering the volume each time I played.
The main levels seem at the right level of difficulty. No matter how many times you die, you will feel like the level is achievable and your death was mostly down to a mistake you made; be it stepping out too far, a missed shot, or choosing the wrong type of weapon. Overcoming the challenge brings a large amount of satisfaction. If you enjoy a simple, fast-paced, brutal game with guaranteed failure for each mistake, then this game is for you.