My Friend Pedro: Blood. Bullets. Bananas. Bliss?

By C.A. Ramirez

Developer: DeadToast Entertainment

Publisher: Devolver Digital

Every now and then, the stars align, leaving gamers of the world with yet another glorious reason to procrastinate. My Friend Pedro is one such title, and it is both gloriously violent and fantastically entertaining, all at once. Those looking for something a bit off the wall will feel right at home with this title.

My Friend Pedro drops you into its side-scrolling world without much information about who you are, but what you must do is made quite clear; kill or be killed. Murder, lest the banana tell you otherwise, is on the menu. Military tacticians, from Patton to Cheney, have made gut wrenching decisions fueled from such an ethos, but I digress — My Friend Pedro is a blast, literally.

I understand side-scrolling shooters have been done to death, and gamers from Seattle to Calcutta have exhausted the genre over the better part of the last two decades, but My Friend Pedro fiercely reinvents the platforming shooter with a host of innovative mechanics that increases its re-playability, ten-fold, through a glorious combination of gore, guns, and grace. With the ability to dual-wield guns and fire in two different directions simultaneously, the player can slow time and dodge bullets. The mechanics are wonderfully seamless and compliment the frenetic gameplay in a way that forces gamers to pull off spectacular flurries of wonton carnage. It is by no means a dog-fall; the enemies are no slouches, and your timing is everything in this wonderful game.

The learning curve is not as steep as you would imagine, but it takes a good deal of hours to actually master this game’s mechanics. When you do, though, you will pull off some wickedly wild kill moves that would prompt Owen Wilson to say, “Wow”. The level design is top-notch, taking us from warehouses filled with aged mobsters to a fever dream straight out of the head of Charles Manson. My Friend Pedro delivers entertaining moments in spades, and there is no shortage of explosively carnal displays of bullet-soaked violence. The game demands a certain level of humor from the player, and I absolutely applaud the developers at DeadToast Entertainment for producing it in such a way where the slaughter you create is paired with tongue-in-cheek moments and hilarious situations — taking down gangsters in suits of armor as you fire Uzi’s akimbo, whilst bullet times affords you the moment to kill the last man standing with a boot to the head — all while you are flying through the level on a skateboard. It is so deliciously chaotic that players will find themselves obsessed with certain levels, its enemies, and its layout. This game permeates your brain with the obsessive notion, “I could have killed more …”.

Great advice doesn’t always come from a banana, and truth be told, it seldom comes from those who have decided to review and suggest games to the masses, but every now and then, a title like My Friend Pedro comes along and dashes the status quo to pieces. This game should be at the top of any Metroidvania hit list and will delight casuals who were chewed up and spit out by Dead Cells. No gamer can resist relinquishing a small portion of their sanity to a friendly banana who awakens your inner killer. It's Shakespearian. My Friend Pedro is a warm blanket on a cold day, if that blanket had been soaked in blood, checkered with bullet holes, and draped over a maniacal banana. Poetry.

“A glorious combination of gore, guns, and grace.”

This article also appears on Medium.com.