Swery65 celebrates Hotel Barcelona reviews on Steam going from ‘Mixed’ to ‘Mostly Positive’ after huge update

Hotel Barcelona director Hidetaka Suehiro, aka Swery65, has thanked players for taking his game out of the ‘Mixed’ review status on Steam.

Hotel Barcelona is a 2.5D action game that parodies slasher films, and was written and directed by Swery based on an original idea by Grasshopper Manufacture‘s Goichi Suda (aka Suda51).

The horror game collaboration from the Deadly Premonition and No More Heroes creators was released last year but it was one of the most heavily criticized releases of the year, with a Metacritic score of just 58.

To address this, the game received a major update in March called Under New Management, which added new content and significantly altered the gameplay.

The update appears to have done its job, because the game’s user review status on Steam has been upgraded from ‘Mixed’ to ‘Mostly Positive’.

Swery took to X to celebrate the game’s turn of fortune and to thank players for their positive feedback.

“We did it,” he wrote, “Hotel Barcelona has finally escaped ‘Mixed’ on Steam and reached ‘Mostly Positive’.

“Since Under New Management in March, every player, review, and bit of support helped us get here. The curse of ‘Mixed’ is broken. Thank you! Check-in and destroy!”

The Under New Management patch attempted to correct some of the perceived issues with Hotel Barcelona, via a series of “major systems overhauls”, as well as additional content including indie cameos from Demonschool, Slitterhead and Promise Mascot Agency.

According to developer White Owls at the time of the update’s release: “Movement is faster. Combat recovery is shorter. Parries now matter. Dodges create space. Enemies react longer. Multiplayer is fairer. The opening experience is clearer. The entire game runs better.”

It added: “This is not a routine patch. This is a structural refinement of the player experience.”