I thought vampire games needed something other than the fanged, pale-skinned bloodsuckers and gun-touting hunters to stand out. I didn’t think it would quite look like a high-school boy ripping the clothes off the backs of strangers, though.
Akiba’s Trip: Undead & Undressed, also known as Akiba’s Trip 2, isn’t a new game. However, Akiba’s Trip: Undead & Undressed Director’s Cut is. The original game launched in Japan for the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita in 2013 and later migrated to North America in 2014. The Director’s Cut features much of the same content with an alternate route for a new romanceable character, Kati. I played it on the PlayStation 4 at PAX East and was delighted to find out how absurd yet satisfying the action was.
Akiba’s Trip: Undead & Undressed stars Nanashi, a teenage otaku who was lured into a trap and turned into a vampire. These vampires, also called “Synthisters,” feast on humans’ social energy and will to live. A mysterious girl named Shizuku saves Nanashi with a kiss before he totally loses his humanity and recruits him to join the Akiba Freedom Fighters, a group hunting the Synthisters. It's up to the ragtag group to uncover the Synthisters’ plot and save Akibahara from the soul-suckers before it’s too late.
This isn’t your average vampire-hunting RPG where you run around slashing at enemies with silver swords or impaling them with wooden stakes. You identify Synthisters with a camera — because vampires look different than humans in photos — and confront them. Then, you expose them to the sun by forcibly stripping them down to their underwear. Then, their bodies melt in the daylight.
Nanashi’s superior vampire strength and reflexes enable him to go hand-to-hand with these bloodsuckers and, more importantly, punch and kick them until their clothes fly off.
Akiba’s Trip might sound like a perverted romcom (and it kind of is), but at least it has a surprisingly robust combat system. At PAX East, I played the demo on a controller where the right-hand buttons corresponded to high and low kicks and punches just like in a fighting game.
You can’t rely on just one button because vampires have different clothing types that can only be removed with specific moves. For example, low kicks wear down their pants. Meanwhile, a headshot can eventually knock off any hats or headgear. It feels satisfying to combo vampires with fast-paced kicks and punches, especially with the layer of strategy that low and high attacks add. You also have to read whether the AI would aim high or low as you approached them.
You might notice a purple aura radiating off the enemy after you land enough hits. That’s the cue that Nanashi can pull off a super move that rips the enemy’s clothing clean off their body. The super move feels especially satisfying to pull off because of the over-the-top animation it triggers when you do it and how much faster it ends a fight.
Akiba’s Trip: Undead and Undressed also delves into the realm of romance. I didn’t get to flirt with any of the girls because of the brief time I had with the demo, but the game leads to different endings based on who Nanashi chooses as his love interest. The new character Kati, an Akibahara maid, is only available as a route in the Akiba’s Trip: Undead & Undressed Director’s Cut and downloadable content for PC and PlayStation 4.
If you’re even remotely titillated by the core premise and want something with a surprising compelling combat system, then this trip is definitely worth the strip.
Akiba’s Trip: Undead and Undressed Director’s Cut will launch for PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch on April 20, 2023. If you already have the original Akiba’s Trip: Undead and Undressed on PC or PlayStation 4, you can download Kati’s route separately without buying the entire game.
