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My Friend Pedro review

I first came across My Friend Pedro a couple of years ago when I spotted an animated gif somewhere on Twitter. At the time I didn’t know anything else about the game but the gif alone was enough for me to find out more. It’s been a long wait and I’ve been super keen to find out if the game plays as good as it looks.

In the game you play as an unnamed protagonist who is approached by a sentient banana named Pedro. If you hadn’t guessed, this is a game with a sense of humour. Your meeting with Pedro sets you off on a rampage across 40 levels armed with a variety of guns. There is a story but I’m not going to get into that here. It really serves as a reason to kill anything that moves.

Watch the My Friend Pedro launch trailer below:

I played the game on PC using mouse and keyboard. The A and D keys move you left and right while the S key is used to crouch. When crouched you can also roll. The mouse is used to aim your weapons and you always face towards the pointer. Spacebar performs a jump and a second press near a wall will let you flip backwards. This is handy for climbing and reaching higher platforms.

The left mouse shoots your current weapon to where your pointer is aiming. By default you have dual pistols so you fire them together. A really neat feature is that you can press and hold the right mouse button to split your aim and lock one of your arms in that position. This lets you fire at two different targets at once and looks really cool at the same time. The R key is used to reload your weapons and the mouse wheel lets you switch to a different gun if you have one.

You have a health bar which is split into three sections. When you take damage your health drops but if you get to safety or dodge before you lose a whole section then it regenerates. Dodging is done by holding the W key which sends you into a spin. When you do die the game respawns you close to where you died so you can keep going. The F key lets you kick objects and enemies. A final option is to tap the Shift key which activates a Max Payne-style bullet time.

Watch the My Friend Pedro Bananas trailer below:

The controls sound a bit complicated and seeing the game in action you’d think it would be hard to pull off some of the stunts. However, DeadToast have done an incredible job and the game plays like a dream. After a few minutes of learning, performing all the different kinds of stunts is near effortless.

The levels are linear and most of them simply require you to simply get from the start to the end. The game does try and mix things up a bit at times with a few different style levels and boss fights. Along the way you’ll want to kill everyone you meet. Downed enemies drop guns and in addition to your pistols you’ll also come across Uzis, shotguns and even an assault rifle.

The game is fairly well paced and constantly introduces new elements as you progress to keep things fresh. My absolute favourite item is the frying pan which you can shoot or kick into the air. After doing so you can then shoot it and the bullets will ricochet off and kill your enemies. A close second is the skateboard which you can ride, perform tricks or simply kick into the face of an enemy.

View some My Friend Pedro screenshots in our gallery:

A first playthrough of the game on the easiest difficulty is probably going to take most players around 5 hours. Things only really get difficult towards the last third of the game. However, there’s a couple more difficulty options available that will really challenge most players.

My Friend Pedro is a score-attack game that is designed to be replayed. Upon completing a level you’ll be given a rank which is determined by things like if you died, how long a level took to beat and how many enemies you killed. Your score is also taken into account and to really do well you need to rush through the levels while chaining your kills together. Beating the levels is easy enough but climbing the leaderboards is what will keep you coming back. Whether that’s competing with yourself, your friends or trying to be the best in the world.

While it lasts, My Friend Pedro is an absolute scream. The stylish gunplay just never gets old and it’s definitely a game that I’ll keep coming back to. If you enjoy action, shooting stuff and climbing leaderboards then I highly recommend you pick this one up. I’ve now got my fingers crossed for a sequel.

My Friend Pedro was reviewed using a digital code supplied by the publisher.

Publisher: Devolver Digital Developer: DeadToast Entertainment Release Date: 20th June, 2019 Reviewed On: PC/Steam Also Available On: Nintendo Switch

author avatar
Greg Ellwood
Greg is the Deputy Editor of Entertainment Focus. He writes about Games, Tech and TV. You can find him on Xbox/PSN/Steam as Tahllian.

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