PAX West 2025 Spotlight: Sashimi Slayer

Forget wielding a guitar or pounding buttons - Sashimi Slayer lets you use a sword as your weapon of rhythm! This quirky rhythm game has players timing slashes and parries to the beat, cleaving through sea creatures only to transform them into sashimi. What started as a student project quickly evolved into a full-blown indie experiment in controller design, and yes, it’s as absurdly fun as it sounds. At PAX West 2025, we had a chat with Alex Ling, the project’s hardware designer, to talk about the challenges of crafting a sword-shaped controller that feels intuitive and comfortable, whether you're left- or right-handed, and how it reshapes the entire gameplay experience. Slice wrong? Miss a beat? The tension - and the amusement - mounts with every swing. Check out our full interview below and discover how Sashimi Slayer turns slicing fish into a sweet symphony of motion, music, and mayhem.