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review information
time played: 12 hours
Platforms Reviewed: pc
Available at: Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X | S, PC
back when i first loaded Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine For the Xbox 360, life was good. It was the halcyon days of 2011, and I was a teenager – a typically broke teenager, obsessed with the dense canon of the world warhammer universe but lacks the funds to buy all those tiny, ridiculously expensive figurines and the paint to decorate them. a used copy of space Marine, Although? that I could afford, and I loved it very much.
At the time, I thought it was just what I was looking for: a crunching, brutal simulation of life as one of the God-Emperor’s designated supersoldiers. I made my way through orcs, chainsword buzzing and boltguns crackling. I was a force of nature, an invincible fridge of thousand kilos on my feet. The ground shook as I moved forward, slowly but surely, towards an increasingly bloody victory. And that time I was wrong.
Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun what was i In fact Looking for Did you know that Space Marines can fight for five days straight without rest, jump four meters straight in the air, and run at 90 kilometers per hour? I did, and apparently Auroch Digital (the developers of boltgun) also did; Here, you are not a moving tank, you are an elephant with rockets attached to it.
ok boomer
boltgun What we affectionately refer to as ‘boomer shooters’ – first person shooters like 90’s classics Apocalypse And Earthquakeand a genre that has enjoyed a resurgence in recent years since the latter series’ 2016 reboot.
immense popularity of Apocalypse 2016 and its speed-metal sequel doom eternal Creates a lot of rifts (no pun intended) on the topic. Many of them like excellent Dusk and early-access gems ultra killhas abandoned modern graphics in favor of a return to the low-poly glory of its forefathers, and it’s the way boltgun Let’s go
in the style of yesteryear Apocalypse, Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun Uses both 3D and 2D art styles; Blocky, three-dimensional polygons are used to construct the gameworld, and flat pixel-art sprites for the (extremely numerous) enemies that occupy it. It’s a timeless style, and the enemy models have just the right amount of detail to make them stand out visually without compromising on the retro aesthetic.
The environments are equally excellent. Starting out on the snowy outskirts of an abandoned industrial fort, boltgun Mixes things up every time I start to worry that my surroundings might be turning stale: military settlements give way to demon-infested catacombs, gothic cathedrals and forges dripping with molten metal. Each chapter of the campaign is divided into enjoyable bite-sized levels that can be completed in under an hour.
The sound design wasn’t skimped on either. The soundtrack delivers exactly the kind of pulse-pounding combination of industrial metal and grand orchestral overtures that I’ve come to expect warhammer 40,000 The game, and the sound effects – especially of the guns – are spectacular. I especially appreciate how much care was taken to isolate the sound of separate spent bullet casings and shotgun shells hitting the floor; Inconspicuous in the heat of battle, but perfectly punctuating the last moments of a long firefight.
fight the hordes of chaos
There’s not much going on in the way of story here, but that’s okay: boltgun Understands that no one is really here to watch long cutscenes, they’re here to destroy monsters. You occupy the power-armored boots of an unnamed Sterngard veteran who is summoned by an Imperial inquisitor to investigate suspicious (read: monstrous) goings-on on the surface of the Forge World.
You get an intro cinematic, lovingly rendered in old-school pixel-art stills, and you get the occasional expository dialogue from your only companion – a hovering servo-skull, which for the uninitiated is a human skull that serves as an assistant. turns into a drone — but for the most part, the plot takes a back seat to the action, which is fine. There are actually some interesting short stories afterwards (which are incredibly related to the events of 2011 space Marine), but I won’t spoil anything here.
Anyone who’s played a single boomer shooter will probably feel at home here. there’s a kind of beautiful simplicity to it boltgun, You have your guns, your chainsaw, and your grenades, and that’s about it. There’s a type of melee ability with a cooldown that can obviously stun some enemies, but I found it a bit unreliable in the heat of battle.
I turned on the sprint toggle in the settings menu after playing the first chapter with my finger pressed to the shift key, because many boltgunThe battles encourage you to keep moving forward as long as possible. You really are incredibly fast and agile as you delve deep into the power fantasy, weaving between enemy projectiles to deliver a crunching chainsword finisher. The barriers to getting into this ‘flow state’ are reduced; You die and the game resets you almost immediately.
to the emperor of mankind
There’s no minimap (or any other kind of map), but very rarely I get lost. The levels are mostly linear, with some expected back-tracking and key-hunting here and there but nothing that will take you out of the action for too long. Too often, you’ll find yourself locked in a large room with waves of enemies to take out before proceeding, but the designs of these arenas are so robust and varied that it never feels like a chore.
The overall level of challenge feels exceptionally balanced. I played on Hard and didn’t die once during the first chapter, but later levels ramped up the difficulty to a point that was punishing but not unfair. There are a handful of mildly annoying enemies – Flying Screamers can be a pain to deal with – but for the most part, I found boltgun To provide a sound degree of difficulty.
In a rather amusing juxtaposition of the cold in-lore authoritarianism of Imperium, there are some solid accessibility features here, including an invincibility mode that allows you to experience the entire game in true power fantasy mode. If you’re roleplaying as someone living in 1995, you can adjust the ‘Retro’ settings to increase pixelation or decrease distance.
Naturally, as a classic shooter, boltgunThe levels are littered with ammo and health pickups, which are often placed under the direction of the player. You also have the Kavach, which is here stylized as the sacred ‘contempt’ for the forces of evil. There are also secret items hidden around each level, some of which grant you temporary bonuses like unlimited ammo or increased damage, which help encourage additional exploration.
guns, guns, guns
talk of ammo, let’s talk boltgunKey boltgun. The first weapon you receive, this iconic Space Marine sidearm is simultaneously the game’s greatest strength and its greatest weakness.
you see it is absolutely awesome, This thing looks great on fire, like a blessed full-auto lovechild bullet stormpeacemaker and doom eternalheavy cannon. With stellar sound design and physical feedback, rank-and-file enemies explode into showers of pixelated gore with only a few shots.
Why is this a problem? Because it’s the first gun you get, and I wasn’t excited to use most of the guns that came later. boltgun There are eight weapons in total, and only one – the highly enjoyable Vengeance Launcher – really reaches the same level of enjoyment as the Boltgun. I rarely felt compelled to use anything else. In fact, I actively avoided the Heavy Bolter because of its movement speed cap, as opposed to the fun of zooming up to Mach 1 speed.
The problem this creates is that, while the Sterngard Veteran’s signature firearm is a lot of fun to use, the game employs the tabletop game’s ‘weapon strength versus enemy toughness’, giving a weapon with a high toughness. Will deal less damage to enemies with the statue. The system isn’t particularly well explained (there’s very little handholding here) but it’s intuitive enough, provided you keep track of the numbers next to an enemy’s health bars.
In practice this means that some stronger enemies are less affected by guns with less power; The 3-Strength Shotgun is fine for clearing out packs of lesser monsters, but come up against a 5-Toughness Chaos Terminator and you’ll want something like the more powerful Plasma Gun. The boltgun itself is 4-power, though – not even the lowest-powered gun in the game – which doesn’t really encourage you to turn it down unless you absolutely have to.
destruction of your enemies
Really, though, it seems like a minor complaint to me when the game is just so much fun to play. Perhaps other players will prefer Heavy Bolter’s slow but constant death stream, or will find that the charge dash mechanic is actually too cool for them.
There’s enough here for every shooter fan to enjoy, and the simple fact is that I had a lot of fun playing boltgun, It delivers exactly what it promises: high-octane shooter action that delivers some of the best its setting has to offer.
current fans of 40,000 You’re sure to appreciate the dedicated entertainment of the universe Imperium Forge World and all the terrifying, monstrous, good-natured inhabitants you’ll fend off as you explore it, but part of boltgunthe beauty of is that you don’t need to know anything about warhammer Canon to enjoy it. You are a supersoldier in power armor and your job is to kill monsters. What are you waiting for? hop to it.
Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun on PC reviewed with code provided by the publisher.
