3/5
Bulletstorm is a manic shooter from EA games.
It opens with an interrogation scene in which your character, Gray is questioning a bounty hunter who was aboard their ship.
You are quickly introduced to the type of characters Gray and his crew are. Coarse language, anger, aggressiveness, alcoholics and all the other things that go with being a macho muscle bound mercenary/ space pirate, although they are old friends who have been working together for a very long time.
It turns out that the crew are being hunted by their old boss General Sarrano. It also turns out that Gray is the type of captain who has a talent for turning situations from bad to worse.
Due to his actions, they end up crash landing on a hostile planet crawling with mad locals who take pleasure in torturing and killing outsiders, and must find a way back into space.
Not wanting to give away too much, but quite a lot happens in the first few sequences, from the character introductions and their relationships to each other, the setting up of the games premise and getting a basic tutorial of the game mechanics, including picking up an extra special weapon.
As you play, you will find that you will have an ally with you for most of the time, which eases some of the onslaught of enemies for you and lets you catch your breath and reload while your friend covers you.
The scenery is on an epic scale, though the missions take you on quite linear paths, not giving much room for exploration, though the views you get of landscapes and cities are wonderful. Everything is huge, from the places you visit to the people to the machines to the monsters.
This game is about the action though. You will continuously be ambushed by the locals and Sarranos men and have to battle your way through waves of them to achieve your goals whether on foot or in a vehicle. As you go further in the game you will receive new weapons to use, the first one of these being the Leash.
Gray picks it up from a fallen member of Sarranos Elite. It is a whiplike weapon which is used to grab enemies or objects to fling them around, and makes a handy backup when you are out of ammo.
Grays foot is another powerful melee weapon. Whether it is reinforced somehow, or if it is his own brute strength, his kick can send an enemy ragdolling into the distance in a quite entertaining manner or batter down obstacles.
One of the main focuses of the game are the Skillshots. These are special kills that award you points to be spent on upgrades and ammo. You will need to gain as many of these as possible as you progress, as ammo is scarce and you will regularly need top ups. Fortunately, you earn points for performing the same Skillshots, so if you find one you can stick with it, though you get more points for original kills. Using the Leash and the kick in conjunction with weapons are good ways to discover new Skillshots. A number of things are littered around the stages to assist such as explosives, electrical pylons and spikes.
One of the problems I found with the game was that I felt that enemies are able to take too much damage. Of course in game world, people have the ability to take more punishment than in real life, but there should still be a limit. You will pump bullets into the same enemy for quite some time before he dies and feel as though you should try to use melee more often to reserve ammunition.
Bosses take even more damage and are immune to melee attacks until weakened, meaning that you are forced to use your guns to take them down, pumping out rounds in a vain hope that the unyielding force in front of you will eventually fall, despite showing no signs of tiring.
There is also no control option for using cover, poking out from behind walls and doors etc or blind firing. Taking cover simply means going behind something or crouching behind piles of rubble until you heal or are ready to come out again. When you are ready to open fire again, you make yourself as much of an open target as your enemy.
Crouching itself is somewhat awkward. Rather than having a button click to go from standing to crouching and back, you must hold down the left stick to remain crouched. It is quite easy to accidentally stop crouching if you want to move Gray around.
The other problem I had with the game was the way that instructions were given. Regularly you are told to ‘Go to Place X’, but being that there is no mini map, or arrows pointing the direction you need to go in, sometimes it is difficult to know where you are meant to be going. Fortunately, due to the linear nature, all you need do is find the only way to go. This is only a real problem when you are asked to ‘Go to Object X’ which could be anywhere in the area that you are in.
On the other hand, as you play, regular reminders of the controls pop up to let you know what button to push to have the desired effect on the environment.
With the sometimes awkward controls, confusing instructions, tough enemies and low ammo, you may find yourself being killed often to begin with, but fortunately there are plenty of checkpoints, so you are never forced to go too far back to try again. During the loading screen a helpful hint will usually tell you where you went wrong.
The game has a multiplayer mode for fun and gore with friends, which would add to the replayability value.
For some gratuitous action and stylish killing, this game is great, though there is not an incredible amount to make it stand out from other shooters. Worth a play if it is your genre of choice.
