Hello Enthusiasts,
Today's review will be of the 2011 game Bulletstorm, by the developer "People Can Fly". There are strong suggestions that this title will be getting a remaster for the current generation of systems, so this may not be something you'll need to go back to older consoles for.
This game is a first-person shooter, with some extra elements added to it. You play as Grayson Hunt, the leader of a band of space-pirates who used to be an elite black ops team before they were burned. Since that incident, Hunt has become something of a reckless commander, and in taking on a warship for the Confederation of Planets, he crash lands his ship on a strange, mutated planet. He finds an electronic leash that will track creative kills and award upgrade points for them, which becomes a focal point for the game. He then sets off with his now part cyborg "friend" Ishi , who is not happy that Hunt was so reckless and got the other two crew members killed. This begins a journey of bith survival and revenge. There are a number of other side characters in the game, including Trishka, who is a Confederation soldier that is captured by Hunt.
While there are several positives to get to, I think the biggest one is the creative kill/upgrade system. As a player goes through the game and gets more proficient with the weapons and the leash, the types of kills that can be performed get really interesting. This is furthered by a number of the guns having special shots that can be used. The assault rifle has a special shot that, if landed, disintigrates the enemy, while the pistol has an option to launch fireworks that can propell enemies around. These would be a lot of fun regardless, but add in the abilities of the leash, which can pull enemies closer or lanuch them in the air, and it's an absolute blast.
As I said though, there are a lot of outstanding elememts to the game. The graphics are great for the time it was released, and I'm sure the remstered version will have an upgrade that that. The dialogue is superb, ranging from being pretty funny to dramatic and emotional. Ishi is particularly interesting, since he will switch between being humorous and helpful to literally strangling Hunt, with the swings being attributed to him fighting with the new cyborg part of his brain. The controls for the game are also really user-friendly, and it didn't take me long at all to get things down. Plus, there is a certain mechanical dinosaur that was a real highlight of the game for me.
As usual though, it's not a perfect game. Some of the guns that get unlocked are boring in comparison to some of the others, and I found myself rotating between a select number of my favorites. The game is also pretty short, so portions of it did feel a bit rushed. The game's difficulty seemed a little unbalanced as well, going from pretty easy to difficult and back to easy again within a single level. This made the more difficult sections even more difficult, since I didn't really get to build up to it.
Despite the flaws of the game, it is a lot of fun. It's really creative for a first-person shooter, and it's just about as well written as I coulf hope for. I'm really glad they're remastering it, and I am hoping we get a sequel sometime soon.
I give Bulletstorm a 8.5 out of 10
Sincerely,
The Bored Enthusiast
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