Great example of why unreal engine is not the silver bullet gamers seem to think it is. Compare the system requirements of this game to the much superior (and generally better looking) Ion Fury and you'll see what I mean. Using this type of engine for a sprite-based shooter is like using a sledgehammer to pin your calendar to the wall. Only thing I'll admit is that they do some pretty complex geometry and effects that are difficult to replicate in Build, but whether that's worth the orders of magnitude higher system resources to accomplish is up for debate. Oh, and the sprites don't behave correctly, in a proper 2D sprite game the corpses won't turn to face you, but in this one they turn like they're saluting you when you pass by which is jarring and honestly pretty amateurish.
The gameplay is very much subpar for something branding itself as a "boomer shooter." This is much closer to DOOM 2016 down to the melee kills that get repetitive and weirdly unsatisfying halfway through the game. The guns do feel weighty in a way that you don't see in most other similar shooters, so I'll give it that. There are sparks of quality in some of the levels, mainly some of the arena sections that allow you use the terrain in interesting ways to avoid damage and fire back. That said, for every quality section, there's like five that seem uninspired.
The AI is also hilariously bad. Like, Build Engine games have better pathfinding. You could make an argument for Doom 1 and 2 having better AI too. In Boltgun, you will regularly see enemies stand in place and look stupid and maybe fire the occasional shot at you (mainly the cultists). There's a certain particularly frustrating enemy in the form of a berserker chaos space marine that is an absolute BULLET SPONGE that runs at you at a really fast speed. Worst part is if you kill him, half the time he resurrects with even more health. I found the best way to kill these guys was to jump off of a ledge and let them fall to their death. Otherwise I'd use like all of my ammo on them because holy shit why do they have so much health ??
It sucks because I really did give this game the benefit of the doubt. I really like Warhammer and enjoy boomer shooters, and the first few levels seemed promising even if they were very easy. It has some nice set pieces and vistas, but there seems to be a huge lack of thought put into the gameplay.
The gameplay is very much subpar for something branding itself as a "boomer shooter." This is much closer to DOOM 2016 down to the melee kills that get repetitive and weirdly unsatisfying halfway through the game. The guns do feel weighty in a way that you don't see in most other similar shooters, so I'll give it that. There are sparks of quality in some of the levels, mainly some of the arena sections that allow you use the terrain in interesting ways to avoid damage and fire back. That said, for every quality section, there's like five that seem uninspired.
The AI is also hilariously bad. Like, Build Engine games have better pathfinding. You could make an argument for Doom 1 and 2 having better AI too. In Boltgun, you will regularly see enemies stand in place and look stupid and maybe fire the occasional shot at you (mainly the cultists). There's a certain particularly frustrating enemy in the form of a berserker chaos space marine that is an absolute BULLET SPONGE that runs at you at a really fast speed. Worst part is if you kill him, half the time he resurrects with even more health. I found the best way to kill these guys was to jump off of a ledge and let them fall to their death. Otherwise I'd use like all of my ammo on them because holy shit why do they have so much health ??
It sucks because I really did give this game the benefit of the doubt. I really like Warhammer and enjoy boomer shooters, and the first few levels seemed promising even if they were very easy. It has some nice set pieces and vistas, but there seems to be a huge lack of thought put into the gameplay.