Originally this was not the game I had planned on playing next for First Person Fridays (one of my streams I do weekly for Extra Life), but things both good and bad changed those plans. On the downside, the publishers who sell the game I was originally goning play are now on my shit list for their behavior around a very public murder and for the foreseeable future you will not see anything by them being added to my work: stream or review. But on the upward swing, my buddy Max Powers sent this my way, and how could I say no to a buddy? Having put the game down, yeah it was a great time for the most part, if not a perfect one.
Story: Captain Titus' mission on the world of Graia is finished, and he has managed to stop the Chaos armies and rising of a Deamon prince. But his victory is far from complete. Several years after the events of Warhammer 40K: Space Marine, the inquisition still watches the world and have noticed the same chaos invasion is starting again. The Dark Mechanicus has managed to get their hands on a fragment of the power source Titus had destroyed and it was enough for the worshippers of Chaos to continue their work from before.
But with Titus currently under examination and interrogation by Inquisitor Thrax, he is not here to continue his crusade. Instead another must stand in his place. To this end, the Inquisition sends a fresh squad of Ultramarines to the surface to find and eradicate the threat as well as retrieve the power source fragment so that no one else can repeat this process. Unfortunately right away things go awry as the team's drop pods are damaged heavily on planetfall, and only one marine survives to carry on the mission: Malum Caedo.
This basic start will begin your rampage through a 3 episode mission to destroy literally everything in your sight. There really isn't much story development as you progress either. In fact in that way this game feels like an old 90s shareware title where the entire story progression takes place basically between the episodes, though in this case told through short retro-styled but fully voiced cutscenes to lead you to the next leg of your adventure as you race the evil Chaos sorcerer Tumulus Samael to get to the relic before he can obtain it for his own dark schemes.
It's basic, it changes little as you play, and what does change is basically an excuse to reach the next chapter and continue your onslaught. In short it's a barely there story that really isn't worth discussing beyond as a backdrop. Fortunately, that is just about all it has to be, since it's not what anyone playing this game is here for.
5/10
Graphics: Boltgun is unapologetically old-school and wears this on it's sleave and at all times, right down to options in the graphic settings you can use to make the game look even more like a VGA title from the 90s then it already does if you so desire. You can find this "Retro" menu in the options easily to adjust as you see fit and how far you want to take it is up to you, but the this does set the tone for everything you are about to see. And it hits hard from the moment you click to start.
You will then be treated to the first of a handful of cutscenes you will get as you play to explain what is going on. These are highly stylized, looking like the pixelated art you might see from before PC games used CD-ROMs as their standard. The picture is pixelated, the colors used are limited to what you might see in the early to mid 90s, and the animation around each image is limited to portions of the screen and often very few frames. Basically it's enough to suggest the movement in each scene, often reusing them to simulate camera changes. It's quaint and charming in a way that will absolutely appeal to anyone who played games on their (or their parents') ancient PCs of that bygone era.
And then the real game begins and we hit the style of the modern-retro boomer shooter head-on. The world is well detailed with a level of geometry that would have been considered impressive but doable during the era of Windows 95/98, matching this motive with chunky pixelated bitmapping across everything in the game. But the world it makes up will soon have you forgetting this limitation. It's vast, bleak, and varied as you travel across the forge-world and through the various fortress-forges that need the forces of Chaos purged from them. It is simply a brilliant looking visage of the grimdark universe of Warhammer 40K and no fan of the franchise will be disappointed here.
The action within this world, however, is completely done in sprites. Everyone you find and slaughter (for there will be no survivors) is a 2D sprite drawn to life, leading all the stronger into this retro-aesthetic the game is running with. And to be honest, it was a brilliant call to design the game around this idea. Every enemy oozes personality (some more literally then others) depicting exactly what they are with a brilliance really only creatable when you have this level of amazing sprite-work. From the menacing Chaos marines of the Black Legion (I am not spoiling anything, trust me), to the jovial jokers on the field we know as Nurglings (god I hate those things, ESPECIALLY after this game), everyone here is lovingly crafted to feel like they would in universe. Even the general personalities of the two major forces of Deamon infestation you will face run strong here as Tzeentch's forces tend to be a little bit out there and mysterious in how they could exist, while anything of Nurgle seems to be smiling at you even as they attack. Hell, I swear some of them even wink jovially as they last out, spreading the mirth of PapaNurgle's filth with them everywhere they go!
Even your touch on the world is done in old school sprite work. True you never see yourself in game, but you see your hands wielding whatever weapons you have equipped and a power-sword. And like the games of old, these are not models, but large sprites set at the bottom of the screen, using this as a strength far more then a weakness as you see every shell fall out of your boltgun in fluid motion, you load every shell into your shotgun as quickly as marine hands can manage, and every weapon's details are immaculately captured in your actions. Even your chainsword delivers in this form far better then many games even today might with a modern look.
The only issue that could be leveled against it all is, however, also due to those sprites. There is no good way for a flat image of a 3D character to be viewed at an extreme angle, so when looking way up or way down at these enemies, you can expect things to look a little wacky.
However this is still a very small gripe as overall this is one of those eye-pleasers of a game that really everyone from graphic whores to retro-only gamers should absolutely delighted to see in motion as they rip and tear through everything in front of them.
9/10
Sound: The first thing that is going to strike you about the soundscape of this game are it's sound effects. Where we are at a point where most games are suitable at this, Boltgun takes the extra effort to make sure everything sounds exactly as it should. Your servo-skull mumbles in a techno-distorted voice seemingly at random, but it does so exactly as you would expect a personal assistant of the grimdark universe to during downtime, staying out of the way for the most part when you are in gunfights, and you almost feel ever clanking step of your power armor as you march and run full steam battling the Chaos invasion you find yourself in the middle of.
Every one of your instruments of the Emperor's wrath (read your weapons) sounds absolutely perfect, from the meaty chunk of your bolter as each round propels towards the soon to be purged, to the coil whine of your gravity gun as it powers up to literally rip a hole in reality within someone's body, there is nothing here that isn't satisfying or (best I can tell) absolutely brilliantly accurate for the universe it takes place in.
Nor will the music, when you can hear it, anyway, disappoint you. Guitar rifts shred through powermetal chords as the game takes to it's 90s inspiration even here, making every song an absolute joy to hear, well when you are not enjoying the sound of thrashing the minions of the Dark Gods back to their masters... and when you can hear the quiet eating at you as you look for (and forward to) the next heretic to face your wrath.
Sadly the real lose here is the voice acting... because there is very little of it. Don't get me wrong, what is here is great, but it boils down to three characters getting to actually talk (your servo-skull doesn't count since it needs a text box to translate): the inquisitor who sent you, Malum himself, and the main villain of the game Tumulus. The first gets the most time to talk as her updates basically make up the cutscenes between chapters, but she is silent outside of those scenes. She sounds good enough, but it's nothing too special to write home about. The other two, however, work with what they were given far more.
Malum really doesn't say anything, however, unless you want him to. You have a taunt button in which he will insult the enemies on command making him either a silent protagonist or one who wont shut up, depending on your taste and wish to trigger it. Still the threats are appropriate enough letting him sound pretty good overall. But the one with the least use is the chaos sorcerer, Tumulus. This man rarely speaks at all, hamming it up like a good villain when he does. Honestly it sounds pretty good, overall, but you wont be missing much if you don't hear it: it tends to be pleas to the Dark Gods or boasts of what he is going to do with you.... nothing you haven't heard a billion times from a trillion villains by now.
Still what you hear overall is again perfect for the grimdark future of Warhammer 40K, and I really wouldn't have it sound any other way... even with the lack of voice acting. This time, less is more since it makes way for some of the most impressive soundwork to bring a beloved universe to life like I haven't heard in a long while.
9/10
Gameplay: At first glance, Boltgun appears to be a blatant clone of Doom 2016 with a 40K skin on it, and to be fair that wouldn't be a bad place to start if you wanted to explain the gameplay quickly, but it is also not quite accurate. So allow me to go into detail.
As noted in the graphic section, you will never see Malum directly while playing because you are him. This is a first person shooter putting you in his metal boots to rip the hell out of everything in front of you. It is fast, it is violent and it is a lot of fun, giving you tight controls, satisfying weapons, and plenty of enemies to unload on as you progress through your adventure. Action junkies certainly have a lot to enjoy from this title.
And the UI around he action is designed to be minimalist, letting you read at a glance and yet still both be out of the way and show a little bit of extra data (like the buttons to swap grenades, throw one, or even to swing your sword) at the same time. This is frankly more then appreciated, making it a very easy way to help new players get into the vibe before the guts can really fly. Hell, they even took the extra step and when you have a minion of Chaos down your crosshairs, you can see a health bar for them as well as a number to suggest how quickly (or slowly) they will take damage when you let loose on them. You see the unique function here is that both your enemies and your weapons have a strength to them which will display, giving you that much more information about what you might want to use against specific nasties you are facing off with. You don't NEED to worry about it if you don't want to, but it's good tactical data most games would not bother to let you have, so I have to admit I appreciated that touch.
Not that you will always get to use it, however. When the bullets begin to fly this game can get hectic and out of control fast, and this can be both good and bad. When it happens naturally this is at it's peak. You will be defending corridors, retreating to a tactical position or dancing with enemies as you blast them to bits and having a great time! Even when trapped in a room with several enemies it can still be a blast and a half, but this is also where the game begins to lose it's steam late game.
You see as you play you will hit rooms in which you will be sealed by chaotic powers with an order to purge the infestation around you. At this point, enemies will teleport in and all hell will break loose. Most of the time, this happens in huge rooms, giving you room to play with your victims, but keeping you moving so you don't get trapped and destroyed by them. Often after enough enemies die, the next wave will warp in and the process will repeat until you've killed enough for the warp-sealed doors to reopen and allow you to progress. And for the first 2 episodes, it's used brilliantly to spice up the action every once in a while. Episode 3, however, seems to have been made by people who love this kind of design way too much, including levels that seem to do nothing but this for several rooms in a row. It goes from a challenging way to split up the action to one where the idea seems to just be to put you in a room where they can mindlessly throw everything at you without rhyme or reason.
But sadly this is not the worst the game will offer you. The absolute worst moments in this game are the final bosses in episodes 2 and 3, but for very much the same reason. The 2nd episode final boss is a showdown with Tumulus where you have to balance keeping enough enemies on the field to prevent him from summoning more, while dualling him around one of the most awkward rooms I have ever seen a mob battle like this in all my time gaming. It is frankly a miserable fight and one of the lowest points of the game, the other being the final battle in Episode 3.
This fight is effectively more of the same that while at LEAST on the positive side is in a much better designed room for it, it is also an extremely long fight for all the wrong reasons. Rather then giving you anything new and interesting, it is made up of the boss fights you have already faced (including 2 more greater deamons, one for each Chaos God in the game). In essence expect to spend long enough in a boss rush that the game itself has three distinct autosave points so you don't have to restart from the beginning if you die. They KNEW it was too long for a single boss fight. And the payoff? Absolutely nothing. The final phase is just Tumulus using the same spells he has been using every time you fought him including BOTH phases you just dealt with in this battle. If it wasn't for the hoards of enemies you have to deal with as well, this would just be tedious. With them, it can be infuriating as they exist basically to extend an already drawn out battle.
The unfortunate truth is while this game plays fantastic overall, it's like they ran out of ideas when they got to the final act, leaving episode 3 a hot mess with some occasional sparks of awesome. Had they finished at the end of the second episode, this game would have faired even better.
7/10
Bugs: While this game did not have any bugs I could see, I can not say it ran perfectly. Unfortunately Boltgun is not using one of the engines you might have seen in other retro-style game, but instead was made in Unreal Engine 4, and not the most optimized using it. It was not often, but at times, I found myself facing the occasional frame-drop. This seemed most common during chapter 2, so I have a feeling this has to do with the levels themselves. But on occasion, expect to see a noticeable, if not severe, drop.
Digital Rights Management: You're experience with DRM will depend entirely on where you bought the game as the game relies on the store you bought it from for this purpose. The exception is GOG since GOG has no DRM.... period.
Source: PC Gaming Wiki
Score: I can not tell you Boltgun is a bad game. It's not: quite the opposite in fact. For the most part this game is an awesome example of how to do boomer shooters right leaning hard into the universe you are playing in. It is fast, furious, flashy, and looks and sounds absolutely amazing doing it all. But all this momentum simply runs out as you reach the end, as if the devs lost momentum and inspiration around this time. It is a shame that it has to end on a low note, because the highs it reaches are really something special.
8/10
System Requirements:
- AMD Phenom II X4 965 or Intel Core i3-2120
- 8 GB RAM
- AMD Radeon HD 7770 or NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 (1 GB VRAM)
- Windows 10
- 5 GB Hard Drive space
System Specs:
- Ryzen 7 (5700X) 3.4 Ghz
- 32 GB RAM
- AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT (8 GB VRAM)
- Windows 11 (64 Bit)
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