First-person-shooters, drunken space pirate style!
Bulletstorm is a new FPS from Epic Games and People Can Fly. You play as Grayson Hunt, an ex-military all-around badass. Betrayed by a comrade, he hit the bottle hard and now lives the life of a drunken space pirate. A chance encounter in deep space with the traitor and the ensuing space battle later leaves both crews stranded on the planet Stygia. Once the playground of the rich, Stygia is now a desolate wasteland and its denizens feral. The race is on for revenge, escape and survival.
Though the demo we played was all action, a script from Rick Remender – of Punisher fame – promises a pulpy, sci-fi experience. Besides Hunt, the cast of characters is rounded out by Ishi, a cold, calculating cyborg (perhaps a Spock to Hunt’s Kirk), and Trishka, a member of the other crew with whom they’ve formed an uneasy alliance.
Gameplay was non-cover-based FPS all the way. You control Grayson, who leads his AI pals through the ruins of the city of Elysium. The stand-out in this game was Grayson’s whip. With this electric lash, enemies can be grabbed and tossed into the air. This creates a curious slow-motion effect on whipped enemies, allowing brutal and imaginative kills. The more creative your kills, the more bonus points you score. There also seemed to be a big emphasis on using the environment to assist in the mayhem.
The game was still a little buggy (my character got frozen on a ledge at one point), but they still have until next February to iron these out. Anyways, who couldn’t love a drunken space pirate with an electric whip!
TGS 2010 reporting is done jointly by Fintan Monaghan and Lisa Gay.
