Video games have always treated guns with a certain reverence, from Doom Slayer’s evil grin when he picks up a shotgun, to the pornographic customization options of Modern Call of Duty. Warhammer: 40k Boltgun brings it to its absurdly logical end. In the opening level, your hulking space marine discovers the titular firearm on an actual altar, and a chorus of angelic voices sings as you pull the weapon from its base. “Holy Relic!” Your accompanying Servo Skull hums as you lock and load. “Bestowed by the emperor!”
It’s an apt introduction to the Boltgun’s eponymous weapon, not just because of the game’s revel in 40k and mid-90s shooters, but how it reflects both its strengths and the weaknesses associated with them. No other weapon gets this treatment, which is appropriate because no other weapon is as good. Boltgun’s bolter is the perfect virtual firearm, so inherently satisfying that it blows away both the game’s own power curve and the hordes of demons you’ll be slaughtering with it.
Unlike the way it introduces its signature guns, the Boltgun isn’t bound to a ceremony that involves you in it. A brief cutscene sums up the situation. Adeptus Mechanicus has detected strange readings in Graia’s forge world system and has sent you and a squad of other Space Marines to investigate. But your team was killed in the initial drop, leaving you alone to fight the burgeoning invasion of the forces of Chaos.
Visually, the Boltgun is derived from Doom and Duke Nukem’s school of polygonal environments and sprite-based enemies. However, the game it reminds me the most of is Star Wars: Darksiders. This may be due in part to the fact that they’re both licensed shooters, but it’s also evident in how they use relatively basic visual techniques to render a massive galaxy. Of course, the technical limitations of the Boltgun are only affected, which means it can infuse the 40k universe with the grandeur it promises. During your adventure, you’ll explore sprawling gothic cityscapes and sprawling industrial complexes, where fountains of tumbling molten metal are as menacing as enemies that tear your armor apart. They might not be as detailed as Darktide’s Tertium, but Boltgun’s maps are every bit as massive.
Even though the Boltgun may look ‘old’, it feels very modern under the fingers. Your Space Marine can traverse the map like any classic FPS avatar. But Auroch wisely gives the movement a tangible weight that mirrors your character’s weaponized bulk. Every footstep jingles, and falls from great heights sound like someone pushing a tank off a cliff (the same effect on any unlucky enemies standing below you when you land). It really makes you believe in the character’s mastery, giving them a physical depth that their sprite-based limbs lack.
This physical depth also extends to your enemies, albeit in a very different way. The sprites you battle the cultists, Chaos Marines, and demons in the game look neatly drawn and simply animated until you attack them with the game’s opening weapon, the chainsword. Binded to the right mouse button, your melee attack hits enemies like a wet sandbag hits concrete, then proceeds to show your foe fairly realistic layers as it swirls through pixelated flesh and bone.I thought the bloody system would take a while Delighted As much as the paint-your-own-map texture system I’ve seen in Prodeus blew me away (although I probably can’t give Dead Island 2 the credit it deserves here). But the bolter’s obsession with violence is eye-popping in every way.
The tactile satisfaction and upbeat spectacle really begins once you pick up your bolter. The brightest jewels in the bolter arsenal spew fiery rivets, leaving trails of smoking pixels in their wake. Any of these glowing projectiles will unwrap a cultist like the world’s worst Christmas present, smearing red ribbons on the ground.Enemies struck by several bolts of lightning will continue to explode Throughout the surrounding area, scattered viscera streamed down the walls.
That might sound rude, but the point is that the Boltgun has got the fundamentals right. On the most basic level, the game is fun in its own right. Auroch also ensures your bolters remain relevant throughout the 10-hour campaign in a number of ways. First, enemy encounters are always littered with basic cult enemies, making a quick switch to the bolter a smart tactical move. You’ll also get special magazines to fill your bolter with more powerful variants, such as the incendiary Dragonfire bolts and piercing Kraken projectiles. Attacking the game’s larger opponents with a bolter loaded with a special magazine is the bolter in its prime, and I always smile when I spot it hovering in some hidden corner of the map.
The problem, as you can probably guess, was that none of the subsequent weapons lived up to the Boltgun’s luster. Unusually, the shotgun is the weakest weapon in your arsenal, still adept at knocking enemies up at close range, but lacking the grunt and recoil I’ve come to expect from this FPS staple. The melta gun is capable of shooting through any obstacle, promising plenty of carnage, but its ammo limit is so small that I’m reluctant to use it in most situations. I’m partial to Vengeance Launcher, largely because it’s called “Vengeance Launcher”.But its projectiles also embed themselves in enemies forward They explode, a punch or two always tickles me That’s it. However, using it is always a bit of a risk as it is so easy to blow yourself up.
To be clear, no single weapon is bad, and all are useful in the right circumstances. But none of them are as good as they should be. The game itself showcases this, as when you pick up the “Machine Spirit” buff, it imbues the weapon you’re holding with special modifiers. It makes the shotgun bounce shells like Unreal Tournament’s flak guns, and significantly increases the rate of fire of the plasma cannon. These feel like alternate firepower that weapons should have, or at least unlock as the game progresses. Instead, they’re limited to this rare power-up that you can easily miss, a design decision I don’t fully understand.
This is the biggest problem with the Boltgun, but it’s not the only one. As I mentioned, the breadth and variety of levels is impressive, and overall it balances the vastness of 40k well with the ‘find three keys’ map design of nineties shooters. But sometimes unsatisfactory level looseness also occurs. Sometimes levels offer a shortcut back to the main path once the key is found. Other times, you’ll have to backtrack through levels where it’s easy to get lost. Sometimes this backtracking will spawn new enemies for you to fight. Other times, it won’t. Compared to Prodeus’ watertight map or the recently released HROT’s original Slavic dungeon, here’s a bag that prevents the Boltgun from reaching the same heights.
Meanwhile, enemies are more of a threat than their numbers, not their skill or tenacity, though there are exceptions. The Plague Toads will give you some trouble early in the game, and the Aspiring Champions will punish you severely if you let them get too close.Still, the bolter enemies are more interesting shooting than they want struggleThe Bolters also have a few boss fights, which are great on first encounters, but these iconic enemies are often reused, stripping them of their power and mystique.
If you want to mess with a good gun and a few other good guns, the Boltgun can fulfill that wish. A few design tweaks and more attention to detail will elevate it from a good shooter to a great shooter, but as a throwback introductory course to the highly anticipated main game Space Marines 2, Boltgun is tantalizing tastebuds. Aspects do an acceptable job.
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