Zero Punctuation: Bulletstorm

[Roggen Bread]

Everything I could say was said before.

Yahtzee, you are yet again right-o.

I just concentrated on the funny explicit violence.
I am suprised though, you did not mention the uberness of just kicking dues into spike things.
Seriously.

 

[LordOrin]

Augh! Thanks Yahtzee, now I'm going to have that song stuck in my head for another 5 years

 

[Art Axiv]

I hate score grinding games. I guess that Yahtzee goes "ditto" on that matter.

 

[Dfskelleton]

I agree on some things here, but not all.
The thing is that Epic tried to make it cover based, but People Can Fly shone through and made it so that it wasn't nessecary. My favorite tactic involves slide kicking someone, blowing their torso off in mid air with the shotgun, and kicking their two parts into a deathtrap. Oppurtunity? Not extremely often. Fun as hell? Totally.
Although, did anyone else notice how short it was, or is that just me. Seriously, I finished it in two days. It was definitely worth it due to how much fun it was.
The dialogue was so immature but still hilarious, such as a conversation along the lines of:
"If you come near me again, I swear, I will kill your dick!"
"...What? You're going to kill my dick? What does that even mean?! Fine, I'll kill your dick!"
*awkward silence*
"Now, if you two are done with the dick killing we have more important things to do."
Also, glad I'm not the only one who remembers Doomguy's physics defying awesomeness.

 

[philosophicalbastard]

Yathzee I blame Halo. Stupid regen health.

The first Halo actually had health bars. I believe it was Call of Duty that first used health regeneration, but I'm not sure.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Bit of a shame that People Can Fly didn't just make a new Painkiller. I like GoW but adding that unrealistic element doesn't sound like a smart move. Oh well.

Well they did release about ten Painkiller versions and it was all just going downhill, they needed a new IP, this sadly wasn't what we wanted, ended up just another one in the huge pile of modern gritty shooters...

Hopefully the Duke will deliver

 

[ReiverCorrupter]

Poor Yahtzee is impossible to please. This game was practically made for him. You've got to kinda pity the guy.

But he's right to point out a few of its flaws. For one, the level design is completely linear.

WHY IS OPEN LEVEL DESIGN SOOOOOOO MUCH TO ASK FOR IN AN FPS THESE DAYS. THIS GAME WAS MADE TO GIVE YOU THE BEST TOYS TO PLAY IN A SANDBOX, BUT IT DOESN'T GIVE YOU THE FRIGGIN' SANDBOX!!!!

Also I could see buying upgrades for the weapons, but having the thump and special abilities cost a bunch of points is just stupid, it made me conserve all game and I never really got to just have fun because I was worried about running out of ammo in the next room. Friggin' stupid. Combine this with the fact that enemies were very hard to bunch up without the thump and you have it so that you could almost never really play with the game mechanics as you're supposedly intended to.

 

[Pikey Mikey]

My favorite line in there would have to be, "Now, drop the net, hit him with sticks!" I have to disagree with his review of the gameplay though. Maybe I'm just better than him, but even on hard I spent very little time hiding behind walls. As long as they died before I did I was fine. And kicking an exlpoding bouncy ball was a blast (pun not intended).

I also played it on Hard and I think it was really fun, except for those fucking snipers and the fact that sniping an enemy in the balls was almost impossible (for me), because as soon as the (normal) bullet got near they would just cower and start running to the side, urgh, charge shot was great tough =). I really liked the weapons, but I think that the Thumper cost more than it was worth (cost more than you got from using it around 3-4 enemies). And I think I read somewhere that there would be "Epic battles with Giant bosses"...Yeah there weren't much of that. The Grindwheel wasn't really a boss, the Hecaton wasn't really a boss either (altough they were giant, so ½ point for that maybe?). The plant-like boss was ok.

Yea I do agree with you there, though the thumper is quite useful, especially indoors where enemies hit the ceiling and get insta-killed. There really is only one boss to, though the others make nice set pieces. The one that killed himself was humorously underwhelming. I also never got the sniper shot skill kills either. Hitting enemies in the head give you more points despite being easier. To get some ball shots, I recomend kicking them first so they can't dodge.

"Luckily enough", I got it after a while (Luckily in the sense that I could move on and stop using the sniper). And you also have to disrupt-shoot them or they will dodge your kick too. I had no problem that the Creeps could "dodge" the bullets, they did say that they are fast (leash immune etc.) but that ALL enemies could dodge it, that's just bogus. My favourite enemies were The Burnouts, just because they charged like pillocks and got me SO MUCH Skillpoints (X-Ray, Chain-Reaction, etc.) Those moments were the best =). And I don't understand why you couldn't use your own weapons while controlling the Mechaton robot thingy. At one point there were like 3 choppers shooting me as soon as I went to target them, when I get into cover, the robot would march to me, getting his face away from the choppers so I would have to wait while he turned around, getting me shot again so I had to go to cover. And then I shot them about 34 times and they didn't die, so I had to reload and do it all again, Why didn't they just let me leash the fuckers? This must all sound very negative, but the game is still very fun. It's just that part and the snipers/using sniper that's......appalling

 

[Pikey Mikey]

Augh! Thanks Yahtzee, now I'm going to have that song stuck in my head for another 5 years

what song?

 

[delroland]

Doom Marine is more of the Aliens variety, "How do I get out of this chicken **** outfit?" than of the pie-eating British tabletop variety of space marine.

 

[Alphakirby]

I'm surprised he didn't mention that they answered his wish to have a gun that had tits on fire on it. Sure, it was just a painting on a gun, but it was a nice little call out to his Painkiller review.

Damn Ninjas...

 

[Levethian]

Bit of a shame that People Can Fly didn't just make a new Painkiller.

Well they did release about ten Painkiller versions and it was all just going downhill

All by 3rd party developers, bar the first expansion. No true sequel was made.

Hopefully the Duke will deliver

I suspect it won't - from what I've seen of it, it seems to have a story to tell, which means a carefully constructed narrative linking set-pieces, rather than a 'nonsense' fun shooter.

The frantic fun has vanished from shooters, number-crunching and tactics is leaving RPG's with DA2, every AAA game seems to be stuffing some story down our throats. Anyone else suspect that developers nowadays seem to imagine that the apex of gaming is, in fact, cinema?

 

[Digikid]

Yathzee......what are you on? It must be something good

The marines in GOW and Bulletstorm are by no means FAT.

 

[LordOrin]

Augh! Thanks Yahtzee, now I'm going to have that song stuck in my head for another 5 years

what song?

He references it in the credits ("I LOST MY HEART AND VARIOUS OTHER THINGS TO A STARSHIP TROOPER"):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TL6MAyTXMRA
Warning: the 70s were WEIRD!

 

[ninjajoeman]

I think he secretly likes it.

 

[Mr Companion]

My favorite line in there would have to be, "Now, drop the net, hit him with sticks!" I have to disagree with his review of the gameplay though. Maybe I'm just better than him, but even on hard I spent very little time hiding behind walls. As long as they died before I did I was fine. And kicking an exlpoding bouncy ball was a blast (pun not intended).

Also, enemies do group up, if you kick them into eachother. With an explosive belt around one of them, in a cloud of gas, next to an explosive barrel. Fun game.

 

[Nomanslander]

Hmmm...I wonder what the response would be from someone like Yahtzee when I'd say I like cover base shooters with regenerating health?

Mehh...still a funny review.

=/

 

[ProjectTrinity]

"We're not going to hurt you. :'> DROP IT, NOW! HIT EM WITH STICKS! >D"

Ahahaha, awe man. xD

 

[jakefongloo]

Yahtzee my man, did Bulletstorm cause you to rape people after you played it? I heard that was a possible side-effect.

L
O
L

OT: I didn't get it because i'm a cheevo whore and i know some of the cheevo's will require you to gold star all the levels. No thanks.

 

[ZZoMBiE13]

Could not possibly agree more with this review.

I hold no special affinity for the "OLD DAYS" of shooter history. I'm more a fan of the newer design philosophies of today's shooters.

Not sure why we can't have both audiences catered for. They're totally different types of games. Painkiller has more in common with Tyrian than it does with Bulletstorm.

I could not agree more. Heaven knows this industry is big enough for all the audiences to be catered to. BulletStorms problem is that it doesn't commit to either. Over the top GUN GUN GUN madness or Dirty Grey Space Opera. Pick one and commit. Don't give me a half hearted hybrid that tries to appease too much and delivers nothing either side can get behind.

Ultimately BS (heh, BS) is little more than the game you had to buy to get access to the Gears of War 3 Beta. Unlike Crackdown before it, there isn't a good game to hold onto and play while you wait for the beta the game gives you access to. Just another soulless shooter that will easily be forgotten.