When the first trailer dropped announcing that Bulletstorm was getting a Virtual Reality port, I was instantly excited. The memories came flowing back of those fun and crazy kills the game offered back in 2011. The question was though can that style of game still live up to today’s gaming?
Release Date: January 18th 2024
Developer: Incuvo
Publisher: People Can Fly
Price: US $39.99 / CA $53.49 / €39,99 / £32.99
Reviewed On: PlayStation VR2
* Code Provided For Review *
THE FEELING OF BEING USED
In the game you will mainly play as Grayson Hunt, who is government assassin tasked with taking out bad people. However, you soon learn you have been used by General Sarrano to kill innocents to cover up his crimes. Now you have only one thing on your mind, taking revenge on General Sarrano, and anything or anyone that gets in your way is only going to be your next casualty.
KILL WITH SKILL
If you have played Bulletstorm before the game has not deviated away from what the game did in the flatscreen release, so it’s important you manage your expectations on what you are going get from the game.
If you haven’t played Bulletstorm before, as aforementioned on your way to finding General Sarrano you will be have no remorse for anything or anyone getting in your way. Where who are killing doesn’t seem important, that way you are doing it is. This is due to game using a skillpoint kill system, which will then be used to buy upgrades to your weapons. The more stylish your skill, the quicker you can do those upgrades.
To rack up the best scores, you need to mix up your kills, using your slide, kicks, leash and guns. Mixing in environmental kills like kicking explosive barrels at them, kicking them into a cactus or over a ledge to their death to name a few. Where mixing and matching parts together is mindless fun, it just seems the jump to VR has removed some of the smoothness offered by the flatscreen, as everything feels a little slower and clunky.
However, this is a shooter from 2011, so you wont get the sort of level of upgrade trees and progression you see now, with each gun allowing for Max Ammo and Charge shots upgrades. The other use of the skillpoints is upgrading your leash, buying ammo (if you ever fall short) and charges for your weapons.
They have added in a few extra missions that weren’t in the original where you play as Trishka Novak, who is looking for revenge on whoever killed her father. These don’t really mix it much compared to playing as Grayson, as you will be doing the same thing, you just have an energy blade. But, I didn’t use it much as it is really over-powered, and removed some of the fun out of the kills.
My main issue with the game overall was it all seemed a little easy, I played on normal to review and very little was a challenge. With this in mind I would advise just going the game on hard mode, as you really won’t get any challenge from the game otherwise.
IT’S AN AGE THING
As with the gameplay, you need to set your expectations when it comes to the presentation, again this is a port of the game from 2011 and not a full ground-up remake for VR. So it doesn’t really make much of an improvement over a game that came out around that time, but does bring in dynamic lighting which really shows in Virtual Reality. However, it is sometimes easy to get distracted when some of the surfaces or clothes should have some 3D definition and they don’t. In VR its much easier to see its just 2D textures that is made to look 3D, compared to this technique on flatscreen and at times it can make the overall look of the game seem muddy.
When booting up the game, you will be given a message informing the audio has not changed from the original, and 2011 was a ‘different time’. Which I think is the best approach they could have taken, because it kept it true to the original, when this sort of game was matched with insults, loudmouths and cringey jokes. Again given the time this was released, you are going to get that sort of ‘meathead’ mentality with deep-gruff voices as the story and dialogue plays out. Nothing has really changed here, the voice acting and writing shows its age as well, and although its passable it would be much more improved today, but again it’s in keeping to games original feel.
COMFORT
THE VERDICT
Summary
Bulletstorm VR in unapologetically true to the original, meaning you have you set your expectations before going into the game. It might have visuals, sound design and writing that shows it’s true age as a game, remember this was part of its charm when it released in 2011. But, what the game was always about was the skillpoint kill system, and where this feels a bit more clunky in VR, it’s still a load fun trying to take enemies out in various ways and rack up those points. It’s great to have another shooter in Virtual Reality that isn’t about being serious, precision reloads and hyper-realism, just go in with expectations of playing a game that released in 2011 in VR and have fun mindlessly shooting, leashing and kicking your way through each chapter.
