Bulletstorm Demo Incoming
In a little under two weeks, you'll be kicking a dude into a giant carnivorous plant for extra style points.
Published: January 14, 2011
If there's one thing that can be said for Polish dev house People Can Fly, it's that they know a thing or two about brutal first-person shooters. Having cut their teeth on the surprisingly great Painkiller series, the studio has had ample time to digest the various middleware offerings out there (Painkiller was a notable showcase for Havok physics). For their sophomore IP, the team opted to head down the same road as many devs this generation and decided on the Unreal Engine 3 for their next project, Bulletstorm.
The decision to side with Epic Games' engine wasn't a mere licensing deal; clearly impressed with People Can Fly's earlier work, Epic signed on to help co-develop and produce the title, with Gears of War and Unreal Tournament designer Cliff Bleszinski serving as hype man and producer. Of course, since Epic technically owns a majority share, and has for a little over three years now, the world "licensing" doesn't exactly mean the same thing as it would with other devs.
Bulletstorm's look and feel, then, is something decidedly familiar for fans of Epic's Unreal-based fare this gen: chunky, gritty and with plenty of satisfying violence. Though the visuals share a clear link to the source engine, the actual gameplay is anything but your standard FPS fare. Instead, it favors stylish kills over straight headshots thanks to two key features: a beefy kick move that can send bodies flying and a leash that allows for quick reel-ins and juggles.
By combining the two, along with a multitude of different environmental hazards indigenous to the one-time resort world where burly lead Grayson Hunt has crash landed, the resulting skillshots allow for arcadey multipliers and bonus points for doing everything from setting an enemy anus aflame to juggling them with explosions. Being an Unreal Engine game, it's no surprise the weapons are equally creative, ranging from a the Screamer Pistol (which lets you make impromptu fireworks out of enemies) to the Flail Gun (which ties two simultaneously-fired grenades together with a chain) to a good old fashioned assault rifle dubbed the Peace Maker Carbine.
Sounds cool, right? Of course it does, and though the game's release is still a few weeks off, EA and Epic are kicking out a demo ahead of the game's February 22nd release to stores. When the PlayStation Store updates on January 25th (or the 26th if you're in Euroland), you'll be able to practice some 45+ different skillshots in prep for the game's proper release a little under a month later.
The decision to side with Epic Games' engine wasn't a mere licensing deal; clearly impressed with People Can Fly's earlier work, Epic signed on to help co-develop and produce the title, with Gears of War and Unreal Tournament designer Cliff Bleszinski serving as hype man and producer. Of course, since Epic technically owns a majority share, and has for a little over three years now, the world "licensing" doesn't exactly mean the same thing as it would with other devs.
Bulletstorm's look and feel, then, is something decidedly familiar for fans of Epic's Unreal-based fare this gen: chunky, gritty and with plenty of satisfying violence. Though the visuals share a clear link to the source engine, the actual gameplay is anything but your standard FPS fare. Instead, it favors stylish kills over straight headshots thanks to two key features: a beefy kick move that can send bodies flying and a leash that allows for quick reel-ins and juggles.
By combining the two, along with a multitude of different environmental hazards indigenous to the one-time resort world where burly lead Grayson Hunt has crash landed, the resulting skillshots allow for arcadey multipliers and bonus points for doing everything from setting an enemy anus aflame to juggling them with explosions. Being an Unreal Engine game, it's no surprise the weapons are equally creative, ranging from a the Screamer Pistol (which lets you make impromptu fireworks out of enemies) to the Flail Gun (which ties two simultaneously-fired grenades together with a chain) to a good old fashioned assault rifle dubbed the Peace Maker Carbine.
Sounds cool, right? Of course it does, and though the game's release is still a few weeks off, EA and Epic are kicking out a demo ahead of the game's February 22nd release to stores. When the PlayStation Store updates on January 25th (or the 26th if you're in Euroland), you'll be able to practice some 45+ different skillshots in prep for the game's proper release a little under a month later.
