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Bulletstorm. The storm of bullets. Storm of the Bullets in the Bullet Storm. Penises. Bulletstorm.

For one, I feel like playing Bulletstorm right after finishing Shadows of the Damned did Bulletstorm a disservice. There was a game that stuck the landing on every single dick joke it dropped. It just worked for the crazy world the game was taking place in. Bulletstorm… well, it doesn’t, really.

The main problem with Bulletstorm is that… well, okay, there are a few problems with Bulletstorm, but one of the biggest hurdles you have to get across to enjoy the game is to understand that Bulletstorm believes it is telling a worthwhile and interesting narrative. Compare this to Shadows, where you have characters who are ridiculous, but real and true to who they are in the world they are. Bulletstorm thinks the story of Grey is interesting, when in reality he is Steven Blum who should be shooting people with crazy weapons and making dick jokes. It doesn’t understand that a player wouldn’t give a shit. The fact that it takes a long while of gameplay, going through story, before you have all the toys and fun things that make the combat in Bulletstorm actually fun is just flat-out stupid. This is a game that sells itself on letting you do stupid shit constantly. Why they tie your hands and keep you from doing as such for so long is really beyond me.

Once you get past that, though, the combat does feel a bit different and pretty fun. However, the weapons just aren’t badass enough. I don’t know. When the game doesn’t give me a reason to switch weapons, I won’t. The fact of the matter is that the Shotgun and Sniper Rifle are basically the best choices in the game. The Sniper Rifle has these guided bullets which are pretty fun to use, and is the option to go with when people are far away. The “charged” shot, which shoots basically a guided grenade, is also fun and effective for dealing with groups. When people are up close, you switch to the Shotgun. Because the game has so many environmental spikes and stuff with which to kill people, the Shotgun’s ridiculous knockback is more useful than your kick to impale enemies and deal with them quickly. On top of that the “charged” shot just flat-out kills the “tank” enemies in one hit. With those two, you can deal with any situation. Sure, there’s a gun that shoots drills, and a explosive bola launcher, but why would I ever use that when the other weapons solve my problems easier? I just feel like the only reason they gave me to work with the other weapons were to unlock the other skillshots, but you get so many points to buy shit that you only would even think about doing that if you’re a completionist.

The game made me laugh at times and was, overall, an enjoyable experience. I don’t regret playing it in the least. But it really seemed like a proof of concept that fell short of the mark. It should have been balls to the motherfucking walls of action and ridiculous nonsense, but instead fell into horrible video game plot traps and not enough weapon variety to really engage. If Epic knows their shit, Bulletstorm 2 should be damn fun. But who knows? That’s the company that claimed I would care about the death of Domwife. So they obviously don’t “get” how stupid their stories are. We’ll see though, I guess.