Bulletstorm

Bulletstorm, you see, is a deeply clever, intricate design masquerading as a big dumb action game. Far beyond simply emulating the “Kill ‘em all!” maelstroms of Doom and its ilk, Bulletstorm re-taught us a more important lesson from the pre-Call-of-Duty days of FPS. Namely meaningful player input in the cause of mastering one’s environment. Bulletstorm’s insanely imaginative weapon-set and its multi-layered combo potential re-empowered players to kill their own way, giving us back the ability to creatively express ourselves on a mammoth scale, using a million different shades of gore. Fun, laugh-out-loud funny, and with immense replay value thanks to its score-attack Echoes mode, Bulletstorm has as immediate an appeal as any shooter around, but the finesse and depth to keep the most technically calculating, second-shaving point-chaser or speed-runner happy for months.