MOTHERGUNSHIP (PC) Preview

Aliens have conquered Earth... blah, blah, blah, you are the lone, silent protagonist who will save humanity... yadda, yadda, yadda, here are some NPCs that do some talking. Any reason to care about anything? Not really. While there is a story here, it's mostly told through a couple of small dialogue sequences, whose main purpose is to just provide some low-key comedic taste to everything, but, make no mistake, MOTHERGUNSHIP is so arcade that it makes Doom look like Deus Ex.

This is all about grabbing a gun, or to be more precise, crafting one (more on that later), and start blasting robotic enemies to pieces. Gunfights take place inside some small arenas that are created from scratch every time you play, but, as is usually the case with random generation, some carefully designed levels would probably work a lot better, especially since the randomisation algorithm at hand isn't exactly as flexible, thus one will soon get a little bit of déjà vu.

MOTHERGUNSHIP stands out from the competition by letting you create your own weapons via a system that's as simple and (almost as) fun as playing with LEGO blocks; a system that enables creating anything, from triple miniguns, to a badass bundle of awesomeness made out of shotguns, railguns, rocket launchers, and then some. There is a price, of course, and that's how much energy a boomstick consumes, which means that one must think whether power is more important than speed.

The neat gun-crafting wouldn't matter if the gameplay wasn't fun, though. Is it, then? Well, it's good, but not as fantastic as it could be. Control-wise, it's flawless, and the dual-wielding or the ability to triple, quadruple, or quintuple-jump is pure ecstasy - but the enemies are extremely boring to fight with. That's not to say that the bots should have some highly advanced AI, but it would be better if they could do more than just fly/run towards you, or fill the room with bullets.

Even design-wise, while this looks good, and runs pretty smoothly (despite some minor frame-rate hiccups), it's another case where the Unreal Engine is being used to build a world that's... forgettable, with boring sci-fi corridor after boring sci-fi corridor, and enemies that are just a bunch of simplistic robot-dogs and turrets. Another thing that would-be buyers should bear in mind is that, currently, battles are so chaotic, that it is sometimes hard to see what's going on!

...Oh, but that doesn't mean that this isn't an enjoyable experience. MOTHERGUNSHIP is some great mindless fun that, besides a good aim, forces you to be always on the go, as well as mindful of your surroundings... but, sadly, it doesn't really let the whole ridiculous-gun-building element shine as much as it should. Hopefully, the developer will work on these more-than-decent foundations, and produce something that will make this sample taste pale in comparison.