Shotgun Cop Man is a wierd platformer. You play as a sq. man with a spherical, bald head who’s chasing Devil to arrest him. Originally of every of the sport’s 9 worlds, Devil offers you the center finger. And also you don’t simply use weapons for combating, however for traversal as properly.
You begin every world with two weapons: a rapid-fire however weak pistol and a extra highly effective shotgun that solely has three blasts. While you’re on the bottom, your ammo always refills, which means you basically have infinite ammo. However once you’re within the air, in the event you run out of bullets, you received’t get a refill till you contact the bottom.
This all issues as a result of there’s no leap button. Which means you get into the air by capturing your weapons: the pistol enables you to hover, whereas the shotgun can rocket you upward to achieve excessive platforms. You may purpose in any course, so the shotgun can blast you from side to side, too — it’s a speedy and enjoyable approach to get round. It’s all just a little bit like Downwell, however sideways.
Picture: Devolver Digital
You’ll must get round rapidly to dodge Devil’s minions. Most frequently, you’ll tackle little devils that spit bullets and are usually a nuisance. However there are a couple of harder enemies, reminiscent of flying sentient saws with one eye. There are bosses on the finish of every world, too, like a flying cranium with horns that may manifest a physique to assault you with.
In the event you get hit by an enemy or stung by a spike, your coronary heart will fly a brief distance away out of your physique. In the event you get the guts again, you’ll survive one other hit and the guts will float away once more. It’s just like a Sonic recreation, the place you’ll be able to take a success as long as you might have at the very least one ring. In the event you’re hit whereas your coronary heart is out, you’ll die — although because of the sport’s beneficiant checkpoint system, you often received’t begin too removed from the place you had been killed.
Every world has 17 quick ranges which can be full of typical platforming risks together with baddies, spikes, shifting platforms, lasers, and block pushing puzzles. (Block capturing puzzles?) Particular person ranges usually take 30 seconds to some minutes to beat, so relying on how skillful you might be together with your weapons, you’ll be able to zip to the aim rapidly and really feel like a speedrunner.
You’ll often discover new weapons, too. I used to be a giant fan of 1 that made bullets bounce off partitions, which doubled as a helpful puzzle-solving instrument. The sniper rifle was a welcome improve as a result of it may blast by means of a number of enemies without delay.
Picture: Devolver Digital
Visually, the sport appears to be like like a platformer in darkish mode: black is the first shade, and enemies are usually a shade of crimson. All through the sport, you’ll hear a persistent, thumping, and unnerving soundtrack that appears like what you’d hear at some type of Devil-worshipping membership. The entire vibe makes you are feeling as in the event you’re really descending into the pits of some darkish hell.
My favourite a part of the sport was that you possibly can accomplish quite a bit in a brief period of time. My full playthrough was about three and a half hours, and I may get by means of many of the 9 worlds in about 20 or half-hour. I appreciated the brevity, as a result of though I very a lot loved the sport, the deliberately uncomfortable environment bought beneath my pores and skin, and I may solely play it in brief bursts.
When you perceive the right way to navigate simply with Shotgun Cop Man’s weapons, you’ll be able to actually fly across the ranges like some type of cartoony motion hero. By the top, you’ll use these weapons to present the finger proper again to Devil.
Shotgun Cop Man is now accessible on PC and Nintendo Swap.
