When the stress of the day-to-day starts to get to you, don’t you just wish you could retire to a cramped little starship and live out the rest of your days as a mech-piloting techno-pirate? Maybe that’s just me, but GUNHEAD was made to execute this very specific brand of escapism. Personality and charm burst from the seams of this roguelike, though its challenging nature might keep you from seeing all of it.
In GUNHEAD, you play as the newest hire of an alien privateer crew, tasked with chasing fleets and collecting technology for your client, by force preferably. To do this, you pilot the titular GUNHEAD, a rust-bucket mech that’s been sufficiently modified to deliver as much death as possible. It’s a gritty job you’ve got to do, and you’re going to feel it immediately.
Something GUNHEAD does spectacularly is executing on the vibe it wants to go for. You’re in space, and while the halls of these titanic spaceships look clean, everything feels gritty and brutal in a sort of grunge way. Giant brains are integrated into computers, robots are designed with spinal cord and ribcage-like parts, and absolutely everything must be ground up with a buzzsaw or decimated with machine gun fire if you want to continue.
The look of everything reminds me of an 80s sci-fi comic or a new entry in the Heavy Metal franchise, which is further emphasized by the game’s killer soundtrack. I don’t know what you’d call the genre of music in the game (I couldn’t tell you the genres on my own Spotify playlist,) but it sounds something like a mix between metal and the ambiance of a dark sci-fi universe. It’s perfectly blood-pumping when you’re blasting through procedurally generated halls in your Gunhead.
The titular mech is the final piece in the puzzle that sells the game’s feel really well. You should already have an idea of what you’re getting into by taking a look at this machine the first time you hop into it. A function-over-form kill machine that looks like it probably still runs on diesel, heavy and brutal not built to OSHA standards. This translates incredibly well to the mech’s controls and sound design; it moves fast, with heavy ground-shaking stomps, and nightmarish firearms that boom and shred and scream.
The controls and movement are spectacular for an FPS title, giving you more or less free range to dash and fly in a zero-gravity environment. Countless flying enemies and hazards make careful maneuvering a challenge, but not something so demanding that it pulls you away from the gunplay.
Guns vary from shotguns to missile launchers to buzzsaws and machine guns, with four being equipable at once. If you’ve got a mouse with programmable buttons, I suggest swapping some of the default key binds for your weapons. You can, if needed, fire all four weapons at once, but trying to press the middle mouse button with fingers on the left and right clickers can be a hassle.
As previously mentioned, GUNHEAD is a roguelike with procedurally generated levels in the way of shipwrecks or otherwise unsuspecting vessels. Your goal in any raid in GUNHEAD is to find and destroy the ship’s core – a big CPU brain – to effectively shut the ship down and allow your employer to scavenge it. To do so, you’re going to have to first seek out and destroy several other ship systems.
A ship’s core will often be protected by one or two shield generators, which you’ll have to destroy before being able to damage the core. However, you might find these shield generators hard to reach, thanks to alarm systems, turret systems, or a great big lottery machine that shuffles systems around while you’re destroying them. It’s up to you if and how many extra systems you want to destroy, dragging a mission out and increasing your potential risk and reward as you navigate procedurally generated maps to widdle a ship’s defenses down.
Going straight for a core is never the best option, and while taking down systems can generally make the whole shield easier to tackle, each room you enter and the enemy therein risk you twiddling down your persistent health bar for the rest of your run.
I found that the game, even on medium, could be surprisingly difficult, with even the first two levels on a run barring the risk of catching you off guard and forcing you to restart. Since going after extra systems in a ship extends the amount of time you’re spending on each level, you could end up spending 15 to 20 minutes in one ship, only to ultimately die to bullet hell in the core room.
Not all cores are built equal, as some will turn out to be entire boss encounters that you must defeat to proceed. These bosses are well designed and formulated to test the “shoot the big weak spot” training you undergo in the levels leading up to them.
The final, surprising treat from GUNHEAD is its cast of characters, all of whom are dryly humorous and pretty cynical in a comedic way, really emphasizing the fact that you’re on a ship full of pirates. The familiar voice cast did a phenomenal job with their characters, and the short little interactions spaced about a run will see you growing super attached to your intrepid little pirate crew.
The Final Word
GUNHEAD promises a unique and brutal video game atmosphere and absolutely delivers. This gritty roguelike shooter will see you tearing metal and shredding lead through the galaxy in pursuit of sweet, sweet cash, and is sure to leave a lasting impression on you with its killer style and smooth shooter gameplay.
9
Try Hard Guides was provided with a PC review copy of this game. Find more detailed looks at popular and upcoming titles in the Game Reviews section of our website! GUNHEAD is available on Steam and PlayStation.