Hellbound (2020)

Overall Hellbound meets expectations as a retro style 90’s Shooter. Whilst it does not innovate as much as some people would like, this game has enough about it to be worth the pickup.

Hellbound is a rip-roaring homage to classic Doom that hits almost all of the right notes.

Hellbound is a fun shooter that’s got all the hallmarks of what made the 90s FPS genre so great. Unfortunately, just like the 90s games before it, it’s pretty dated in both optimization and graphics. There’s a large number of bugs and game-breaking glitches to be experienced, all of which tarnish what is otherwise an incredible experience.

Hellbound is based around recreating the classic first-person shooter game experience of the 90s, which it does succeed in doing. If you were a fan of those games or wanted to experience what they were like in a modern package, then the developers at Saibot Studios have delivered, for the most part. Unfortunately, the game falls short of a great experience.

Hellbound offers some old school fun if you enjoy putting your aim and reflexes to the test. It’s a shame the developers stopped at seven levels, one boss fight, a handful of monsters, and six weapons (of which two are useless and some lack an alternative fire mode). What would have been merely a first episode in a 90’s shooter, pretends to be a whole campaign in Hellbound. If you’re experienced with the genre, you’ll finish the game in around two hours. [10/2020, p.82]

An earnest but empty love letter to Quake and Duke Nukem 3D that never gets around to doing anything to call its own.

Ultimately, Hellbound isn't going to leave a sour taste in any player's mouth, but that's only because it leaves no taste at all. It's a bland retread of a bygone era of gaming that has no understanding of why people want to return to it. Hellbound carelessly mashes up concepts and mechanics with no thought and no craft, creating an end product that's serviceable only because of the strength of its foundation. Fighting demons with a shotgun is fun. It always was fun, and it always will be fun, and there's nothing wrong with Hellbound's interpretation of that. It's just that there are a thousand other games that do all this so much better, so it's hard to see why anyone would pick up this particularly shotgun.

Hellbound puede no ser genial, pero es un paseo corto y dulce mientras dure. La acción es agradable y rápida con las armas empacando un golpe sólido, y todas las armas ganan su lugar en el arsenal. La duración del juego significa que sus límites no tienen la oportunidad de sentir rallado y la igualidad de los enemigos está muy bien compensada por la personalidad de los niveles. Incluso después de que el juego ha terminado todavía hay un puñado de niveles de arena para jugar, tratando de sobrevivir el mayor tiempo posible para reclamar un lugar en sus tablas de clasificación. Hellbound puede estar restringido por sus límites, pero no hay duda de que hace mucho dentro de ellos y es muy divertido mientras dure el viaje.

A boomer shooter that rode the coat tails of DOOM 2016 & more true to the spirit of the 90's era of FPS games. Only hampered by graphics that make the world feel more like a Masters of the Universe playset & it's short length.

Extremely nostalgic gunplay and movement, as well as very classic level design reminiscent of Quake. A bit too short for the price though, and the dialogue is kinda cringey.

TLDR: An average boomer shooter. Pros: + If you like boomer shooters, you might enjoy this game Cons: – I like boomer shooters, and I didn’t enjoy this one

In the 90’s the term “DOOM Clone” was given to First Person Shooters following the runaway success of iD’s Demon Slaying Magnum Opus. It wasn’t always used negatively though as this era saw many great titles including Heretic, Blood and of course Duke Nukem 3D. Hellbound however is a DOOM Clone in the sense they actually tried to clone the game but something was contaminated in the test tube. Hellbound wants you to think that it is a game inspired by the shooters of the 90’s, with all the twitchy finger, devasting weapons and bloodlust they were known for. But playing the game, I felt as far away from the 90’s as possible and just saw a game that was seriously trying way too hard. It starts with the title screen that isn’t even pretending to be a ripoff of the DOOM logo, but I will give them one point, the game does play just like a 90’s game in one sense as there is no, I repeat NO CONTROLLER SUPPORT. In this day and age, especially with how cross platform game development is, there really is no reason whatsoever to exclude this feature. On the gameplay side of things, you have level design seemingly taken from the cutting room floor of DOOM Eternal, I’ll be with a little less jumping and a few uninspired one-liners, so digging into Duke’s rubbish bin while we are at it, seemingly dropping F-bombs as much as other people use a comma. **** like Hellbound was released in the 90’s it would undoubtedly be promoting itself by calling DOOM weak, they have a Double Shotgun? well, we have a TRIPLE Shotgun! But that’s the thing, while promoting itself as a game inspired by the 90’s there is really nothing about this game that reminds me of that era. Shooters of that era were always fast paced with a trove of weaponry to play with, health and ammo littered everywhere so you could continue blazing through. Here, your main TWO guns really lack any sort of punch with them even having issues with the smallest enemies. The game promotes itself on its difficulty, but it is more cheap, with a lousy checkpoint system than difficult. Performance wise, the game is even more of a nightmare. I wouldn’t say I have the beefiest rig, but I’ve been playing games on it now for several years with barely any issues. But with Hellbound, the game is continuously pausing for moments at a time and I found the only way to make the game run properly on my rig was turning down the visuals wayyy down. I’m talking graphic quality that would make the Switch cringe, and that’s just the graphics, load times are a real hassle with the game taking forever to load a save file, might explain why the game doesn’t utilise a Quick Save button. That’s probably my biggest issue with Hellbound, just how much of a poser it wants to be. It wants to be DOOM so badly, it will give us the gruff protagonist but give him no personality whatsoever outside of saying **** a lot. Halfway decent hellish inspired levels that are marred with graphical and performance issues and just the most generic metal music playing over it all as you plough through one of 5 different enemies. It wants to think its from the 90’s, but what shooter from then had ironsights? The only saving grace this game has is that it’s over quickly with a wet fart of an ending. This game would like to think of itself as “Unapologetically 90’s” but really it just owes me an apology.