Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun Review — A Very Good Cover Version

Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun is a first-person shooter that treats the 1990s as a design brief rather than a nostalgia trip. Auroch Digital developed it, Focus Entertainment published it, and it landed on May 23, 2023 for Windows, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S. Android and iOS versions followed.

You play as Malum Caedo, a Sternguard Veteran Space Marine of the Ultramarines Chapter, sent by the Inquisition to the Forge World Graia. The mission: retrieve a Power Source that rogue Techpriests have been experimenting with, experiments that tore open a warp rift and let Chaos back in.

Trailer, via Focus Entertainment.

Graia, and the drop pods that do not survive it

The setup is grim and efficient. Graia has been watched closely by the Inquisition since the Ork and Chaos invasions years before. Inquisitor Seibel of the Ordo Malleus reveals what the rogue Techpriests have done with the remains of the late Inquisitor Drogan’s Power Source. A Servo Skull belonging to Drogan tags along to help.

Then the Ultramarines make planetfall, and their drop pods are severely damaged during the descent. They crash. Malum Caedo is the sole survivor.

That is the whole premise, and Boltgun does not waste it. The game is single-player only, first person, and built around the Space Marine arsenal. You scour Graia, pick up devastating weapons and holy equipment, and purge heretics. The promotional language says purge the heretics; the game means it literally.

Doom is the reference point, and Auroch knows it

Boltgun’s gameplay and artistic style are heavily influenced by first-person shooters from the 1990s, Doom chief among them. Some promotional material calls the game a “boomer shooter.” The developers have pushed back on that framing in one specific way: they have highlighted their inclusion of modern gaming features, including modern enemy behaviour AI.

That tension is the whole review in miniature. The sprites, pixels and blood are a costume. The enemy AI is not. A retro shooter that only copies the look of 1993 gets old in an hour. A retro shooter that copies the pace of 1993 while letting enemies think like it is 2023 is a different animal.

Malum Caedo versus Tumulus Samael

The story escalates past the initial retrieval mission. As Malum fights through the Chaos Forces, it emerges that the enemy’s leader is a Chaos Sorcerer named Tumulus Samael of the Black Legion, and he wants the Power Source for his own plans. He has already obtained information on the location of the Power Source fragment.

Malum races him to the vault. Tumulus Samael appears there and gloats that he has already taken the Power Source. The sorcerer and his minions then attack the Inquisitor’s Ship above Graia and use the Power Source to enlarge the warp rift, which threatens to engulf Graia and the entire sector.

Malum fights through the space station and finally reaches Tumulus Samael. After a gruelling fight, he kills the sorcerer. Inquisitor Seibel arrives.

A release schedule that says a lot

A six-platform simultaneous launch is not the behaviour of a publisher hedging on a niche curiosity. Focus Entertainment shipped Boltgun everywhere at once, then extended it to mobile. That is a bet on the Warhammer 40,000 license carrying a genre that most studios have abandoned.

The verdict on Boltgun

Boltgun earns its 8.3. The shooting is the reason. Auroch built a game where the Space Marine arsenal feels like the point rather than a delivery system for a story, and the story is thin enough that it never gets in the way of the guns.

The Chaos Space Marines and Chaos daemons give the campaign a roster of targets that fits the setting, and Malum Caedo’s arc from sole survivor to sorcerer-killer is a straight line, which is the correct shape for this kind of game. Nobody is here for a twist.

What holds it back from higher is that the Doom inheritance is visible everywhere, and Boltgun rarely escapes the shadow of its reference. The modern enemy AI is the one place the game argues for itself as something other than a homage. It is a real argument. It is not quite enough to make Boltgun feel like its own thing rather than a very good cover version.

A sequel, Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun 2, is in development. That is the right call. The first game proved the formula works; the second one has to prove Auroch can build past it.

8.3 of 10.

Auroch Digital · Boltgun review · boomer shooter · Focus Entertainment · retro FPS · Warhammer 40000 Boltgun