Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition Review - Eliminate Your Enemies With Style With A Perfectly Timed Skillshot

Written by Brandon Hofer  on April 16, 2017

Reviews: Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition is a nice remaster that fans should enjoy but there might not be enough for some to jump in at full price.

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Bulletstorm was originally released a little over six years ago. Back then it was this insane, over-the-top, goofy shooter with a sense of humor that was littered with profanity and made up words. The gameplay consisted of most of your first person shooter mechanics, with a couple of exceptions. Now we have the Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition which is a remaster of the original that retains the spirit of the original title while adding in even more insanity. The graphical fidelity of the game looks better than it did in 2011, although it is fairly minor. It runs in 1080p, 60fps for the most part, there were a few instances where I noticed some slowdown if there was a lot of stuff happening on the screen. Then of course you have the inclusion of Duke Nukem in the game which makes things a bit more crazy.

Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition features all of the DLC that was released for the original title. There is the normal campaign, overkill mode, “echoes” mode, online multiplayer and then Duke Nukem’s Tour where you can play through the campaign as Duke Nukem. Going through the standard campaign mode you’ll experience the story of Grayson Hunt, a man that is willing to sacrifice everything to try and get revenge for the atrocities that were committed by his former boss, General Sarrano. Hunt’s quest for revenge comes with a heavy price tag which includes both him and Sarrano crash landing on a planet. After that sequence of events takes place the two primary goals are tracking down Sarrano and getting off the planet. Of course as you go through the campaign you’ll have to fight your way through an army of enemies whether they be part of Sarrano’s crew or the local inhabitants of where you crash landed.



One of the main concepts in Bulletstorm was being able to creatively (and violently) kill your opponents. You can simply stand there and shoot them with your gun like in any other shooter but that is no fun. There are times when the environment can be just as deadly as your enemy and I had a lot of fun using that to my advantage. Early on in the game you acquire this “leash” which allows you to manipulate certain parts of the environment as well as perform creative kills on your enemies. If there is a piece of debris in your way chances are you can use the leash to pull it out of the way. When you are engaged in a firefight you can use the leash to grab the enemy and pull them closer and then it is up to you how you want to dispose of them. You can shoot them as they are flying towards the air to you in slow motion. You can shoot them in the head, in the crotch or wherever you feel like. If you want you can wait until they get close to you and then you kick them and as they fly backwards you can shoot them out of the sky. This is also where the environment can come into play. One of my favorite things was impaling an enemy on the environment whether it was some metal sticking out or there was a cactus in the area. I would use my leash to bring the enemy closer to me and then once I had them lined up I would kick them so that they would fly back into the aforementioned area that would impale them. In some areas there are hyper-mutated venus fly traps so you could also use your leash to bring an enemy closer to you but make it so it is in the path of these fly traps so it grabs the enemy out of midair on his way over to you. This is of course only a couple of the many creative ways you can use to get rid of the enemy. You will get points based on how creative you can be in your kills. There are skillshots that you can get with all of the different weapons and if you unlock all of them for any given weapon then you will earn an unlimited ammo perk in a different mode.

Once you have completed the standard campaign mode you will unlock the Overkill campaign. This is essentially the same campaign you just went through but it is cranked up and unrestricted. What that means is you are immediately provided access to all weapons and skillshots starting from Act 1. Obviously in the standard campaign you won’t get some of the more powerful weapons until later on in the game. This is also where you can turn on the aforementioned Infinite Ammo, if you have completed all the skillshots for a weapon. So if you were able to complete all of the skillshots for the shotgun, then you will now unlimited ammo for that shotgun in this mode, if you enable this feature.



The next mode is Echoes which is just like what it was back in the original version and then Ultimate Echoes, where special challenges can unlock some additional gameplay rules. In this mode there are different areas from the campaign that you are placed in where you can play it like an online competitive mode. The goal here is to rack up your score by using Skillshots. You need to try and acquire three stars to get the highest score possible so that you can see how you stack up against not only your friends but the entire world.

The other mode available to you is the multiplayer. There is your standard quick and private match options. There are 12 maps to choose from. Bulletstorm’s multiplayer here is sort of like a horde mode. You and up to three other friends can pick one of those 12 maps and work your way through waves of enemies. In addition to the normal Skillshot opportunities you can also use the environment to your advantage here. There was one time when playing on the Villa map that I was able to bring down an enormous bell that took out a decent number of enemies and it felt great being able to successfully pull that off. Going through this mode and grinding a bit will get you some more gear and some emotes so that you can customize your character a bit. It is a fun mode to play with friends and if you have enjoyed Horde mode-esque modes in other games then you should enjoy this one as well.



Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition is still a goofy, over-the-top good time. The story is fairly light but the main purpose of the game is to see how creative you can get with your kills. You can go through the campaign as the Duke (who will replace Grayson Hunt) which is a bit surreal but definitely has it’s cool moments. They didn’t completely rewrite the script for Duke’s inclusion which makes for some awkward moments and transitions but it is a nice little addition and Duke fans should get a kick out of seeing him and hearing some of his trademark phrases. It does need to be stated though that Duke Nukem was available for free as a pre-order bonus. If you didn’t pre-order the game then the Duke Nukem content will cost you $4.99. Overall Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition is a nice package. If you have played the original then you know exactly what to expect from the remaster. Whether or not it is worth the full price that they are asking is up to you to decide as there isn’t anything substantially different here but it does run a bit better and look better and you can also take advantage of all of the Xbox One’s social features as well.