No! The heroine’s outbursts continue, epithets to go along with the epitaphs.

The points you earn for the kill and some sort of epitaph for whatever you just killed. The driving beat of the music reinforces that it’s not kidding around, goddammit.Įvery kill is accompanied by two things. Voice actress Isa And and her poor vocal cords give it their all. Every game opens with a goatse parting of the curtains and then a hoarse “let’s fuckin’ do this!” from the heroine who has a skull on the front of her gun. Bulletstorm’s profanity had an ironic hipster quality, but Tormenter X Punisher is nothing if not sincere. The gore, of course, paints the floor, but what videogamer notices gore anymore? The real attitude is the recurring fuck yous and cockfaces and whatnot. That says a lot about this game’s attitude.Īttitude bursts Tourettically from every moment of the short handful of minutes it takes to play a round. You reload it by shooting your other gun. How do you reload it? By firing the shotgun! Yep, that’s how Torment X Punisher deals with the downtime of an empty gun. The machinegun will eventually run out of ammo. Alternatively, you can fire your machinegun to spit bullets farther across the screen, but those kills only get you 100 points. You get 300 points for anything you kill, combos notwithstanding. It’s basic twin-stickery, without messing with health or ammo or weapon loadouts, and with its own rhythm. Otherwise, there are a couple of basic bad guys types and a random boss spawns every now and then. These pies seem to be the key to lasting longer than I tend to last, but I’ll have to get back to you on that. I’m guessing it’s one of those weapon upgrades. When the pie is full, something happens that I’m too busy not dying to notice. You fill in pie pieces when you do certain combos. The tutorial (ha ha, as if) says that you can “kill enemies in creative ways to earn upgrades”. This is a lean score-chase, as pared down and aesthetically focused as Devil Daggers.īut whereas Devil Daggers is a first-person shooter score-chase with some gimmickry hidden under the deceptive simplicity of just shooting stuff, Tormenter X Punisher is a top-down twin-stick shooter score-chase with some gimmickry hidden under the deceptive simplicity of just shooting stuff. You just start the game to play the one level with the one chick with the same two weapons every time. You don’t choose weapons, you don’t choose a secondary ability, you don’t choose which character to play, you don’t choose a level. If you take too long, it will begrudgingly show you a little cartoon intro. The title screen throbs with self-awareness and a steady beat like fingers drumming impatiently. At which point it doesn’t even ask you if you want to restart. Three or even four if you’re really good or lucky. It will last maybe two minutes if you’re good. It’s delivering a quick sharp jolt of gore, profanity, and arcade-induced dexterity. Unlike some dude burbling on in an attempt to write about this lean retro tantrum of game design, Tormenter X Punisher knows exactly what it’s doing. Because this is a review of Tormenter X Punisher, in which you go to planet Fuck You to shoot hundreds of demon things and get a high score. I had some stuff here about the glut of twin-stick shooter rogue-likes with retro graphics, the legacy of Doom, gameplay filler, and even a bit about female protagonists.

Tormentor x punisher