Ultrakill simply put is a masterpiece hybrid of modern FPS conventions and retro fps conventions, mixed with a bit of devil may cry. A game that emphasises movement and bloodlust in equal measure. While it can seem like the game is constantly at a breakneck pace, ULTRAKILL isn't so. An excellently paced experience that does let you breath and take in it's level design and descent into it's world. Sometimes i don't feel like i'm doing it justice to articulate how solid the game is and it's not even done. There are fully released games that don't get to anywhere near the luster that ULTRAKILL does.

The combat at first glimpse seems delightfully simple, somewhat similar to what you might be familiar with Doom Eternal. Humanity is Dead, only leaving behind husks, demons and angels. Killing enemies gives you blood, blood is fuel : Health. Hell is full : full of blood. Each enemy added presents a unique challenge to the player and their tools, some are vulnerable to ricochet shots. Some are more vulnerable to high amounts of burst damage. You are nearly always presented with the problem first before having the solution. It makes having each option open up to you immensely gratifying. Each weapon is fantastically unique in each of it's firing modes, some are barely weapons at all but instead options to enhance your movement which allows you to reach higher rankings or speedrun the level. Best of all they are all immensely cool to pull off at their optimal execution. It's not like Doom Eternal where it feels kinda good, the weapon feedback in this game is rewarded with an enormous gush of blood and explosions. It's just hard to top that and it makes you want to perform at your best at every chance you can. Chiefly above all, killing with style is rewarded the most. Be unconventional. Shake it up. It can be tempting to projectile boost your shotgun blasts with parries but shaking up your strategy is rewarded constantly.

It leaves an immense skillgap between a novice player and a really skilled one with people doing insane strats like throwing all your coins with the sharpshooter revolver and combining it with a railgun projectile. Instantly turning the nearest enemy into a shower of gibs. Or Fastcoining where you switch your weapons to reset the cooldown between cointhrows meaning you can nail that railcoin faster.

Enemies are FAST on high difficulties with blisteringly fast projectiles. Timing a melee punch (using your feedbacker) allows you to deflect that projectile and is a feature that can be abused with many weapons. Have you ever punched your own shotgun blast to make it explode? Have you ever punched a coin to humiliate an enemy and reset it's airtime or used it to send a death laser right back into their face? Have you parried the fist of a corpse god right back into his face? There are so many things that can be parried, a staggering amount. Sometimes you'll be surprised it was even possible. All it takes is timing. I think the only exceptions are hitscan projectiles. If all of this sounds like you can get away with lot, do not be mistaken. This game is hard, really really hard on it's current hardest difficulty. The Bosses especially and they actively need to be considered with their strategies. Of course this becomes trivial on an easier difficulty and i actually recommend to go through the game on Harmless first for fun and also to get a basic gist of what the game has going for you.

Movement. You can move ungodly fast in this game if you know what you are doing, skipping entire sections of levels or turning bosses into laughing stocks. You obtain tools later on in the game to facilitate this greatly. It also helps immensely because moving fast means you get hit less. It's your main form of defence in this game. Boost. Slide around enemies. Jumpkick your way up walls. I'm not going to spoil all the ways you can turn yourself into a speeding bullet unlike the combat. It can be just as advanced as combat at times and rewards practice. This is only of the only fps shooter games i can think of recently where i've felt compelled to constantly practice to achieve better results for higher scores.

The story is remarkably simple. Humanity is Dead. Blood is Fuel. Hell is Full. It's essentially Dante. I'm not going to be spoiling the major plot beats because they are best presented by the game itself. My words aren't going to do it justice. Traveling through each layer of hell with it's own unique environment and each is different from the last sometimes in drastic ways. Secrets litter each level ranging from giving you secret orbs that open up more weapon skins to full blown secret levels that are gimmicks in of themselves most of the time but the ones most people rave about are the hardest content in the game. Sometimes entire weapons or weapon modes are locked behind these secrets. It really does reinforce replaying the game over and over to learn them all. Sometimes a secret that opens a shortcut or a faster way to get an encounter started can be found. The game is full of secrets like these. It's a game with a remarkable amount of spirit and while the game's concept can be overwhelmingly hopeless, it isn't. It always has a neat little secret that puts a smile on your face or a moment of contemplation that makes you reflect on the world that it's trying to portray. How did everything get this bad? It also has such an element of fun and spirit through it's little jokes here and there that it gives you a great sense of levity even though you are essentially playing through a demon angel genocide at the hands of a homicidal robot at the end of the world. It's a game about living first and foremost and constantly improving yourself and overcoming the metaphorical dragon of difficulty. Reflect in failure even on the most humiliating death. The game wants you to get better.

The Music keeps up with the pace of the game perfectly from the old timey tunes of the upgrade vending machine to the intense high octane tunes of the cybergrind arena. It's fully in tune with the game itself. The little voice acting there is, is absolutely fantastic to the point that people will constantly quote them over and over. I can't remember the last time that i had to blink twice to being called "an insignificant ♥♥♥♥" or obtain mild ptsd from hearing "JUDGEMENT". The little things from even turning an entire room into blood and explosions to the rippling sound of a railgun projectile deflecting off several coins at once or the crash of a overloaded charge shotgun followed by the perfectly timed grind of a slide onto the ground. It's just perfect. The game can even be decently atmospheric, the melancholy sounds of Claire De Lune as you slide along the ground, only broken by the simple click clack of your servos leading into a jump.

I can understand some who are expectantly waiting for a full release of ULTRAKILL but even before i bought or even tried the demo. The universe seemed singularly focused onto getting me to play this game. It ended up in my youtube recommendations even though i never touched the game or searched it. It was on my twitter feed more times than i could count. People would recommend the game to me over and over again. This game is the exception to my personal early access rule of "Play the game when it's done." The product as it is so overwhelmingly strong if you enjoy fps shooters in general even at an incomplete state that it's one of the strongest recommends that i've ever given in my 140 review record on steam. If you aren't into this type of shooter then it's a much more lukewarm recommendation but considering the price and what you are getting out of it. It's an excellent deal. (£20 for me.)I rarely ever feel so strongly that i love a game but this one is one that i can comfortably say that.