Metal: Hellsinger

The rhythm shooter was, perhaps, inevitable. After all, a sense of timing and the ability to predict what’s coming next serve you equally well whether you’re lining up a head in your crosshairs or strutting your stuff on a Dance Dance Revolution machine.

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While Metal: Hellsinger is far from the first entry in this hybrid genre – recent years have brought us BPM, Audica and Pistol Whip – it might be the most high profile. This is in part due to the pedigree of Swedish developer The Outsiders, formed by Battlefield and Payday 2 veteran David Goldfarb, but also as a result of its musical genre. Because if the rhythm shooter was inevitable, one set to metal was surely a foregone conclusion.

There’s a lot of shared history, of course, stretching back to the formative years of the first-person shooter at id Software, with a shared love of the iconography of skulls and demons, and anything of an infernal nature. That legacy is evident as you’re led through the circles of this Hell, which after beginning in the land of the ice and snow, take in medieval structures and ruined industrial facilities that could pass for Mars, the colour palette cycling between Quake browns and Doom reds. Even more keenly felt, though, is the influence the latter series’ revival has had on the ebb and flow of combat.

With a density of incoming bullets that befits the setting, constant strafing is a necessity, with a dash and double-jump (afforded by the wings of your demonic avatar) ensuring you’re always in motion. Lost health, meanwhile, can be recouped through Slaughters – messy finishing moves that can be triggered on wounded enemies, sending you rushing in close to rip and tear until green orbs tumble out. So far, so Eternal. The difference is that all this must be done to the beat.