Warhammer 40K: Shootas, Blood and Teef is simple, frantic fun | Hands-on preview
Warhammer 40k’s representation of its Orks varies by property. If you watch the most recent Killteam trailer, for example, you’ll see a bunch of hulking, violent brutes that tear humans apart or melt them with flamethrowers. While this is technically the canon representation, they’re also often shown as burly lugheads with strong Cockney accents and a tendency to scream at everyone. Warhammer 40K: Shootas, Blood and Teef leans into the angry buffoon branch, and it’s all the better for it.
I joked in my review of Necromunda: Hired Gun that Warhammer have a big wall somewhere that they just throw ideas at, then make whatever sticks. I’m certain that at some point in the future they will have licensed a game in every genre. Warhammer 40K: The Dating Sim, Warhammer 40K: The Kart Racer…
Shootas, Blood and Teef transposes the action into a side-scrolling shooter-platformer with much the same degree of care for the source material as usual. It manages to capture enough of the quintessential Warhammer 40K DNA while still being wildly different to the other games that shelter under the same umbrella.
Refusing to take itself or its universe too seriously, Rogueside’s blaster is frenetic fun. It sees your green-skinned meathead loading up with his favourite murder toys and going after a powerful Warboss called Ogruk Gutrekka. Ogruk has stolen your special hair squig (yeah, we wondered about that, too), and you’re on a mission to get it back.
It’s all the context you need, really. In a bid to recover your beloved pet you’ll mow through armies of fellow Orks with your Slugga, Choppa and Boomstick, tearing enemies into inky squibs as you go.
The art is wonderful. Warhammer’s universe is too heavy metal to be referred to as “beautiful”, but Shootas, Blood and Teef has a nice art style. It’s all hand-drawn with muted colours, while the animation is fluid and cartoony. Blood and limbs fly around the screen, as explosions and gunfire stitch pretty, pretty lights across everything.
As for the actual gameplay – well, there’s not much to talk about. This is about as simple as you can get. You move from left to right, mowing through enemies that pour in from all angles. Squigs can be shot and collected for health refills, and you’ve got a variety of weapons and explosives to get the job done. And really, that’s kind of it.
We only played a very, very short slice of the full game for preview purposes, but it’s a very straightforward shooter. It’s unlikely to set the world on fire at launch, but if all you’re after is something to kill an hour or so at a time, Rogueside Games may well have you covered when Warhammer 40K: Shootas, Blood and Teef drops later this year.
Warhammer 40,000: Shootas, Blood & Teef is coming to PC later in 2022.
