Cultic

Дата публикации: 23-07-2026 09:00:00

The one-man-army. It's partly a concept, a trope, but also precisely what lies at the heart of this first-person shooter, which fully grasps what the genre is all about - without, for that matter, taking the easy and entirely obvious route. Developed by a single passionate individual (Jason Smith) with a flair for the "boomer shooter" sub-genre, this is a genuine and faithful retro feast, as well as a throwback to the good old days when the main character, Caleb from Blood, vied for Duke Nukem's favour in a duel to see who had the best one-liners, the heaviest guns and the most hidden surprises. Here, however, you'll get few witty punchlines, but everything else and more besides.
<bild>People are mysteriously disappearing... and turning up in piles of brown goo.</bild>
3D Realms is the publisher, and the game goes to great lengths to both tie together and unravel the legacy of a bygone era. The game was originally released back in 2022 on PC and has built up a reputation amongst those who appreciate this kind of retro-inspired bloodshed. Now, four years later, it's coming to consoles. Perhaps you've tried other similar tributes over the years, such as {Prodeus}, {Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun} - or, for that matter, {Ion Fury}? Brilliant games, with just the right touch of humour. {Cultic} is built on exactly the same basic formula. And that does the genre justice - because who cares that it's an older title by today's standards when it's making its debut on other platforms in 2026, when it's quite clearly paying homage to an era and a visual style that doesn't for a second try to be Unreal Engine or stand out through ray tracing and the latest cutting-edge graphics technology.
<bild>A headshot is your best friend - just like a Zippo and a Winchester.</bild>
If we're to summarise the story briefly, it's neither particularly groundbreaking nor, for that matter, unique. I'd call it quasi-spectacular, and familiar. You wake up in a pile of mutilated bodies, but you're not quite sure what's going on, other than that a satanic cult is running riot in the streets. The game's intro tugs at heartstrings reminiscent of {Resident Evil}, with abductions and strange occurrences, and certainly the game does get eerie in places (especially in the darker sections) even though I rarely find myself particularly frightened. It blends the occult with body horror and a dash of the paranormal, mixed with a touch of detective work in a small town where nothing is quite right. That's enough, and it's reason enough for us to get going. After all, it's the guns that take centre stage.
The combat in {Cultic} is a mixed bag - it's equal parts old-school and more modern innovations. A weapon wheel where time slows down? Check. Sliding along the ground and tackles that paralyse opponents? Check on that one too. This is also where the game's charm lies, as it effectively blends a 16-colour bolognese with more contemporary gameplay mechanics. It's deliberately drawn from several eras, so don't be put off by the fact that it looks as though someone's opened a tin of brown beans and hurled them at full force towards your expensive 4K screen. The pixels that make up the enemies and terrain can be counted on one hand in close-up, but you can't really criticise this entirely deliberate choice and claim that the graphics are a failure. It's a tribute, it's a highly deliberate nod to retro aesthetics, and the game is certainly not boring to play.
<bild>The devil in the hole... and the fire in the sky. We need something of a heavier calibre here.</bild>
As well as tackling my enemies and leaving them stunned, I can drag my bolt-action rifle along the ground and fire broadside from the hip using my secondary fire to create a slow-motion effect where I chain off headshots, with heads exploding like water balloons, which feels both new and familiar. Or, for that matter, when I generously throw dynamite (or choose to unleash these taped clusters for a wider effect, or combine it with a Molotov cocktail). Well, then most things in front of me detonate and burn, with the corpses spinning towards my camera angle like the sprites of dead goo that they are.
Because this is, after all, where you want to end up - it's not about rewriting old rules, it's about honouring them, but with added modern gameplay innovations. Your torch that lights up the environment? It also flickers in the direction of secrets hidden within the environment - but at the same time, you can only fire one-handed weapons, which also applies when you're carrying a riot shield, which you can also use to smash skulls in with. It's well-balanced and delivers a satisfying punch in every shot, and the levels where the occult unfolds? They're absolutely massive, which initially shocked me with hours-long ordeals and hundreds of enemies. {Quake}-style levels that can be completed in 50 seconds? You won't find any of those here.
<bild>The levels are vast, offering different approaches to tackling them - as well as a myriad of clever ways to both blow up and set fire to anything that moves.</bild>
I also appreciate the fact that the game hasn't been designed with a maze of narrow corridors; most battles can be tackled from alternative angles and nooks, as the battlefields often lend themselves to different strategies depending on how you approach them. You can sneak past, but you can also go round the side or attack from above - or simply go in guns blazing from the front. The choice is often yours. The game also features classic 'weapon workbenches' where you can upgrade your arsenal, with options such as faster firing rates, perhaps more powerful ammunition with greater impact, or added gameplay effects that often involve slowing down time. Everyone knows that slow motion is a thing of the past - but it's always welcome - especially when there are only two shots left in a double-barrelled shotgun and four angry enemies on screen, where the angle works in your favour if you line up the shots correctly.
<bild>Dynamite and mystery.</bild>
It certainly doesn't adhere to any conventions, whether for the first-person genre or the classic 'boomer shooter' - but it's not boring to play either, and it's hard to criticise the game for its visual style, even though it looks like... brown, grey and dead meat that's rotted and been tossed in barbecue seasoning, then left in the sun to cook. The enemy roster, on the other hand, could have done with more variety; as a rule, you're shooting at differently coloured figures armed in slightly different ways, with the odd surprise in the form of heavier cavalry who reel you in with meat hooks and throw bear traps about, as well as a handful of other satanic abominations that can jump just as fast and far as the flayed variants from {Half-Life 2} and Ravenholm, as well as various ghostly enemies with abilities I'll leave you to discover for yourself.
Here, I would have liked to see a bit more variety to offer more interesting battles with greater dynamism. The environments, too, could have benefited from a slightly different colour palette a bit more often, for the sake of variety - because although they are certainly vast in scale and offer slightly different strategic routes to the same objective, interspersed with simpler puzzles, you can end up with tunnel vision and your eyes start to tire after a while. However, it's well worth exploring every nook and cranny, as hidden within the terrain are, of course, the usual secrets and secluded rooms that are part and parcel of the concept.
<bild>Everything turns red in the end - especially when you upgrade your arsenal with new abilities.</bild>
{Cultic} is 'new-old' - for want of a better term. It takes a classic approach to the genre, including the visuals, and spices it up with rhythmic modern touches. It's no revolution, it's no evolution - it's good old fun and classic carnage, seen through the eyes and passion of a devoted fan of the genre. The console version includes all the content released to date - both Chapter 1 and 2, as well as a survival mode. It's many hours of gameplay packaged in a brown box with red laces - which I consider to be both timeless and modern at the same time.
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