Metal: Hellsinger review − when Doom meets Guitar Hero

If the idea of a music-based shooter sounds weird to you, you’ve probably never played a Doom game before − that series has grown an icon status thanks to its legendary heavy metal OST. Metal: Hellsinger takes that combination of metal and guns, makes them smooch, and births a diabolical baby. 

Developed by The Outsiders, Metal: Hellsinger is an old-school FPS backed by rip-roaring, headbanging music. As in a Devil May Cry-styled action game, you’re tasked with not only playing, but playing well. Oh, and playing to the beat. This requires you to switch your mentality compared to traditional shooters, as you don’t simply need to progress through a level in order to “win” – you also want to dominate the leaderboards and land the perfect score. 

With good timing, you can rank your way through to a 16x score multiplier, and doing so makes your weapons more powerful and brings in each of the original musical track’s vocals. If you get shot or shoot out of time, your combo loses its intensity and the song gets back to its basics, down until the sole bass track.

Most of time, it’s easy to follow the pace of those songs, especially as the soundtrack is filled with bangers − bands are not involved, but singers from System of a Down, Arch Enemy (our favorite with “Stygia”), Trivium, Dark Tranquillity and Lamb of God, among the others, definitely are – and they’re such foot tappers that you’ll get into the right cadence without even noticing. The soundtrack really shines during boss fights, where they’re played at the 16x multiplier by default – it’s a bit of a shame they’re not very challenging, outside of the last two, but at least the final boss grants an absolutely epic ending to the game.

It’s not long before you find yourself counting the seconds between each shot so you can get the timing right, and you’ll naturally increase your tempo – and your fire rate – as the tracks get more intense. The game does a good job with that, dynamically switching between situations where you should follow a slower beat and a faster one throughout the same level.

All is music in Hellsinger, and doing anything in time – sprinting, shooting, reloading, slicing a demon up with your sword – rewards you. It’s a bit like playing a real instrument, at times.

Metal: Hellsinger has more than just music to it, though. It’s a full-fledged shooter, working exactly as you’d expect, with a good variety of enemies and weapons – the latter complete with extremely powerful special abilities. You might even say some of them are overpowered, but we’re here to have fun, right? Shooting is precise and reactive as you move your character around levels, especially with mouse and keyboard. It’s particularly exhilarating to quickly turn around while shooting, landing a headshot on the spin, perfectly on-beat, which is easier to do than it sounds. Truth to be told, the aiming assist feels generous, as it doesn’t demand exact precision, but like I said, we’re here to have fun, right? The weapons feel good, and that’s what matters.

Levels are linear, built around the concept of increasing your music’s momentum as quickly as possibly, and there’s no room for exploration nor gathering collectibles. While it’s in the tradition of boomer shooters, it feels refreshing after spending so much time doing Super Mario jumps in Doom Eternal. 

You’ll never meet overwhelming, Doom-like hordes, either, but you’ll still need to dash, jump, and constantly be on the move if you don’t want to get overwhelmed. At times, you’ll think you’ve dodged a shot, only to take one directly in the face, but that’s probably more an issue with my skill than the game.

Speaking of Doom’s inspirations, Glory Kill-style takedowns are available for you to instantly kill your enemies after a few shots. This rewards you with health items, but not ammo − switching guns here isn’t a result of dwindling resources, but a move of necessity, with each weapon in your arsenal tuned for a different kind of threat. Plus, you want to look stylish and rack up those combos.

The Outsiders put together a six-hour campaign, where the story – despite Troy Baker’s charisma as the narrator – is just in the background and never goes much further than a trivial premise and a rambling ending. On top of that, you can pour a few more hours into the game’s challenge mode. Whether you play it during your first run or later, it’s useful as it grants you with perks that make it easier to rack up combos. As for the challenges themselves, you’re tasked with getting rid of a series of enemies in small arenas, in limited amounts of time and with modifiers that rotate your weapons randomly or don’t allow you to restore your health.

But speaking of longevity misses the point with this game. The developer clearly wanted a Guitar Hero-styled experience in the shooter genre – a game where you play the same level multiple times just to improve your high score or simply listen to that song you love one more time. Get your friends to play and see who can come out on top. It’s perfect for Xbox Game Pass. 

In the current gaming landscape, it’s tough to come up with a memorable experience in the shooter space, but Metal: Hellsinger is a fancy idea seen from the outside, and one that entertains and simply works once you get to play. While the game leaves behind some gameplay and storytelling elements that could’ve been interesting to explore, it’s one that FPS and rhythm game fans, possibly with a bit of nostalgia for the good ol’ days, should definitely give a chance.

Written by Paolo Sirio on behalf of GLHF.