It’s not every day that a roguelike completely takes me by surprise, but I can safely say as much for Gunhead. A mech-based first-person shooter where you glide around a randomly generated alien spacecraft, there’s a little bit of Borderlands in the art style and Titanfall 2 in gameplay, even if does do something wildly different from what I was expecting.
Immediately after picking up the Gunhead demo on Steam, I was thrown by how good it feels to control the mech. You’re darting around small spaces while using dashes and jetpacks to get around, firing four different weapons at once, making for a positively chaotic FPS game. With the weapon options and speed on offer, it feels like a lighter and more fast-paced version of Titanfall 2.
You’ll be fighting around these small interconnected rooms in Gunhead a lot, which is where the roguelike element comes into this FPS. Randomly generated alien spaceships will need to be navigated so you can destroy their central system core, and you can see the layout ahead of time and plan out your build, with 50 weapons to choose from and a number of mechs to unlock (in the full game at least) for some sweet variety.
It’s a simple premise, sure, but I was really impressed by how good it felt to control your mech in Gunhead. It doesn’t have the same weight as a Titanfall mech, but there’s something so satisfying about the movement on offer.
Gunhead’s cel shading also brought me back to Borderlands very quickly, as it combines an almost comic book aesthetic with bright colors and plenty of different sci-fi elements. As one of PCGamesN’s big roguelike fans, the Gunhead demo has definitely got me interested in what the full game has to offer.
You can try Gunhead for free via a Steam demo right now, with the full release coming to the Valve platform on Wednesday, November 8.
In the meantime, we’ve also put together breakdowns of the best roguelike games and space games currently available on PC, if Gunhead has you scratching a specific itch.
