Warhammer 40K is having a bit of a moment in PC gaming. In addition to new modding tools for the smash hit Space Marine II, there’s a new game based on the excellent old-school Doom-style boomer shooter, Boltgun. It’s a typing “shooter” in the tradition of Typing of the Dead—and it’s free!
Boltgun: Words of Vengeance keeps the gory, pixelated, chunky 2.5D visuals of Boltgun, released in 2023. You’re a Space Marine wearing about four refrigerators’ worth of armor, on a planet infested with chaos demons and worshippers. You know what to do. But in this one, you can take your hand off the mouse and place it on those little dimples on the F and J keys instead. Your movement is on rails, so you just need to type the words as they appear above enemies to destroy them. Typing too slowly or making errors will cost you health and armor.
It’s a fun little exercise in the vein of Sega’s cult classic The Typing of the Dead, which got a generation of Dreamcast kids to buy a keyboard. Unfortunately, it’s not very long at just about 15 minutes—Typing of the Dead was basically a full-length reskin of the House of the Dead 2 lightgun game—but since it’s free on Steam and you don’t even need to own the original Boltgun to play it, the length is forgivable. It’s basically an advertisement for Boltgun 2, which is also on the way.
Warhammer fans will dig being able to actually shoot heretics by typing phrases like “heretical spawn,” and keyboard fans like me might appreciate the ability to put those WPM skills to more immediate use. Have fun, and remember: The Emperor protects.
