KeelWork’s strikingly opulent shooter dares to do new things with its genre in an effort to unite players of every level. This is what a blockbuster shooter should look like.
Arcade shooting games are, in truth, about fragility. Despite their reputation as gaming’s most furious, excessive form, they almost universally place you at the controls of a weaponised weakling; a vessel that disintegrates after the briefest contact with a single enemy bullet.
That’s not the case with Cygni: All Guns Blazing, a new shooter that insists it’s OK to take dozens of enemy hits and stay in the game. That might sound like a reckless inversion of what makes the genre so special and rewarding. However, Scottish developer KeelWorks appears to have been meticulous in its subtle revolution of what a shooting game can be – and who it can serve. There’s even an argument to be made that Cygni proposes a vision of what a blockbuster shooter could be; namely staggeringly polished, technically muscular, and able to welcome and impress a vast mainstream audience.
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