Playing 150 Boomer Shooters #1 – 420BLAZEIT2 GAME OF THE YEAR -=Dank Dreams and Goated Memes=- [#wow11 Like and Subscribe] Poggerz Edition – From /r/BoomerShooters

I can’t possibly think of a worse title to start this journey on, but here we are.

I scoured the Steam store under the Boomer Shooter tag and compiled a list of 150 boomer shooters that I plan on playing through, at least until I get through 5 and then abandon the project in classic fashion. Most of them review well, as let’s face it – nobody has time to sit through 100 bad shooters. I intentionally omitted games I’ve played through all the way before, so no Doom or Quake this time around. I’m also going through them alphabetically. Which means…

Yes, that is the full title. We’re literally one game in and already will almost certainly spark fierce debate as to what ‘boomer shooter’ even means. Because let’s face it; aesthetically, this is a zoomer shooter. It’s completely saturated with meme culture all the way down to its core. Every time you pick up a powerup? Memes flood the screen. Get a headshot? Memes flood the screen. Environmental kill? Yeah, you get the idea. You can actually set this to be as unintrusive as possible, or crank it up to be TEN TIMES WORSE than default. I left the slider exactly where it was, as I feel eschewing this obnoxious feature would go against the spirit of the game.

Admittedly, 420BLAZEIT2 (there is no 1 as far as I can tell) delivers a fairly rancid first impression. The intro level feels like a very by-the-numbers shooter, except with an unbearable level of memery that exceeds the point of satire and goes straight into a living hell. The gunplay works. It’s fine. Nothing feels off about it. But I got the early idea that this game is focused almost solely on the gimmick. Like trying to intentionally create a Bad Rats esque experience for the sake of going viral. (Albeit far more functional than Bad Rats) But the total sensory overload was a bitter pill to swallow.

To my surprise, as I groaned and continued on, I gradually found myself becoming more and more surprised at how many genuinely fun ideas were implemented. Yes, the meme culture is an inescapable stench, but things quickly turned around and become legitimately entertaining. For instance, one level revolves around collecting as much cash as possible, including an absurd portion where you’re prompted to shoplift. As you continue to steal merchandise, you eventually begin stealing the walls, creating level breaking geometry (or lack thereof) as textures begin to disappear. Or the single rail shooter level where you have to water your tiny car to grow it to full size and then embark on a wild car chase to your job at a fast food restaurant. These moments of pure surrealism honestly saved the day.

There’s a solid weapon variety as well, with weapons as basic as the ‘shitty pistol’ to legally distinct versions of the old standards (.mp3 instead of MP4, bad guy rifle instead of AK-47) as well as goofier things such as throwable blunts that instantly disintegrate enemies or a trash gun. Shaped like a blunderbuss, but shoots out giant hunks of trash. Like most games that incorporate silly weapons, you’ll probably just wind up sticking with whatever the most effective fully auto dakka dakka gun you can find is. Me, personally though, I liked the melee weapons. They’re very poorly balanced with the ability to infinitely block bullets with RMB and then go in for what is usually a 1 or 2 hit kill with LMB. You can clear most levels with these, and it’s a total breeze.

There’s even a bit of replayability in case the assault on all of your senses wasn’t enough by the time you’re done. (I probably beat the game in 3 hours or less) Every mission has a series of checklist challenges, and beating them all unlocks powerful weapon variants that you can take into any level. I didn’t do all of these, as despite having fun, I was developing a bit of a headache at just how loud and spastic the entire experience was. But it’s genuinely nice that the developers bothered to give you a carrot on a stick beyond just ‘here, play these ridiculous levels and then tell your friends that this game is silly’.

So yeah. Despite initially having a really bad feeling about it, 420BLAZEIT2 wound up being a remarkably fun and mercifully short little romp that got some legitimate laughs out of me, despite my early annoyance with the premise. Is it a boomer shooter? I mean, in the way that it’s full of power ups and is generally fast paced, sure. But the presentation may cause the average boomer’s head to cleave itself in two under the pressure of pure concentrated stupidity. But hey, that’s the point. There’s nothing cerebral here, and I’d say the final outcome is probably ‘the good ending’ of what this could have been.

Next up: 77p egg: Eggwife. I have a terrible feeling that I’m in for more of the same.