Hunt: Showdown is the one game I keep returning to, whether a major update has happened or not. It possesses something so magnetic and magical that it continuously brings me back. And, while I cannot pinpoint what it is, I know that I will never get tired of it.
Many PVPVE games have come out over the industry’s long history. It’s a great formula. Chaotic, intense. It requires players to always be on edge and watch out not just for each other, but also for what the game itself throws at them. Hunt: Showdown is no different, as the PVE side of things sits at the very middle of its gameplay loop, with the PVP aspect added on top.
You’re put in the position of a hunter, a mercenary paid by shady organizations to go into accursed lands and slay the beasts within. Each run consists of looking for boss clues, locating the boss, slaying it, and extracting safely with the bounty. You can, at any time, be prevented from doing so by AI enemies dotted throughout its maps or, more commonly, other players.
It’s a PVP rush to complete PVE objectives, a functional formula allowing for two very different styles of gameplay to be combined.
What’s more, it removes that post-boss moment of respite players are used to. Take, for example, the Souls games or any similar title out there. Each boss defeat results in a cool new cutscene, a bonfire to rest at and take a breather, and a unique reward for your hard-fought battle.
But in Hunt: Showdown, no such thing exists. Beating a boss brings upon its arena an unbearable silence, one broken merely by the sound of the Banishing, with thunder lowly clapping and echoing throughout. It’s heavy, it’s atmospheric. You’ve completed a difficult challenge, fought the boss and won, but you remain in the thick of it, anticipating other players who all at once now know your position and are slowly but surely moving toward you.
Picking up the reward, the Bounty, additionally reveals your location every few seconds on the map, opening you up completely to the rest of the server. What’s more, each death of your hunter is permanent, meaning all their equipment and guns are lost on death, as well as their perks and progression, while you are forced to recruit a new one.
This level of looming danger is present constantly and gives the game an incredible vibe. One that, combined with its beautiful and haunting environments, simply cannot be found in other titles.
One-of-a-kind gunplay
Shooting a gun in Hunt: Showdown is not something to be taken lightly. Whenever you let one off, you’re giving a free signal to anyone in your vicinity that you’re just around the corner, either fighting others, the boss, or merely messing about. Any of these activities leaves you vulnerable, the gunshots attracting fight-savvy players to come and see if they could exploit your weakness.
And when the players do come or are encountered, you make use of some of the best gunplay ever conceived of in gaming. The guns are 19th-century-style, but modified with more advanced in-universe technologies that put them on a level just higher than their real-life counterparts.
Multiple ammo types and variations all play a significant role in how each particular gun functions, as do various melee weapons when things start to get dicey and personal.
Guns have weight, kickback, aren’t lasers and machine guns that can be pointed in a direction and shot with perfect precision. You have to be meticulous, conserve relatively scarce ammunition, properly aim and fire and never miscalculate. Everything depends on skillfully using any given weapon in the game, each of which opens up a world of possibilities and playstyles, from sneaky snipers to blazing shotgunners to battle-crazed swordsmen.
It’s almost the perfect game, built and refined over many years by the creative minds at Crytek who, with their fantastic Cryengine, have crafted a timeless experience which I will never have enough of.
What’s your take on Hunt: Showdown, Destructoid? Have you ever played it or plan to try it out? Do let me know below.
