Over the last decade, AAA developers have basically stopped releasing FPS games except for established franchises like DOOM and Call of Duty. If you mostly focus on that side of things, you would be forgiven for believing the genre is on its deathbed… rather than in the middle of a new golden era. Smaller and indie developers have taken up the shooter mantle, and they just refuse to stop releasing great games!
Every year, we get a few brilliant FPS games that either push the genre forward or serve as loving tributes to the past, but you need to be tapped into this part of the industry to really notice any of these masterpieces. Occasionally, something like Trepang2 might slip into the mainstream, but that is the exception and not the rule.
Anybody really into FPS games will probably recognize some of these titles, but they are quite obscure, even more so than stuff like Turbo Overkill and Echo Point Nova. Hopefully, you find something new to enjoy.
ADACA Pulls From The FPS Genre’s Greats
Perfect For Fans Of Half-Life 2 Or Open-World Survival Games
- A solo developer project (Siris Pendrake).
- An absurdly generous demo that includes the entire first episode.
- Steam page for ADACA.
The accomplishments of solo devs never cease to amaze me.
Famously, Bright Memory: Infinite was largely developed by a single person, and that’s one of the more exciting shooters of the early 2020s. Honestly, ADACA deserves to stand alongside Bright Memory as a showcase of the heights a single person can reach, though it offers a very different experience. Combining a Half-Life 2 campaign with an extra sandbox mode, this project comes with an absurd amount of content, and you can sample a lot of it in the demo.
Split into three episodes that each last a couple of hours, the campaign mode drops you on a mysterious alien planet filled with military factions, security units, and mutant-esque creatures. With no cutscenes, ADACA relies on environmental storytelling and exploration to set the stage, along with some pretty impressive set-pieces. Along with plenty of guns, the combat revolves around an always-equipped gravity gun, which opens up many possibilities for manipulating enemies and the environment.
Is that not enough? Well, how about an open-world mode that acts more like a survival game? Well, ADACA also comes with Zone Patrol, and you can easily drop more hours in this mode than the campaign.
Boomerang X Proves A Great FPS Game Needs No Guns
Perfect For Fans Of Neon White, Ultrakill, And DOOM Eternal
Technically, Boomerang X isn’t an FPS game because it contains exactly 0 guns, with the eponymous weapon representing your entire arsenal. However, that’s really just being pedantic, and this first-person thrower very much fits the modern shooter genre. DANG built an entire campaign around an unconventional weapon, offering 5 hours of consistently brilliant action with no fluff.
Obviously, you don’t just have a normal four-point blade, as this one comes with a few neat tricks. After throwing the boomerang, players can warp instantly to its location, meaning they can pretty much fly by just constantly throwing it higher in the air. Aiming the blade slows down time, allowing for the perfect shot or an opportunity to read the room. These two mechanics are simple to understand but come with high ceilings that encourage experimentation.
You feel like a boss when you master Boomerang X.
Click on the game with the higher OpenCritic rating.
Sprawl Feels So Good To Play
Perfect For Fans Of Trepang2, Ghostrunner, Titanfall 2, And F.E.A.R. (Minus The Horror Elements)
- Nothing beats a perfect wall-run leap into a vertical shootdown.
- Developed by MAETH.
- Steam page for SPRAWL.
Do you prefer your movement shooters to have guns? Great! As Steam has roughly a billion games that fit, let’s go with a title that doesn’t get that much attention: SPRAWL.
A cybernetic shooter that doesn’t know the meaning of “slow down,” SPRAWL doesn’t just make shooting feel great, but also every single moment out of it. The gameplay loop is built around vertical movement, momentum, wall-running, and bullet time, all of which combine to create an incredibly satisfying core moveset. Naturally, the game features some pretty cool and dangerous weapons that can smash through enemies, at least in the first half of the campaign.
Moving fast doesn’t mean all that much if you barely hit the target, and SPRAWL also kind of functions like a precision shooter. Using bullet time, we can dismember enemies, which rewards ammo and health packs (and a boost to our ego).
Northern Journey Is The Only HappySad FPS Game
Perfect For Fans Of STALKER And Thief
Play enough FPS games, and they begin to blend together in your memory. However, I can safely say that shouldn’t happen with Northern Journey, which stands as one of the most singular recent entries in the genre. With absolutely zero military or even sci-fi tropes, this 2021 title drops you in a Norwegian folk horror tale that blends beauty and dread, aka “HappySad,” as described by the developer.
The lack of FPS conveniences extends to your weapons, as you shoot slingshots and crossbows instead of pistols and assault rifles. Also, no crosshair aim assists, lengthy reload animations, slow weapons, and projectile arcs make for a combat system that demands discipline and foresight rather than just quick reflexes. To balance the relatively deliberate weapons, you move at a blistering pace, similar to modern movement shooters.
While the medieval weaponry and eerie atmosphere might suggest a first-person action game, Northern Journey is fundamentally afirst-person shooter, albeit one with an adventure atmosphere.
Hedon Bloodrite Comes With Two Awesome Games In One
Perfect For Fans Of Hexen, Unreal, Blood, And Arx Fatalis
Created in the legendary GZDoom engine, Hedon Bloodrite wears its throwback influences on its sleeve to an extent, but it doesn’t settle for being a copy of long-time greats like Blood or Hexen. Although sold as episodes, this package basically includes two games that are both long enough to stand on their own.
- Hedon: The Crystal Heart – Originally released as just Hedon, the first game/episode follows a strict linear dungeon-crawler formula, with corridors leading to small arenas filled with aggressive enemies.
- Hedon Bloodrite – Although the core gameplay is mostly the same, Bloodrite switches to surprisingly expansive hub levels with towns, NPCs, merchants, and quests. To be honest, this change seems fairly polarizing because it results in a completely different experience, but it is executed fairly well.
Level design alterations aside, both Hedon episodes feature heavy-hitting weapons that embrace its crystal punk setting. As enemies hit hard and kill you quickly, you need to rely on weapons that can take multiple targets at once or provide one-hit kills, causing you to always feel both vulnerable and absurdly powerful.
Oh, the protagonist is a female orc. How many FPS games can claim that?
