If, like me, you were very much interested in My Friend Pedro off the back of its surprise showing at E3 last year, you may be a little disappointed to discover that it isn’t quite the dual-wielding slow motion ballet that presentation would have you to believe. But, you’ll realise that’s probably most likely for the best.

You see, all that is there. Jumping and spinning to avoid gunfire, and returning bullets in two directions at once is still a large part (and it is always impressive and makes you feel like a Big Man) of the game, but it isn’t as relentless as shown. There are platforming sections. Lasers to avoid. A bizarre level where you have a propellor hat so can effectively fly. A section on a motorbike. Door and trapdoor opening puzzles. Lots of things, in fact.

Also perhaps a surprise is how the game is actually geared towards score combo and high score arcade type play. On Normal mode, the game isn’t very difficult, checkpoints are frequent, and it’s very forgiving with plenty of aim assist and reminders to dodge bullets if you’d forgotten. It’s running through quickly, cleanly, and seeking out every baddie that nets you the big points, so the three or four hours length is mostly irrelevant. Now, I’m not a score chaser generally so that doesn’t really interest me, but the game is still great anyway.

Many people wondered how the dual aiming would work, worrying the game would be on-rails if the two analogue sticks were busy, but in fact it’s pretty simple – you lock on to one foe first, then you are free to target a second and can shoot both together. It works well, but it turns out that it isn’t used as frequently as you maybe thought. Indeed, later weapons aren’t even dual-wieldable.

So it might not be quite what I was expecting, or perhaps I’d say hoping for, but in fact it seems the game knew what I really actually wanted more than I did because the deviations from the original reveal videos are welcome and I suspect too much of the same thing would have made it a bit of a chore. It’s definitely recommended if you want what could be described as Olli Olli only Bulletstorm, but even if you’re not after a score attack game it’s funny and stylish and unusual enough to warrant a purchase anyway.

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