Serious Sam: The First Encounter

Just look at that box art. That's a manly game right there. If that wasn't enough to make you want the game, I'll go on.

Let me explain where I am stuck right now in this game. I have a gigantic green dragon-like thing that shoots green fireballs at me. They home in on me and if I dodge them they'll circle around and try again. I can shoot the fireballs to destroy them, but they're fired at you pretty rapidly. In the meantime, I havea giant bull that runs at me trying to gore me. I also have crazy suicide bombers that run at me screaming to try to kill me. I need to shoot the bull in the face to kill it. I need to shoot the bombers before they get within range of me. I need to shoot the green fireballs. And I need to shoot the green dragon-like thing so that he'll STOP shooting green fireballs at me and I can continue the level (this isn't an end boss or anything). If I get caught by any single one of these objects, I die. If you're afraid of challenge, or in other words a wuss, stay away from this one. If you're a real man, though, get ready for an awesome FPS.

The underlying game is basically Doom. Walk around, shoot everything you see, keep going until the end of the level. There's also no annoying key cards to collect like in Doom. If there's a story, I don't care because I skip the cutscenes to get to the action. And oh boy is there action! The game is great about throwing a ton of stuff at you, all the time. This is a game where you need to dodge stuff to survive. The action is fast and furious and it hardly ever lets up. You'll be bunnyhopping, dodging left and right while shooting frantically at anything you see, and constantly looking over your shoulder to check other threats. The dodging also feels like it's ripped right out of a shmup. You can see the bullets the other guys shoot at you and you'll be dodging them, and believe me there's some fun stuff to dodge. There's also powerups, armor, and ammo lying around everywhere. This is a hardcore action-packed FPS for people with quick reflexes. If you have the reflexes of a spayed kitten, you are going to die. It's the fun kind of death though. The kind you wish you would have in real life. I don't know about you, but I'd love to be killed by a missile launched from a giant red scorpion as I try to gun down it and all its friends with a shotgun. What a eulogy that would be! "We'll miss him, but wow, that must be one of the most awesome deaths I have ever heard of in my life. He'll be happy to know that giant red scorpion with the missile launcher died from loss of blood just minutes after we finished picking up Kevin's pieces from the floor. Who's up for some cheesecake?"

I like cheesecake.