''Bombshell'' is a

multidirectional shooter Shoot 'em ups (also known as shmups or STGs ) are a sub-genre of action games. There is no consensus as to which design elements compose a shoot 'em up; some restrict the definition to games featuring spacecraft and certain types of charac ...

developed by

Interceptor Entertainment Slipgate Ironworks ApS (formerly Interceptor Entertainment ApS and Slipgate Studios ApS) is a Danish video game developer based in Aalborg, founded in 2010 by Frederik Schreiber. History Interceptor Entertainment was founded in 2010 by mana ...

and published by

3D Realms 3D Realms Entertainment ApS is a video game publisher based in Aalborg, Denmark. Scott Miller (entrepreneur), Scott Miller founded the company in his parents' home in Garland, Texas, in 1987 as Apogee Software Productions to release his game ' ...

. The game was released on January 29, 2016, for Microsoft Windows. The game runs on

Unreal Engine 3 Unreal Engine (UE) is a 3D computer graphics game engine developed by Epic Games, first showcased in the 1998 first-person shooter game ''Unreal''. Initially developed for PC first-person shooters, it has since been used in a variety of genres ...

Plot

The game allows the player to control Shelly "Bombshell" Harrison, a

colonel Colonel (abbreviated as Col., Col or COL) is a senior military officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations. In the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, a colonel was typically in charge ...

in the Global Defense Force. Her career is abruptly brought to an end after an event titled "the Washington Incident", which caused her to lose her arm and her team. Shelly is then offered a new contract by a private military contractor and offered a second chance and a new mechanical arm.

Development

The game was conceived during

Gearbox Software Gearbox Software is an American video game development company based in Frisco, Texas. It was established as a limited liability company in February 1999 by five developers formerly of Rebel Boat Rocker. Randy Pitchford, one of the founders, s ...

's lawsuit against Interceptor regarding the video game ''Duke Nukem: Mass Destruction'', as they did not authorize any new development. Interceptor was working on the game for the PlayStation 4 and Microsoft Windows; however, due to a lawsuit by

, who owns the right to the Duke Nukem franchise, the game's name was changed to ''Bombshell'' and the main character was changed to Shelly Harrison, who was originally meant to play a supporting role in the

Duke Nukem ''Duke Nukem'' is a video game series named for its main character, Duke Nukem. Created by the company Apogee Software Ltd. (now 3D Realms) as a series of video games for personal computers, the series expanded to games released for various co ...

game. In April 2014, a website NoGumNeeded.com was launched by Interceptor Entertainment that showed a countdown. The game was revealed with the title ''Bombshell'' in development for Microsoft Windows and PlayStation 4 on May 14, 2014, along with a trailer and was scheduled to be released in 2015. Some details about the gameplay and the protagonist Shelly "Bombshell" Harrison were revealed in the announcement. It was also announced that the game utilised the

Unreal Engine Unreal Engine (UE) is a 3D computer graphics game engine developed by Epic Games, first showcased in the 1998 first-person shooter game '' Unreal''. Initially developed for PC first-person shooters, it has since been used in a variety of genr ...

and it will launch with modding tools. Due to the negative reception to the trailer, 3D Realms started the development of the game from scratch. The gameplay trailer was released on March 2, 2015, during

Game Developers Conference The Game Developers Conference (GDC) is an annual conference for video game developers. The event includes an expo, networking events, and awards shows like the Game Developers Choice Awards and Independent Games Festival, and a variety of tuto ...

. The

E3 2015 The Electronic Entertainment Expo 2015 (E3 2015) was the 21st E3 held. The event took place at the Los Angeles Convention Center in Los Angeles, California. It took place from June 16 to June 18, 2015, with 52,200 total attendees. Major exhibit ...

trailer was released on June 25, 2015. On July 23, a ten-minute long video showing gameplay of the game was released during

QuakeCon QuakeCon is a yearly convention held by ZeniMax Media to celebrate and promote the major franchises of id Software and other studios owned by ZeniMax. It includes a large, paid, bring-your-own-computer (BYOC) LAN party event with a competitive ...

2015. On August 27, a game trailer of the boss battle against "Zeroth Guardian" was released during

PAX Prime PAX (originally known as Penny Arcade Expo) is a series of gaming culture festivals involving tabletop, arcade, and video gaming. PAX is held annually in Seattle, Boston and Philadelphia in the United States; and Melbourne in Australia. PAX w ...

2015. In January 2016, the game's voice cast was announced, including Valerie Arem as Bombshell and Duke Nukem voice actor

Jon St. John Jon St. John (born December 19, 1960) is an American voice actor, former radio personality and ordained minister. He is best known for his voice roles such as Duke Nukem in the ''Duke Nukem'' video game series and Big the Cat and E-123 Omega ...

as Professor Jadus Heskel. The release of the Windows version of the game was delayed to January 29, 2016, so as to give additional time for the developer to fix

bugs Bugs may refer to: * Plural of bug Arts, entertainment and media Fictional characters * Bugs Bunny, a character * Bugs Meany, a character in the ''Encyclopedia Brown'' books Films * ''Bugs'' (2003 film), a science-fiction-horror film * ''Bugs ...

Reception

GameSpot ''GameSpot'' is an American video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information on video games. The site was launched on May 1, 1996, created by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. In addition ...

awarded it a score of 2.0 out of 10, calling it a "buggy, bland game with some of the worst writing you're likely to hear in some time." Hardcore Gamer rated the game a 2 out of 5 saying "What once began as something that had potential to become a so-stupid-it's-awesome classic ended up being merely... well, it isn't even really that stupid as a whole, just dull."

PC Gamer ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games m ...

awarded it 30%, saying "An ction role-playing gamewith weak combat and too many bugs, ''Bombshell'' isn't worth your click-click-clicks."

IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa dist ...

rated the game 6.9 out of 10 saying the game "''Bombshell'' is a fast-paced, energetic, deliberately absurd action shooter that's mostly competent at everything it tries to do". Leo Espada of GoneWithTheWin rated it 6/10 and stated, "Bombshell features a solid core of combat mechanics, visual design, and a genius soundtrack. It is light on the RPG side, with little depth to sink your teeth into". It has a score of 44% on

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

Legacy

A prequel for Harrison's story, entitled ''

Ion Fury ''Ion Fury'' (originally titled ''Ion Maiden'') is a 2019 cyberpunk first-person shooter video game developed by Finnish studio Voidpoint and published by 3D Realms. It is a prequel to the 2016 video game '' Bombshell''. ''Ion Fury'' runs on a m ...

'', was developed by Voidpoint and released in 2019 by

. It uses an updated version of the original

Build engine Build Engine is a first-person shooter engine created by Ken Silverman, author of ''Ken's Labyrinth'', for 3D Realms. Like the ''Doom'' engine, the Build Engine represents its world on a two-dimensional grid using closed 2D shapes called sector ...

. Harrison will also appear in the upcoming game '' Phantom Fury''. This game serves as sequel to Ion Fury and it being developed by Interceptor Entertainment.

References

External links

* {{Portal bar, Video games 2016 video games 3D Realms games Alien invasions in video games Amputees in video games Cancelled PlayStation 4 games Military science fiction video games Multidirectional shooters Single-player video games Unreal Engine games Video games about bomb disposal Video games about cyborgs Video games developed in Denmark Video games featuring female protagonists Video games scored by Andrew Hulshult Windows games Windows-only games Slipgate Ironworks games