The Official PlayStation 2 Magazine played a pivotal part in generating hype for EA/Criterion’s 2006 first-person shooter Black. They claimed it would progress the shooter genre significantly, comparing its shootouts to Burnout’s crashes – every bullet had the potential to ricochet, bouncing off surfaces and into explosive barrels, causing unforeseen chain reactions. For the most part, Black made good on its promises, and while fans have long requested a sequel, it’s something that has never happened.
Enter Trepang2 – which isn’t a sequel despite the name. It’s a gory shooter forged from ideas found in noughties shooters; Black included. You’ll also notice inspiration from FEAR, and maybe Crysis too.
Visually, it resembles all three of these when it comes to art direction – complete with a slight sci-fi slant courtesy of Crysis – only it’s far more contemporary, recalling a mid-PS4/Xbox One era Call of Duty. Considering this in an indie title, that isn’t as damning as it may sound. In fact, it’s a compliment. It runs like greased lightning, has some remarkably brief loading screens, and you’ll soon notice its penchant for particle effects with even a single shotgun blast temporarily obscuring the action with glowing bullet trails and flaming embers.
The premise allows for supernatural elements – hence the FEAR comparison. We’re thrust into the bloodstained boots of Subject 106, a survivor of inhumane experiments. Now free of their shackles – with their escape sequence acting as a tutorial – they join a task force located at an undisclosed safe house and set about investigating anomalies at black sites. Should said anomalies fall into the wrong hands, the consequences could be world-changing. Consequently, the stakes are high.
Developers Trepang Studios (yes, they named themselves after their debut title – how’s that for confidence?) has dialed down realism to allow for an experience that constantly entertains. The best example of this is the physics – our battle-scarred soldier can slide along the floor, toppling shield-carrying enemies, and grab foes before throwing them through the air or off ledges. Together with a slow-mo ability – linked to a rechargeable adrenaline gauge – this makes it possible to throw an enemy, activate slow-mo, and then perform headshots before they hit the ground. There’s a wealth of other possible surprise attacks to find and exploit, and when it comes to stronger enemies, you’ll certainly need to get creative.
The guns themselves are perhaps the stars of the show. From pistols to one-handed mini-guns, everything is delightfully overpowered – there’s hefty kickback, and every bullet feels impactful, causing sparks to fly and gore to gush. The flashbangs may as well be molotovs, spreading flames and setting troops on fire if thrown directly. Adding to the already fast pace, grenades have no fuse either, detonating on impact. Then, later (mild spoiler) dual welding becomes available – although only two weapons of the same type can be carried. There’s no aiming down sights either, which makes sense considering most missions take place indoors, and focus is on close combat. A sniper rifle is introduced for a sole balcony shootout, seemingly just to induce variety, then quickly forgotten.
The AI quickly reacts to your presence, usually advancing in groups, and there are some surprisingly realistic touches – if you don’t finish a foe off completely, they may be able to scrape themselves off the floor and stagger back onto their feet. Enemy behaviour isn’t perfect, however – I observed a couple of soldiers spinning on the spot, and one pointing their gun at the ceiling.
The difficulty level is well-balanced. I played on one of the easier settings and frustration never crept in – a few boss battles took a couple of tries, as you’d expect, and sometimes I had to run around to get the primary objective marker to appear, but that was about it for hiccups. There’s also a good variety within the levels and their objectives, with different enemy factions appearing. At 7-8 hours, the campaign is well paced too, and there’s also the opportunity to take a break and engage in VR battle simulations where waves of enemies appear. Heavier weapons and other ordinances must be purchased to deal with the increasing hostility, and there are around 20 maps available. Another modern touch is that weapons can be customised – even mid-mission – by swapping out parts, adding scopes, and so forth.
In addition to the VR missions, there are a bunch of cheats to unlock and play around with, varying from the silly (hello, Big Head Mode) to ones that drastically alter the experience, such as Spooky Mode which removes checkpoints. These cheats require collectable intel to unlock, and the safehouse keeps track of your progress, even allowing missions to be replayed on harder difficulties – which unlocks more VR mission goodies. If you opt to finish every submission, which mostly play like faux ‘protect the objective’ online matches, you can add a few extra hours to the playtime.
Trepang2 is a constantly thrilling and well-designed homage to cult shooters of yore while having modern touches that enrich the experience, helping it to satisfy those who spend their spare time rising up the ranks in Call of Duty and Battlefield. If you miss the days before large-scale battle royales took over the gaming landscape, you’ll relish the more linear and over-the-top carnage it provides. Turns out that playing a contemporary military FPS without a toxic online community attached to it is rather refreshing.
Trepang Studios’ Trepang2 is out now on PS5 and Xbox Series. Published by Team17. It first launched on PC earlier this year.