Only the most important features make the cut in Phantom Fury!@Bombshell_Game @3DRealms @SlipgateIron pic.twitter.com/yf2hbYHDkeJanuary 19, 2023
Every once in a while PC Gamer’s Chris Livingston (opens in new tab) will post something in the site’s slack channel with the tagline “COOL WATER ALERT” and I love it when I’m around for those posts. Why, you might ask? Because cool water is always good. It is good when a videogame does something cool with water.
So it is in Phantom Fury (opens in new tab), which Slipgate Ironworks CEO Frederik Schreiber has revealed includes the absolutely delightful ability to put bullet holes in fish tanks and then the water drains out.
Not impressed? What if I told you that it drains out faster when there’re more holes below the waterline. It’s true. That’s very good, as a video obtained by this ace journalist here at PC Gamer shows. (I embedded it above from Twitter (opens in new tab).)
Phantom Fury is an explosive, seat-of-your-pants homage to late 90s shooters. Modeled and textured like a PS2 game, but lit like a 2023 game, Phantom Fury has the kind of sliding movement and chaotic combat you’d expect from an homage to the era when Duke Nukem and Half-Life were the kings. Phantom Fury is coming this year, in 2023, and was announced (opens in new tab) at last year’s Realms Deep event.
It’s also a sequel to Ion Fury, a game Evan Lahti quite liked in 2019. “More than an homage to Duke Nukem, this retro FPS brings ’90s FPSes to life in 2019,” he said in a 77-scored PC Gamer review. (opens in new tab)
It’s cool to see that while Ion Fury was a take on Duke Nukem 3D, Phantom Fury progresses forward a few years to the Half-Life era in terms of both look and tech inspirations. It’s a neat thing to see, and we’ll definitely keep an eye on Bombshell Harrison’s anti-mutant activities.
You can find Phantom Fury on GOG (opens in new tab) and Steam (opens in new tab) so far.