2023 saw the release of Sprawl, a “boomer-shooter” that has been sitting on my Steam wishlist for some time, mostly because of its Yoji Shinkawa style cover art. I’m a sucker for the cyberpunk aesthetic, the ultra dense urban warzone look where power cables and neon act as the veins of some great steel beast, a leviathan of light and pain. The downside to this is a lot of the novelty has been lost in titles like Hard Reset and Ghostrunner that just beat Sprawl to the punch. I was certain the time would come when the game would drop so low and I was so bored it’d eat up a fun afternoon and that’d be that, but before the stars aligned a demo for it’s follow up, Sprawl Zero, hit Steam and the buzz in the shooter community felt strong enough that I gave it a shot. I am not going to let the sequel sit languid on my wishlist.
You are Five, a super soldier working for some nondescript group surely to be explored more properly in the final release. You are given a job with a few objectives and set loose through the tutorials and it’s spattering of systems. Much like last year’s indie darling Expedition 33, Sprawl Zero is a collage of beloved mechanics from the genres best. The slowdown from FEAR, the gravity gun from Half-Life, Hotline Miami weapon throws, and a BioShock Infinite style gravity shield round out the arsenal you take into a game that sure feels a lot like Doom Eternal rock-paper-scissors resource system slowed down a tad. The trick, the part that makes it all work, is your gun. Singular. You only have one at a time, no reloads no inventory. When your gun is empty, you swap it for another and another and another until there’s nothing left.
Last year when the rumors of Half-Life 3’s impending announcement circulated, I sat down and tried to hash out what it would play like. At the end of my attempts, I came to define Half-Life as a defensive game in contrast to the offense style of its contemporary, Doom. Fundamentally Half-Life has you strafing around enemies like in Doom or Quake, but the baddies are given weapons too fast to dodge up close forcing you to keep the environment between them and you. The evolution of this system to me seemed to be digging in further, like a tick. Confronting an enemy and then raising a wall between you and them as you retreat. The instrument of this barrier seemed obvious, the gravity gun. In recent playthroughs, I’ve attempted to use the gravity gun for makeshift cover and as a more central pillar to my combat but the switch is just to slow and the environments not built to sustain it. Sprawl Zero can sustain it.
Sprawl Zero is so close to the mental image of Half-Life 3 I designed that I’m not convinced I didn’t write it down somewhere the devs came across and pilfered it, but I’m not so arrogant to really believe I’m the only person to look at Half-Life 2’s most unique weapon and decide it should be more central to the experience. Other than using bits and pieces of the environments as weapons, the gravity mechanic also lets you lasso loose guns on the ground to keep you from being stuck defenseless so long as you can take out someone before you get there. The gravity gloves also have a shield variation closer to my personal ideas in execution. Throw it up and all enemy fire is blocked, and then flung back at the enemy afterward. It’s a very district 9 style use, one that might actually be a bit too powerful if I’m honest, but Sprawl Zero clearly isn’t too worried about making you feel too strong.
Instead, the title seems to offer a rhythm to combat to follow. Hitting enemies while in slowdown forces them to drop health pickups so it’s maybe best saved for a retreat than an ambush, while your melee is extremely strong, it’s slow, making it hard to line up in a crowded firefight. Most of these powers draw from the same “adrenaline” resource which makes them a question of which tool to use rather than how to combo them effectively, but as upgrades to this bar can be found in the environment it’s not impossible to imagine a scenario where you’re using them in conjunction.
With only two levels to its demo, there isn’t too much to chew on with Sprawl Zero yet, but what’s here is chewy and delicious. Were the rest of the game to just be arenas with the same combat mechanics throughout, I think I’d be wholly satisfied, but the in-game UI hints at more systems to be uncovered and secret chests with additional weapons have been tucked away to make replaying the demo worthwhile, as well as a higher difficulty mode to get a taste of a more refined experience. It’s a little sad to see someone find success with an idea you had independently, but the real rub is these suckers have to make the game. I just get to play it.
