If there’s one thing Devolver Digital has on lock it’s the action-platformer reliant on one wild gameplay hook. Katana Zero featured time-bending swordplay, Carrion famously turned horror on its ear, and Gato Roboto—a doinksoft game in its own right—starred a puss in armoured boots. Anyone who’s seen their annual showcase would know there’s a charming eccentricity to Devolver, and it seems as though Gunbrella is no different.
The titular Gunbrella, a union of a parasol and a blunderbuss, is perhaps the ultimate fusion of function and fashion and it really stands out, so far, as the star of the show. Although it is taken up and drawn against all manner of foe, mortal and otherwise, uncovering its origins is what transforms this simple woodsman into what is effectively John Wick with a sunshade-cannon. But it’s not merely a merchant for malice and ill-will, it safeguards and shifts the player throughout doinksoft’s biggest game yet.
Gunbrella’s opening couple of hours is a journey through a drizzly “noir-punk” world full of missing mayors and damsels, divine sacrifice, and a breadcrumb trail of clues that’ll lead the player to Gunbrella’s original owner. It departs slightly from their Metroidvania roots, focusing on the emergent stories that pop up in a series of industrial, backwater towns all linked together by a rail and cable system. For a quaint action-platformer like this, it’s surprising to see so many small tales, adjacent to the central plot, packed in. Not only do they serve to build out Gunbrella’s world and characters, they’re so neatly tied to the mission design of the main questline there’s no downside to straying from the path to explore.
The combat feels fast and frenetic, like a balletic blend of Celeste’s fluid traversal and the blood and guts show of Katana Zero. The brolly-blaster’s default ammo type is a shotty shell of infinite supply, its range is woeful but it’ll eviscerate most anything at arm’s reach. At least early on, the game offers a few other options, an automatic rifle toggle and a far more outlandish saw blade to name a couple. The brolly can also be used to block incoming fire, and even deflect projectiles with a well-timed parry. Getting around is perhaps the biggest pleasure of all, with dashes, freewheeling on updraughts, and drifting gently on a breeze like a badass Mary Poppins knock-off.
There’s a huge diversity in Gunbrella’s world, even from the first couple of hours. There’s industrial areas and small settlements, with explorable interiors, there are cave systems, scrap yards worthy of Mad Max, and no hard-boiled noir piece would be worth a damn without a speakeasy, complete with a passphrase required to slip past the gate.
Similarly, there are plenty of things out to kill you in Gunbrella. A cabal of ghouls, gangsters, scrappers, supernatural cultists, Lovecraftian monstrosities, as well as the world’s fauna all vie for your scalp. And honestly, in my experience, they’ll do a decent job of getting it—I died plenty. Fortunately, the game checkpoints exceptionally, both automatically and manually through the welcoming benches and beds you can rest on, and has a lot of quality touches that respect your time and makes the game more accessible for those not attuned to tougher platformers.
There’s something apt about a grisly pixel-art adventure to suit the game’s hard-nosed hero, even if his chilly reception to most is probably warranted given his plight. The attempt to force a new sub-genre in “noir-punk” is admirable, and I think there’s an unusual marriage of miserable gloom and Victorian-era industrialism that makes Gunbrella a rather unique prospect. The garish attire of the parasol police unit, the surreal creature design, and the many environments tirelessly pull along what is ultimately a pretty weird, yet spectacularly designed, game.
It’s hard to get a gauge of just how long Gunbrella might be, it feels as though the beat the preview climaxes one suggests I’ve experienced what might be the first of a few acts. If it is a six-to-eight hour adventure that continues to surprise just as its opening salvo has, Gunbrella could be yet another indie surprise packet in a year that’s already had plenty and is forecast for more. When it comes to this year’s indie gems, when it rains it pours—so don’t forget a brolly. Just don’t blow your foot off.
