Rollerdrome review – brutal deluxe

metro.co.uk:

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater meets Doom Eternal in a dystopian sci-fi sport where fancy tricks and spraying bullets go hand-in-hand.

Unlike skateboarding, roller-skating feels short-changed in its digital representation. Aside from Jet Set Radio and Ubisoft’s recent Roller Champions, there’s few examples of the sport in the gaming landscape. It might be an image problem – skating doesn’t have the distinctive culture and household names like Tony Hawk to parade on the box – but given some of the considerably more obscure things other games have been based on, it’s surprising it hasn’t been attempted more often.

If roller-skating is considered somewhat lame next to its edgier skateboarding sibling, OlliOlli World developer Roll7 has given the sport a makeover via Shadow The Hedgehog logic: what about adding guns? Set in a 2030 dystopia, that’s heavily influenced by 1975 film Rollerball (itself a major inspiration for Speedball), Rollerdrome casts you as contestant Kara Hassan in a televised bloodsport where you skate around arenas and take out enemy House Players until you’re the last one standing.

Between the bullet-time slow motion, explosive barrels, and lethal vertical slopes, it’s a far cry from hobbling around in a circle to the sounds of 80s disco.

Rollerdrome makes a great first impression. After a welcoming tutorial, which teaches you the basics of movement, ascending slopes, grinding, dodging, and shooting, you’re thrown into a small arena with a set of dual pistols and plenty of enemies to blast. The core loop is built on executing tricks and well-timed dodges to refill your ammo, so you’re encouraged to seize every ramp and rail to maintain your stock while managing your Reflex Time, which slows down the action so you