Psychotoxic Hands-On

Psychotoxic is an upcoming first-person shooter with a bit of a supernatural twist. In the game from German developer NuClearVision, you play as Angie Prophet, a part-human, part-angel hybrid out to save the world from nuclear annihilation. Tasked with destroying the Fourth Horseman of the Apocalypse, Angie must battle through approximately 30 levels, some of which are set in the real world and some of which are set in the dream world.

As she battles her way across real-world locations, such as New York and Washington, Angie discovers that she has to delve into an enemy's subconscious to glean important information. These levels take place in the dream world, which includes a cartoon level that uses cel-shading to make the level feel like, well, an animated cartoon come to life. Other dream levels include a medieval village and a zombie plant. The game is slated to feature more than 30 cutscenes that piece its story together.

There will also be plenty of opponents to battle, because Psychotoxic will feature more than 90 enemies that range from human to monster. These enemies include religious fanatics, gang members, evil police officers, zombies, sea monsters, and more. To take them on, you'll be given 19 different weapons from the real world, including pistols, submachine guns, and assault rifles, in addition to more-unusual and exotic weapons, including a giant jackhammer. Since she's part angel, Angie also has access to special powers like slowdown, (which works like bullet time from The Matrix), heal, invisibility, and shield. These abilities are fueled by special-force power-ups that can be collected throughout the game's various levels.

In the level that we played, we battled it out with evil SWAT members in a container port. The gameplay is fairly typical of a run-and-gun shooter, so you'll run around blasting enemies while picking up health packs and ammo along the way. The weapons ranged from a six-shot revolver, a submachine gun with a scope, and an M-16 assault rifle with a grenade launcher. We noticed the game has a physics engine that lets you push and destroy various objects in the level, which namely consist of boxes and crates. The graphics engine looks a bit dated, but it will take advantage of advanced shaders for reflections, refractions, and more. And unlike most first-person shooters, the game will not feature a multiplayer mode, as NuClear Vision decided to focus on the single-player game. Publisher Whiptail Interactive, which released Postal 2 and Gangland, plans to release Psychotoxic in the first quarter of 2005.