The Callisto Protocol review – a shotgun-blast from the past

PC, PlayStation, Xbox; Striking Distance Studios/Krafton
This intense, gory horror game is steadfastly old-fashioned and lacking in internal logic - but it's fun anyway

An immense amount of effort has gone into making the derelict spaceship and monstrous creatures of The Callisto Protocol look, sound and feel realistic, but this sci-fi horror revival from some of the creators of Dead Space still runs on pure video game logic. Why is a prison colony orbiting Jupiter so extensively decorated with spiked wall-hangings? Why does every floor collapse just as hapless space-trucker hero Jacob stumbles across it, on his way to press the button to drop the bridge to reach the door to loot the room to get the fuse to fix the power to call the lift? And why do all the monsters - that look like furious tangles of teeth and chicken thighs, perhaps the beginnings of an excellent soup, if they'd just stop screaming and growing new talons - reliably burble up everything from bullets to health kits once Jacob has hacked them to death?

It's technologically cutting-edge, but in spirit this is an action game from the mid-to-late 00s. It's best to take your common sense over to that weapons fabricator and see if you can't swap it for some shotgun shells.