If you’ve worked in the corporate world at any point in the last decade, you’ve probably become familiar with the “Memphis” art style that’s taken over slide shows and infographics in offices across America. Corporate Memphis generously stretches the definitions of both the words “art” and “style,” and is characterized by flat, round figures devoid of soul and personality.

Sulfur, the new indie game from developer Perfect Random, might look a little Corporate Memphis, but is devoid of neither soul nor personality – in fact, it has personality in excess.

Also, guns.

Sulfur is a first-person shooter game that takes place in a fantastical purgatory populated by hungry goblins, bandit sharpshooters and friendly shopkeepers totally unbothered by the chaos around them. Players step into the clerical garb of “The Father,” leader of The Church of the Original Sin, which was burned down by an evil witch. In hot pursuit of the wicked one on her broomstick, The Father picks up a samurai sword and loads a gun, intent on avenging his congregation by the most violent of means. I’m pretty sure The Father’s quest for revenge violates at least one ecclesiastic code of conduct, but hey, maybe this world’s Good Book says wrath is a virtue.

Questionable religious dogma aside, the main gameplay of Sulfur consists of navigating through dungeons filled with enemies in order to reach a shrine infused with powerful magic. In the first few levels, enemies include the aforementioned goblins, human assailants, skeletons, ghosts and vicious dogs. To survive these adversaries, The Father has access to a vast arsenal of fantastical firearms, starting with the humble “P38 Dirk” handgun and escalating to impractical sniper rifles that scream overkill with every shot. These weapons are a highlight of the game thanks to the sheer variety of them, plus the satisfying animations and sounds unique to each one. Weapons can be further modified with attachments like scopes and silencers, as well as magical scrolls and oils that alter their properties.

This brings me to my main complaint with Sulfur in its current state: it’s just too stingy with the player. Guns and other items can drop from slain enemies and loot containers found in the world. The issue is the vast majority of these things contain either worthless crap like rocks or nothing at all. Even ammo, necessary for surviving the onslaught of enemies populating the dungeons, drops rarely, and when it does drop, it has a tendency to be in a caliber incompatible with the player’s current weapons. The excitement of a shiny new weapon dropping from a loot box is palpable, but I still felt like these moments were few and far between.

The loot pool doesn’t only contain firearms and their accessories, however. Sulfur also contains a charmingly robust cooking system that allows players to combine a wide variety of ingredients into dishes real and imaginary. Cooking is critical because food allows the player to recover health lost in gunfight, and cooked meals heal more efficiently than raw ingredients. The playfulness of cooking comes from trying different ingredients to see what combines into a recipe: eggs and cheese make omelets, milk and cacao make a milkshake, mystery meat and a stick make, uh, mystery meat on a stick.

If you couldn’t already tell, Sulfur is a pretty funny game. It’s almost absurd how Sulfur’s cutesy art style is juxtaposed with bloody violence – shooting enemies actually reveals flesh and bone and even organs that can be sold to vendors for a tidy profit – disgusting, of course, but weirdly on brand for the “always be looting” maxim at the core of the game.

Of course, Sulfur adds a pretty major wrinkle to the cycle of looting: the threat of permanent failure. Should the player die in a dungeon, they lose everything they were carrying, including guns, armor, food and cash.

To secure their loot, the player must either make it to the end of the dungeon or “extract” using their magical amulet, which can only be activated halfway through the dungeon. From there, they can store their collected items, but Sulfur puts its finger on the scales of risk and reward by encouraging players to level up and upgrade their favorite gear, thus putting it on the line in exchange for more power in-game.

The system is one pioneered by infamously competitive multiplayer games like Escape from Tarkov that could be classified as health hazards given how they assault players’ blood pressure as they compete to escape with the shiniest gear. Sulfur is a single-player game (co-op play is planned for a future update), so the stakes aren’t that high, but it’s still pretty devastating when I’m mobbed by enemies and lose a unique weapon I liked.

Compared to other Early Access releases, Sulfur is in great shape. There is some major lag when corpses pile up on screen, an issue the developer is already aware of and working on. One additional complaint I have is that enemies are fairly predictable in their single-minded forward assaults on the player. The second Town area contains a multitude of opportunities to exploit high ground and cover; however, they sit unused because the enemies just rush directly to the player.

But aside from my gripes with the game’s balance logic, there isn’t much to not like about it at this stage. Overall, the developers at Perfect Random have nailed the addictive qualities of the extraction shooter and combined them with a unique art style and a bevy of whimsical weaponry. I’m interested in learning how The Father’s revenge quest unfolds, and discovering more food items and weapons as I play more.

Huh, now I’m hungry for mystery meat on a stick.

Thumbnail image courtesy of Perfect Random