Superhot is an FPS where time only moves when you do

The fastest game to get accepted on Steam Greenlight.

News by Jeffrey Matulef Contributor

Updated on Sept. 21, 2013

Last month we saw the inspired week-long game jam, 7DFPS, which tasked developers with creating a first-person shooter in seven days. With this tiny timeline, developers had to get creative to produce something that felt like more than a mere Doom clone. Chris Donlan wrote about some of its highlights, while I covered Notch's contribution to the project, but now one of its best entries, Superhot, has made waves with its upcoming spruced up commercial release getting accepted on Steam Greenlight in record time.

"Thanks to your AMAZING support we passed Steam Greenlight in mere five days!," said Polish developer Blue Brick in its announcement. "We've checked it - Superhot is the fastest game ever to get greenlit."

Why's it all-of-a-sudden so popular you ask? Because it's brilliant. The idea is that time only moves when you do. It's a bit like that one world in Braid then, only you can't make time move backwards. Instead, you need to meticulously line up your shots then carefully walk around in such a way that you won't collide with a bullet. It sounds easy, and indeed the first level or two are, but the challenge ramps up quickly as guns can only hold a few bullets and you die in one hit. What begins as a John-Woo-meets-Zack-Morris power fantasy swiftly evolves into a mesmerising spacial puzzler featuring perhaps the most fluid mix of real-time and turn-based combat I've encountered.

The minimalist graphics comprised of drab grey environments and red silhouetted enemies are simple, but it has a stylish Mad Men-esque noir charm - though it's unclear if the final release will continue with this colour palette or not. I've reached out to Blue Brick about this - and other changes - and am awaiting reply.

So far the developer has noted on a Steam thread that it would like to add: machine guns, enemies that dodge bullets, slow-motion explosions, timed challenges, and endless shootouts with an increasingly dense swarm of foes. It also said the final game would be about the size of the first Portal.

The current iteration is just a proof of concept, but what a concept it is. Give it a go, I say. The prototype version is absolutely free and can be played in a browser at Superhot's website.

Elsewhere, 17 other titles were just accepted on Steam Greenlight. These include: