Before the start of this week, I didn't know Captain Wayne – Vacation Desperation existed, and thankfully, when I did find out, it was releasing the very next day... and it took all of 30 minutes of playing to start seriously rethinking my game of the year list.
As much as I adore a good boomer shooter, it is one of those genres – like the Metroidvania – where there are so many good takes on it now that it's becoming harder and harder for new ones to stick out, whereas one of my favourite indie trends (if you can call it that) as of late has been the rise of the Wario-like through games like Pizza Tower and Antonblast.
It turns out the zany '90s cartoon style is always a big winner when it comes to games for me. Step forward, Captain Wayne, which feels like Duke Nukem 3D with the absurdist style and breakneck pacing of Wario Land.
After the "hot pink-wearing, fish-chomping, cigar-huffing Captain Wayne" falls afoul of the most fearsome mercenary group around (as the game's Steam page describes), which results in the theft of his boat, he equips his trusty arm (which is also a shotgun, by the way) and continues "his gory conquest to rob and humiliate every rich asshole around the globe."
The game features a fantastic hand-drawn art style that makes me oddly nostalgic for the weird MS Paint-like animations you would get in the early days of Newgrounds and YouTube, while the soundtrack spans Doom-style heavy metal tracks and jungle numbers – and, of course, a little sea shanty is thrown in there, too. The voice acting is on point too, especially from the title character, who throws out dumb quips akin to Duke Nukem (just y'know, less sexually charged and more into finding buckets of fish guts to eat in a single bite).
The gameplay is where it truly hits, though. Each encounter is taken at breakneck speed, with the mixture of wide-open arenas and terrifying close encounters you would expect from any boomer shooter worth its weight. Plus, any game with a dedicated dropkick mechanic is always going to be a winner for me – and given that it's only $10, you could do much worse in terms of shooters with a lot of dialogue, especially ones that border on good but don't quite land while costing $70.
