When the develop came up with the Voosh mode, which switches your weapon every 30 seconds, it must have been aware the bottom of the barrel was fast approaching. Greater interest is gathered by the People Can Fly mode, which only records damage when your opponent is in mid air, but even this wears thin. It gets repetitive very quickly and isn't a patch on the similarly veined combat in Quake III Arena. Also, those maps are fairly basic, despite a few nice ideas such as the reflective windows scattered around that enable you to warp to the action quickly.

It's fast and it's mental, but with only six maps on offer it's a limited package. The multiplayer game tries a similar angle, tying itself to old-skool frenetic shooters like Quake, but somehow doesn't make enough of itself to gain anything but the occasional online follower. It's a vent through which anger and frustration can be funnelled, while keeping your gameplay arm steady with clever level design and a degree of variation. Painkiller is a mindless barrage of violence, and in single-player this is its selling point.

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