Over the last decade, we’ve seen many developers release retro-inspired first-person shooters, often called “boomer shooters” online. And most of these have been trying to recreate the look and feel of games like the original Doom, Quake, Wolfenstein 3D, and other late ’90s shooters. I’ve enjoyed many of these, but I’ll be honest: I’ve been craving more first-person shooters that play like the PS2-era FPS games I loved. And Sprawl Zero, out now on consoles and PC, is exactly what I’ve been wanting.
Sprawl Zero, which is set in the same universe as the studio’s past boomer shooter Sprawl, is a fast-paced FPS directly inspired by the shooters of the early 2000s. You know, stuff like Halo, Killzone, Black, Half-Life 2, and FEAR, some of which Sprawl Zero‘s Steam page directly references. There’s no secret here as to what this game wants to look, sound, and feel like. And I’m so on board with this pitch, having spent many, many hours of my youth blasting enemies in brown hallways and empty alleys while tightly gripping a PS2 or OG Xbox controller and sitting way to close to the TV.
In Sprawl Zero, you take on the role of Five, a powerful, genetically altered super-soldier enforcer who is sent on different missions to eliminate a militant religious cult in a sprawling, dystopian city (Oh…Sprawl...) in a future where everything has gone to shit. To stop the cult, Five will kill a whole lot of enemies using a lot of guns, some of which might remind you of fan-favorite weapons seen in some 2000s-era shooters.
Right away, if you’ve played any of the previously mentioned PS2/Xbox-era shooters, you’ll spot a lot of similarities in Sprawl Zero. Guns are chunky, levels are mostly linear, the soundtrack is electronic, enemies chatter all the time, and every map is drenched in shades of brown, beige, grey, and black. Oh yeah, this looks and sounds a lot like a PS2-era shooter, and I mean that in the best way possible. There ain’t any crafting screens to tinker with or RPG skill trees to fill out here. Just enemies to kill, simple objectives to complete, and some collectibles to find if you look off the beaten path.
And if all Sprawl Zero did was remind me of those older games while also playing and feel great, I’d be happy enough. But Sprawl Zero puts its own spin on that era of FPS.
The big difference between Sprawl Zero and games like Halo and Black is that you can only hold one gun at a time and can never reload any weapon you find. This means you are constantly switching guns on the fly during fights as you run out of ammo. It makes each combat encounter in Sprawl Zero more dynamic and tense as sometimes you might not have enough bullets in your stolen pistol to get through a room, meaning you’ll need to kill someone to get their gun and keep fighting.
This design choice could have been annoying, but Sprawl Zero is filled with fantastically distinct and fun-to-use guns, so I was rarely upset to pick up something new. Five possesses the ability to grab objects from a distance using his Gravity Gloves, which makes the simple act of picking up a new weapon during a fight feel fantastic. And if there are a few bodies piled up, you might not even be sure which gun is going to come flying over to you in the moment.
These same gloves can be used to grab random items, like barrels, and toss them at enemies, evoking the same feeling I get when blasting a box at a Combine soldier in Half-Life 2 with that game’s iconic Gravity Gun. Oh, and yes, at any point you can just throw your gun at an enemy, possibly stunning them or even killing them.
Gravity Gloves aren’t the only cool trick Five has in Sprawl Zero. As you play through the game’s handcrafted levels, you’ll unlock bullet time so you can slow down the action during chaotic fights, a Gravity Shield that blocks projectiles and flings them back upon release, and a hard-hitting punch that can shatter shields. You’ll need these extra tools, as later fights in Sprawl Zero get really intense as the game starts tossing waves of enemies at you at once.
Sprawl Zero is obviously inspired by games like Halo, Half-Life 2, and Killzone. But its fast-paced combat, focus on weapon swapping, and various abilities really help Sprawl Zero stand out as more than just nostalgia bait. It uses the aesthetics of a PS2 shooter, but doesn’t feel beholden to playing exactly like those older games did 20+ years ago. Mixing new and old ideas, Sprawl Zero ends up being something really special and one of my favorite shooters of 2026 so far. Sprawl Zero is out now on PS5, Xbox, Switch 2, and PC.
