Cursorblade

Cursorblade (2023) is a shooting game where you are a mouse cursor and use your mouse motion to move, attack and deftly dodge the deluge of bullets. Control is one-to-one with your mouse, in this way, you move through the anthropomorphized flora and fauna to kill them and avoid getting hit by bullets. It stands out for its exacting controls that are free from momentum or friction in a way that lets you take on super-harder levels that would otherwise be impossible.

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Cursorblade subverts the usual bullet-hell game where the challenge is dodging hundreds of bullets in a craft or character with limited movement. Here the only limit to your speed is how fast (and how accurately) you move your mouse.

As you progress things get ever more hectic, but between each wave, you get to choose an item that levels up the attacks for your cursor or makes enemy attacks slower or less powerful. These can be combined and stacked to create powerful builds.

The result is a game that's all about movement. Being able to instantly start and stop, move as slow or fast as you want and do that at will, revolutionises the shooting video game away from realism, momentum and barriers.

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Our examiner, Andy Robertson, first checked Cursorblade a year ago. It was re-examined by Ellen Robertson and updated 7 months ago.