As a man who feels an involuntary pang of indignant anger every time there’s an unexpected knock at my front door, I can relate to the hero of I Am Your Beast. If indeed “hero” is the right word.

Agent Alphonse Harding is a former top government assassin with a horrifying number of kills under his belt, and has retired to a secluded woodland in the middle of nowhere with the intent to put his past behind him and whittle birds out of soap. But when his superiors come looking for him for “one last job”, negotiations quickly devolve into a… well, I’d say “war”, but that would imply the army sent in to stop you ever had a chance.

I Am Your Beast is beautifully, stupidly violent. Over the course of 25 meticulously designed levels, you get to guide Harding through a blood soaked odyssey that’d make John Wick sick in his mouth. Imagine Superhot and DOOM had a baby, and that baby immediately started throwing combat knives right between the eyes of invading government agents.

If that sounds like the rawest concept for a game you’ve ever heard, then I Am Your Beast is for you, baby.

Objectives across the 25 story levels range from killing every enemy to activating a certain amount of laptops or destroying satellites within the time limit, but all are about maintaining a sense of forward momentum. Bullets fly and blood splatters and you never, ever stop to turn back.

These levels are broken up by a story which plays out via audio communications between Harding and his superiors, with Harding usually calmly asking to be left alone as his former boss sends in wave after wave to be killed. There are a few nice moments, although given the brevity of the game, a few of the relationships between key players come to decidedly unearned endings. Still, the focus here is on running and gunning, and in that regard, I Am Your Beast delivers beautifully.

What impresses me most about I Am Your Beast is just how quickly it teaches you to play like a speedrunner who’s dedicated their entire life to this one game. With a few deft movements, you leap from the trees to crush a soldier under your boots before catching their knife in mid-air, hurtling it at the dead soldiers’ startled friend. Without pausing to breathe you grab the second soldier’s shotgun and sprint forwards, blowing the heads off the backup that has come charging towards you.

The speed at which this game moves is almost obscene, and pushing for the best scores and times - which will unlock even more difficult challenge levels - will undoubtedly leave your knuckles white and your butt firmly clenched. I Am Your Beast is a symphony of violence and highly polished FPS gameplay with a thunderingly excellent soundtrack, and one of the best games of 2024 so far.

Pros: Breathless action, gloriously violent, very easy to pick up and play

Cons: Weak story

For fans of: Superhot, DOOM, Hotline Miami

Score: 9/10: Exceptional

I Am Your Beast is available now for PC via Steam (version tested). Review code provided by the publisher. Find a complete guide to GAMINGbible's review scores here.