The rise of virtual reality gaming has been nothing short of remarkable. Over the past few years, it’s gone from a gimmicky piece of hardware you break out at parties to a genuinely respected and supported platform for video games, with more and more developers leaping on the bandwagon.

Personally, I had never tried VR in any form, largely due to a fear of motion sickness. I get light headed when characters in games jump from large heights and the camera can’t keep up; I figured VR would cause immediate and intensive vomiting.

But during Paris Games Week, a certain PS VR game took my eye: Blood and Truth, which is being developed by London Studios. The trailer boasted a mix of John Wick-esque action combined with a London based revenge thriller. As combinations go, that’s a pretty strong one to aim. I always wanted to be a cross between John McClane and Phil Mitchell.

We were fortunate enough to be invited by PlayStation to a Press Event to try out the latest and greatest games at House Sony, and there sat Blood and Truth. It was finally time to conquer that fear, and I’m glad I did, because Blood and Truth is nothing short of astonishing.

The key to the game’s quality comes in its simplicity. The controls are intuitive, with your interaction with the virtual world mirroring how you’d perform that action in the real world. The trigger is your primary action, allowing you to grab items or fire your gun. Movement is different, but still retains that key simplicity. All you need to do is aim at a designated waypoint and push the thumb button, and your character will move, and you can strafe behind cover by using the face buttons.

By eliminating the faff that comes with moving a VR character via teleporting or by waggling your hands like a moron, the team have created a game that’s instantly accessible and incredibly immersive. It’s fluid, and feels like the cinematic experience it’s meant to be creating.

Blood and Truth follows the adventures of one Ryan Marks, a former SAS operative who returns home to find out his family are being harassed by a ruthless mob lord, which simply will not do. Time to put on those big boy pants and crack a few gangster skulls. Or a lot, if our time with the game is any indicator.

The demo we got to experience had us breaking into a gang owned casino, which started out slow but quickly ramped up in pace. Even during the quiet moments, doing “menial” tasks like climbing a ladder or manning a camera to find your mark felt engaging. It’s reassuring to know that Blood and Truth remains interesting during those periods.

Of course, when the action does ramp up and bullets start flying, it’s hard not to get swept up in the chaos. Again, your movement is constricted to set waypoints, allowing you to focus on moving cover-to-cover through the level and blasting those bad guys. It feels tactical, efficient and realistic, which makes sense considering you’re playing as a former SAS operative.

The demo quickly hit a fever pitch, switching from cover shooting to on-rails, and it’s here that Blood and Truth is at its best. Enemies start pouring in left and right as you become the living embodiment of badassery, popping dudes left and right in pursuit of your target. It’s the ultimate in action movie wish fulfilment.

There’s something to be said about the rush of adrenaline that comes with rushing from room to room, gunning down goons and reloading your gun as you would do a real gun. Your heart begins to beat faster and faster, as each bullet whizzes past your head. It’s almost euphoric.

Even the final moments, which see you interrogating your target in order to gain more information, presented new opportunities for engaging gameplay. Characters you talk to react to what you do in real time, meaning you have more control in conversations than you would normally.

You could try and talk to the guy by selecting dialogue options, but that runs the risk of him stalling for time whilst his back-up arrives. Alternatively, you could fire a warning shot to prove that you’re not messing about, which will force him to start blabbing pretty quickly. Or you could just shoot him, and dedicate your playthrough to becoming a British Punisher.

Having gone into this event never experiencing VR, I’ve left this event excited for the medium and where the future takes it, and that’s thanks to Blood and Truth. If London Studios are the standard bearers for quality VR/PSVR entertainment, then the platform is in good hands.