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“Coders Will Never Forgive Me for This Level”: Boltgun 2’s Rotating “Fleshmetal” Puzzle

By Freedom251 Team · · 2 min read

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Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun 2 has a spaceship level built from linked rotating rings, which players move to open routes and uncover secrets. The team calls it “Puzzle Box” informally; its reported level name is “Vicious Circles.” Principal designer Matt Bone says the shifting geometry made enemy navigation, performance and art production unusually difficult.

How the rotating level works

“Vicious Circles” takes place aboard antagonist Vashtorr’s ship, in an environment described as “fleshmetal”—a disturbing blend of bodily forms and machinery. That setting and the level details were reported by Maxbit in an October 5, 2026 story republishing Rock Paper Shotgun’s coverage and attributing comments to an email exchange with Boltgun 2 principal designer Matt Bone.

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Rather than simply moving through a fixed corridor, players operate linked ring sections at points in the level. Rotating a ring changes which sections connect, opening routes to progress or explore for secrets. The moving sections also carry enemies and pickups, so the geometry affects traversal and combat at once. A huge, slowly turning cog forms the finale.

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Why it challenged the developers

Enemies had to work on moving ground

Bone said the platforms are populated with enemies and pickups, making dependable enemy behavior a central technical problem. Enemies need to navigate and fight across connected surfaces whose positions change, rather than relying on a static arena. He joked that the level was one reason “coders will never forgive me.”

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The final cog put pressure on performance

Bone described the finale as a gigantic cog covered in “hundreds of meshes” and called spinning it a performance challenge. That is his qualitative description, not a published benchmark or a verified frame-rate result.

Art had to survive every configuration

Rotating the level changes where detailed props and organic shapes sit relative to walls and passages. Artists therefore had to make intricate assets work across multiple layouts, not just the original one. Bone gave the example of a fleshy tendril that must avoid clipping through a wall as the level rotates.

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Bone said the team wanted more variety in Boltgun 2 through more diverse biomes and novel mechanics. He described this level as a demanding way to pursue that goal, but said he believed the challenge was worth it and hoped it would be memorable for players.

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What is known about Boltgun 2’s launch

In official Steam news, the publisher has scheduled Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun 2 for October 14, 2026 on Steam, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, with a Nintendo Switch 2 version planned for later. The announcement also describes a branching campaign and an automap. Those are game-wide details; the official announcement does not independently confirm the mechanics of “Vicious Circles.”

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