You know that feeling of disappointment when you look around and realize that something you loved has basically evaporated? I've felt that way about big shooter campaigns for the past few years; Respawn pulled out of "Titanfall" a few years ago, "Battlefield" went multiplayer-only, and even Arkane's "Redfall" is (so far) always Call of Duty, Doom, and eventually Stalker 2 are still carrying the torch, but let's face it: big-budget single-player FPSs are on life support. EA s latest original, "Immortals of Aveum," hopes to inject some adrenaline into such FPSs.

Or whatever your healing totem is. The game is a magic shooter, a sub-genre that usually appears only once in a long time (but recently appeared twice in a short time (open in new tab)); the same goes for the 25-hour single-player campaign, which has no multiplayer, no battle path, no roadmap, and no "real" gameplay, just a few hours of fun and a lot of fun. It's a neat-looking first-person "battlemage" adventure from the man who once ran the Call of Duty campaign.

Ascendant Studios founder Brett Robbins, who once directed "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3," "Advanced Warfare" and "World War 2" for Sledgehammer. From the hands-off campaign demo released to the press last week, Immortals actually has more in common with Doom 2016. Evil wizards take more punishment than soldiers in an army, and there's quite a bit of verticality. Players will find upgrades, level up their skill trees, fit new equipment, and solve environmental puzzles.

It's certainly no Modern Warfare, but the cinematic cutscenes at the end of missions and the instantly recognizable CoD-isms, such as a commander barking orders in your ear, suggest that Robbins is still making what he knows.

I didn't get to play Immortals of Aveum, but I think it looks interesting, just as I can be 80% sure I'll like it after seeing the trailer on Steam. Red is the shotgun, blue is the beam, and green is the lock-on machine gun. The left hand is where you cast control spells, such as the blue laser whip that looks like it came straight out of 2011's "Bulletstorm" and the green glove that slows down enemies and traps.

At first, I thought Immortals only had three "guns," but Robbins said players gain a new sigil (a gauntlet gizmo that shoots spells) that dramatically changes the behavior of these basic spells.

"There is a spell called Shrikebolt, which is like a fast-firing, accurate blue magic spell. If you get a javelin-style sigil, it's like a charge-up shot. In green magic, you get the Seeker's Crest.

Within these three colors, there are nine different sigils that can be used to change the way major spells are used.

While it sounds like a metaphorical gun enough to fill a weapons wheel, I'm still not convinced that a metaphorical video game gun is better than an actual video game gun. Recoil, reload animations, and explosive trigger pulls are effective feedback that convey instant power. Also, guns are cool.

The invulnerability spells are spammy and weak and ultimately got on my nerves in "Hogwarts Legacy" and "Ghostwire": in Tokyo. It was also a bit difficult to keep up with the action of six battle mages throwing skittles of various flavors at each other. Of course, I'll reserve judgment until I've actually played it. Perhaps the spells feel and sound cooler when no one is talking to the images.

I'm skeptical of the storyline, which wasn't really depicted in Ascendant, but the cutscenes I saw showed a war for control of a vein of magical power. There is a man with an evil-looking name, who wears sharp armor and never shows his face. I found the dragon. It's fantasy stuff, but not intentionally high fantasy. Robbins said he didn't want to get involved with standard fantasy archetypes like wands and pointed wizard hats (hence the militarized "battlemage" aesthetic). I am not interested in fantasy and probably never will be.

However, I do like FPS campaigns, so I will definitely play this one. I hope it's great, and Immortals of Aveum will be released on July 20 on consoles, Steam, and the Epic Store (yes, it's a $60 game).