Above all else, Evil West is a video game ass video game and that's what I love about it.

The marketing knows this too, it has a trailer featuring goddamn Danny Trejo where it boasts not having lootboxes and making fun of the absurd monetization of games. "I just want to play a game!" he proclaims. If you're beyond a casual consumer (which I assume is the case if you're using this site) you'd find this trailer a bit cringe. It's basically just yelling that its a single player game without a bunch of microtransactions (ignoring the fact it has a pre order bonus skin lol) which yknow, isn't really all that uncommon. But there's something that makes you just wanna vigorously shout "Hell yeah" about that statement and well goddamn Evil West sure is a game.

Saying something "sure is" a game or a movie is usually used as a bit of an insult but for Evil West it is not only a true descriptor but its a bit of a refreshing one. You're just a badass cowboy with electric gauntlets that rips vampires and werewolves in half. There are upgrades and perks, which may be a bit of a mandatory and exhausted system these days, but they only enhance the gameplay and add on to the glorious variety this game has to offer. For most of the game there's constantly new mechanics thrown in. It's entirely designed to make the game more fun and thats what Evil West excels at, being fun. There is an argument to make that the game is a bit simplistic. As many others point out its reminiscent of an older gen title. Non interconnected levels, gruff badass protag and a silly story. Looking at it objectively you can sum up the game as combat arena, slight exploration, combat arena, slight exploration, small puzzle, combat arena, cutscene and so on. But you can really boil any game down to something like that and dismissing Evil West because of that is denying just how fun and cool it is. Maybe its not anything new but it doesn't need to be to be a fantastic time on its own. Hell, even the cover is a form of the "generic cool guy with a gun" but the way its presented and the art style just makes it look sick as fuck.

Throughout Evil West, you'll face a lot of repeat but unique enemies throughout with an occasional new one thrown into the mix. But it's the way enemies are thrown in together and the badass arsenal you're given that still make it so every fight feels different. I was never left with a feeling of boredom or that it was repetitive. It's hella challenging too. I played the whole game on normal. Usually I find games aren't balanced well but Evil West I thought was the perfect level for me. So many of the fights toss a huge amount of tough enemies at you. I was constantly audibly saying "Jesus Christ" or "Fucking hell" at the constant bullshit this game gives you to deal with. But because of how well this game is done I was never left feeling defeated at the constant deaths or like that it was too impossible to win. The only part of this combat I don't like are the suicide bomb enemies. They do cause you to change your play style up a bit but in every game they're put in they're more of a nuisance than a meaningful feature. There's only a few actual boss fights but all of these are quite fun as well, except maybe for The Parasite and thats only because it featured a bunch of the suicide dudes. I nervously laughed at the final bosses transformation. Fighting it, watching some of its surprisingly creepy animations and getting my ass kicked but still killing the fuck out of it in the end was when I knew for sure that this game had succeeded in everything it set out to do.

Now that i've beaten in the fact that the gameplay is super fun (without actually spoiling the mechanics) let's talk about the rest of Evil West. Firstly I want to note that the game gives you an arachnophobia warning (and the option to turn off spiders) at the start which I appreciate. As someone who is deathly scared of them but also didn't want to lessen the overall experience I didnt use this option, and fuck are there a shitload of spiders lmao. Its just a nice little bit of accessibility that I think deserved its own bit of praise. Onto the story, I don't have anything bad to say about it. It's obviously not the selling point. I do honestly wish it was a bit more over the top but I was curious in the direction and it was enjoyable. The ending is slightly abrupt but I still found it to be satisfying. Graphically Evil West isn't the best looking but something I very much appreciated was how much visual variety the levels had. Almost all of them had their own unique setting, color and feel to them. Lots of unique locations is one of the things a game can do to earn a spot in my heart and I was really happy that Evil West committed to this. One thing stopping me from giving it a full 90 is that it was a bit buggy. it was nothing game breaking. The basement of your main base has a lighting glitch, there were two instances where I got stuck in the floor during combat and had to restart. And there were a few audio glitches where just this really loud annoying sound would loop. This was all kinda a pain in the ass when it happened but everything was fixable with a simple restarting checkpoint or death. Playing on performance mode I only ever had one lag spike (that happened every time i got to this section either after death or when replaying for a trophy) was when three big bat demons spawn simultaneously. Otherwise it was never choppy or anything of the such. Another thing worth mentioning isnt a bug but a little silly and definitely a product of budget. When you're at your home base and you walk by an npc they will talk but their mouth wont move or anything. You spend such little time here that it doesnt matter but I thought it was funny enough to share.

That's kinda all I've got to say about Evil West. I really do like this game. In a year where i've gotten lots of games on launch that ended up pretty disappointing, It was nice to play a game I expected very little of that ended up being a surprisingly good time. This year has taught me a lot about both how lame critics are and how terrible I am with money.

Thanks for reading y'all <3
More stuff is on the way.

Nancymeter - 88/100
Trophy Completion - 56% (18/30)
Time Played - 15 hours 12 minutes
Game Completion #150 of 2022
Game Completion #4 of December

This is a Video Game™️. Level based campaign structure, variety in level locales, perk tree, money upgrades, collectables off the path in levels, story that doesnt matter to context the levels, its all there baby. I'm back in 2008.

The gameplay is fun, though I do find some enemies really fucking annoying (really the flying shield givers/tentacle wall clingers), but not too bad, it makes the fights tense. It feels good as fuck to punch and thats always a BIG plus for me.
I do feel like the dodge kind of sucks, but its fine enough.

Also, I really wonder if the dev's read Blaster Knuckle, cause the similarities are there. And if you haven't read Blaster Knuckle, you should read that shit, it rules.

Until the midpoint, it was one of my favoirte games I’ve played in this year, but it turned sour near the end. Here’s my explanation.

I played it on Hard difficulty from the start to finish. I dabbled into Evil difficulty with NG+ a bit. Didn’t finish that one, but I think my issue will be conveyed without fully playing that one.

What I really liked about the game is the initial attitude of the game; “We are not a typical cinematic game, and we are not gonna waste your time with walky-talky sections. Go and kill some hordes of enemies with these tools and keep moving on”. Within the first three stages, all the important melee/ranged options get opened such as melee juggling, ranged juggling, launcher, sniping, rapid pistol shot, long-distance pull, long-distance dash, parry, cancel kick, etc. These combat options are designed around the fact the player character’s movement is kinda clumsy so that you must actively make a safe space by actively demolishing the enemies with destructive combos. Fodders get easily stunned and electrocuted, and they turn into cannonballs when they get launched. Sniping the weak spot mostly guarantees heavy damage and stun, and a well-timed uppercut and cancel kick can cancel the incoming attack.

These overpowered options synergize with arena combats wonderfully. Since enemies are trying to surround and push you from everywhere, and there are frequent miniboss mix-ups in the later part of the game, you have to improvise the best combat methods that suit your situation every time. For example, when the fat giant type of miniboss shows up, pulling and cannonballing fodder enemies to the mini boss helps a lot. Also, you can zap the mini bosses if you punch them enough, so there’s an incentive to push more in the close distance. If the miniboss that got mixed is a flying type, maintaining your position to snipe the boss becomes the high priority, so you have to use more range-focused attacks to deal with the enemies. There’s a good sense of chaos control simulator in there, and when the game shows more and more ridiculous combat settings (such as fighting 3 giant bats and fodders at the final arena), the game shines brilliantly. I would say, the best moment of the game reminds me some of God Hand combat, even though this game has fewer options than that game.

However, the game really suffers from the technical department. And I’m not talking about graphical fidelity. For that size of a game dev company, the game looks great on its own with its gritty western vibe. One of the big problems is that while the control works fluently 98% of time, in the other 2%, it takes a nosedive and turns into an uncontrollable mess. And that aspect is worsened by the fact that the game is built around context-sensitive moveset and janky-ass collisions. To properly launch an enemy to a target, the target should be in the player’s frontal viewpoint while the character model is directly standing in front of the target in the distance. The same goes for the zapper-related moves. If you want to zap-pull or zap-dash to the enemy, the enemy should be in your sight, and in the right distance. There are some UI elements that try to remove the guess works -such as the glowing circle or the zapper target mark-, but when the arena becomes chaos, not only relying on UI is not viable, but the target priority becomes tangled, and you start to accidentally pull wrong things or launch wrong enemies to wrong targets. Not only that, if the context-sensitive movement failed to register, your input will start the “wrong movement” which will make the player vulnerable for short time. This doesn’t seem like an issue in the early-to-mid part of the game, but as the enemies become deadlier and overcrowded, you will see why it can lead to frustrating moments.

Other context-sensitive moveset-related issues can be found in the zapping mechanic. Happened only a few times in the game, but worth mentioning. When the enemy is zapped, and you are right in front of them, your main melee attack input will start the E-combo punch attack that works like grab attacks. And E-combo makes enemies attack less frequently, which means not only it’s a combo method, but it is also a useful breathing room maker too. Most of the time, it works well with the player’s intention, but when the arena gets uneven, and cramped, and the enemies are too many, the colliders become messy…and you know what it leads to. It may start the normal punch combo when I want to start the E-combo or vice versa. One time, I successfully electrocute the miniboss and then I dashed to the target, but my character model got stuck between the boss’s back and the wall behind the boss. But still, I was still contacting the miniboss and if my E-Combo somehow registered in this situation, I would have survived since it would automatically positioned me in front of the miniboss. But my attempt to punish the miniboss with E-combo didn’t get registered and I died by getting slashed by fodders and the miniboss who just got rid of the status effect. It was so frustrating.

Don’t get me wrong, a lot of games can have issues with context-sensitive movements, since colliders are tricky bastards in game development. Bloodborne’s viscera attack and Doom Eternal’s Blood punch mechanic come to my mind. But my gripe is, the game is designed in a way that makes players dive into groups of enemies and that’s often the most enjoyable way to play. And sadly, it is also the method that makes players deal with the buggy colliders and combo movements. Maybe, if there were better ways to see the “grander picture” of the arena fight, I would have also found the fun in predicting the enemy behaviors, planning, positioning, and proceeding with the attack in a careful manner. Sadly, the camera is also too janky to provide the “grander picture”.
The good thing about this game is that enemy magnetism is not as harsh as Sifu or GoW reboot, fitting to the character’s close-up over-the-shoulder camera. But that doesn’t mean the camera is clean from issues. I think there are some AI features that reduce the attack patterns when they are behind the player’s back, but the unfair offscreen attacks are still frequent. Of course, the close-up camera doesn’t really help in that situation. Also, the camera refuses to work properly when there’s a wall behind the player -my least favorite aspect of the typical over-the-shoulder-view action games-. Getting stuck in the corner by two mini bosses was surely an experience. Some terrains prevent the players from doing the dodge-roll, but thanks to the default camera angle, players can’t see the feet, which caused a lot of death by getting stuck in the small pebble in the road that I couldn’t see. And don’t mention how atrocious can the camera be in some main boss fights.

I don’t know if the issues related to the main bosses stem purely from the technical problem or the design decision, but I have to say, there are many issues. The Parasiter is bad. Normally there aren’t many good static structure bosses in action games in general, but this one is even more frustrating, thanks to the weird lock-on feature that wires the player input in an unintuitive way. Bruch and the third main boss were mostly enjoyable, but the camera didn’t help when there are multiple targets to snipe quickly as possible. Also, I thought the feedbacks for player melee attacks were not that great, considering that all the bipedal minibosses show some flinch when they get hit by the player’s uppercut, no matter how tanky they look. The final boss worked in a similar fashion (with really good animation btw), but the final third phase was not great both on the technical and design sides. The third phase is the sized-up version of the first & second phase entity, but for some reason, your melee attack refuses to register, and you get blocked by an invisible capsule preventing the players to go underneath the body. In this situation, you are forced to use ranged options and contextual punish moves. What a great way to end the game built upon varied combat maneuvers and mostly consistent player interaction, isn’t it? And don’t forget the camera issue, as it gets worse and worse when the boss’s size grows up.

Also, here are some more things to add. Even if every control worked in the way I intended, the camera didn’t have issues, and the bosses were buttery smooth, there are some fundamental design decisions that baffled me. While there are SOME elements that break the flow of constant combat scenarios (such as the mine cart roller coaster sections and the puzzle sections), Fundamentally, the game is extremely repetitive. Now, this is a bit contradictory to what I’ve said before, but the point is different. I enjoyed the improvisational chaotic decision-making in the combat loop, but the combat loop is, still, the loop. If a player finds the most effective solution for certain chess pieces, then it becomes a habit. And a habit is anti-dynamism if you know what I mean. Unless they introduce the absurd difficulty spike (like the 3-bats battle I mentioned), or introduce the chess pieces in a different context, the combat situations will get stale.

While there are varied enemies with different moveset and different weak points, the arena’s context blends together way too much. When the arenas are mostly just the flat grounds with TNT boxes here and there, then the whole massive train cargo, oil rig, mines, vampire cavern, and swamp themes are losing their value as distinguishable stage settings, which must have taken a lot of effort to visualize. I’m not saying that this game should be the next coming of The Wonderful 101, but some elements could have been mixed as the arena gimmicks to make the combat situations more distinguishable and memorable. The sinking swamp tiles that made you keep moving in the puzzle section could have been used in certain arenas. They could have introduced an interactable mine cart that you can kick to turn it into a moving cannon ball on a rail. Sifu also proved that even if the character is mostly stuck to the ground, as long as there’s gravity working on the map, you can turn the whole level into your weapon, like throwing the enemy off the stairs or ledges. And in Evil West, you already can launch enemies off the cliff! This means by adding some layers to the arena, the game could have been more dynamic than what we have right now.

But even then, I’m kinda hesitant to call the game devs were not even trying to break the mold because I’m also facing a similar dilemma as a game dev who is developing an action game consisting of constant arenas. As you develop the enemy behaviors, you will realize that just a tiny bit of obstacles in an arena can make a lot of unintended noises. Maybe the flattened arena with no obstacles in the middle is the best for both players and enemies who are already facing numerous issues with the colliders. Maybe they tried to add the dynamic elements at the end of the dev cycle, but the time ran out, so they released it as it is. Whatever the reason is, I think they knew what they were doing. And my trust in the dev team’s future project is high. The fundamental of Evil West still reminds me of the golden era of PS2 action game titles, and they have balls to put bazillions of enemies in an arena even if they can cause a technical issue, just for sake of the dynamic play. I have no intention to play the game again since I think I’ve seen enough, but I hope their spirit carries on to more double-A game studios.

Evil West is just simply a fun game that comes from the developers of the recent Shadow Warrior trilogy. It has been on my radar since it launched but thanks to PS Plus Essential it jumped up my list and after playing it I’d like to grab a physical copy. It’s a western/horror beat ‘em up with guns and it feels like something from the 360/PS3 era, in a good way.

Evil West is set during the 1800s in an alternate universe where the American frontier needs to be protected from a supernatural threat. That’s where the Rentier Institute comes in. This organisation and their agents fight against vampires and their familiars. You play as one of these agents, Jesse Rentier. The humans are doing quite well thanks to the advancing technology and one vampire sees this as a threat to the continued existence of his kind, so he declares war. From here shit obviously hits the fan and let’s just says you’ve got a lot of monsters to kill. The world and lore of Evil West is surprisingly really cool. There is easily potential here for a prequel or sequel. The story and characters are enjoyable in a B horror movie way and it mostly moves along at a good pace, with some detours. The dialogue is fun with performances well suited to the characters and the type of game this is. There are also collectables along the way that flesh things out a bit more.

The presentation is spot on for this type of game. The cutscenes are in widescreen, with film grain and a slightly worn out look to suit the old western and horror movie style. I think they should have gone further though and carried this through more into during the gameplay too. The locations and the variety of the locations are just fantastic. There’s so many different ‘western’ locations here from rail yards, to towns, swamps, sawmills, mountains, mining areas and oil fields, with many places pushed beyond the norm into something hellish. Each location has its own distinct personality while still fitting perfectly into this world. I love all the details too, like the spiders and webs and the bats and the huge full moon filling the sky. The characters and monsters look very good too. They’ve done such a good job with this games look and with how well they blended the horror, sci-fi and western elements together. Unfortunately though the more you venture into this game the more cracks appear. Technical problems and a lack of polish here and there bring things down a bit. The worst thing I encountered was a boss that completely disappeared from the stage we were fighting in, giving me no choice but to restart the fight.

One thing that looked off to me at first was the glowing chains that signify that this is something to interact with. But not long after I realised they fit in just fine as Evil West is such a game-y game. It’s broken into chapters, each one being a narrow linear path that regularly opens to larger circles, so you always know when a fight is coming. It even has a couple of mine cart rides. There are things to find just around the corner or by looking up or around. Usually it is chests or boxes that burst into a shower of shiny coins that are used for upgrades. The upgrades and perks are very straight forward but progression is constant and satisfying with the game constantly throwing new things at you. By the end you’ll be an electrically charged powerhouse, with a ridiculous arsenal, which you use to tear apart the enemies in gory, messy style. It’s absolutely a game-y game and it is kind of glorious but also formulaic and would be too monotonous if it wasn’t so good at putting a smile on your face.

One of the reasons for that smile on your face is going to be the combat. It’s an over the shoulder, third person shooter blended with a beat ‘em up. You get a couple of main guns for precise shooting, grenades and a revolver you unload from the hip, a shotgun as well for quick, close, heavy damage and a couple more fun surprises. The melee part is punch combos, launching uppercuts and slams. You get a cool electric gauntlet that lets you stun and pull yourself to enemies or pull the stunned enemies to you. For defence you have a block, a kick that interrupts and a quick evade that if pressed twice you will fully roll away. There are a couple of special things you can do too that I won’t give away. It works, and works really well for the most part. You’ll be zipping around, punching faces and blasting away as you try to manage the bloodthirsty creatures all around you. But this sea of blood, carnage and fun does trip up and fall short in some ways.

Evil West shares the same problem as God of War (2018), which is a close over the shoulder camera limiting your view, with enemies, attacks and ranged enemies all around, at least Evil West is more fun than God of War though. Evil West handles this issue with on screen indicators and sounds but you will still find yourself getting smacked by attacks coming from off screen every now and then and it might even lead to a death here and there. This issue compounds with another problem which is just how busy the screen can get, resulting in obscured action. As you can probably guess there’s a bit of frustration to be had with the combination of these problems. The difficulty actually kind of helps fix this but is also another fault. The game is just too easy on normal, things don’t get going until towards the end and you can easily not die for most of the game. Playing the game on Evil difficulty, new game plus felt like the sweet spot, once you get past a simple start. During this second play through I had all the tools and previous experience but it kept the tension up. I was on my toes and punished for mistakes. Frustration did kick in a bit towards the end of my Evil difficulty play through and it highlighted the combats flaws. Some other things you may encounter is getting a bit stuck between the enemies and environment, the electric pull not working smoothly, things not feeling as snappy and responsive as you would like and there is not an enormous amount of depth to it all. However I had far more fun than troubles with the combat.

Evil West is a good time that feels like an older game with some modern benefits. I enjoyed going through the game twice and would’ve gone for the Platinum Trophy if there was a quick, simple way to replay the bosses. If you’re not a fan of things that are a bit silly, over the top and violent then clearly give this a miss. But if you are a fan of this or can at least tolerate it then Evil West is easily worth a play through maybe even two.

7.7/10

In an era defined by large and mostly bland open-world games, rpg’s, souls-like’s, and FPS’s - Evil West decided to go completely against that and create a straight from 2005 PS2 era Action-Shooter game that feels completely enjoyable start to finish.

Now, it has its issues (lack of enemy variety, short length, levels tend to blend into one after a while - as well as a distinct lack of visual/gameplay polish) BUT it’s still an incredibly fun time. The story is nothing to write home about, vampire hunter hunts down vampires and spoils plot to overthrow the USA etc etc.

But there’s something that was so fun about mixing a western with quick-draw style moments with a fast-paced action game. I really do, however, wish there was more use to half of the upgrades and abilities you get as half of them were pretty pointless and I’d only unlocked maybe half by the time I reached the final boss.

If this ever gets a sequel, I absolutely will be buying day 1.

A bloody, raucous slobber-knocker of a throwback title. Decided on an additional playthru to get the Platinum, because the more perks I unlocked, the more fun the game became. In similar games (modern God of War), I usually find one or two strategies that get me through every fight, but by the end of my 3rd playthru (on the hardest difficulty) I was using every tool in the kit in nearly every fight to claw my way through. That's great game design.

This is now the most fun I've had with a game from PS Plus that I never would have bought on my own.

Damn good time.

Evil West despertou meu interesse quando foi anunciado em 2022, pois parecia ser um jogo diferente e divertido. No entanto, minha experiência pessoal com o jogo foi bastante decepcionante, tornando-se um dos mais enjoativos que joguei recentemente. A jogabilidade e os combates em geral funcionam bem, e o estilo visual do jogo, que mescla o Velho Oeste com monstros e vampiros, é bem feito. No entanto, a gameplay se mostrou extremamente linear, simples e repetitiva. Apesar disso, Evil West cumpre seu papel e entrega uma experiência de jogo mediana. No meu caso, o jogo não me envolveu, pois valorizo bastante a combinação entre jogabilidade e história, e infelizmente, nesse aspecto, Evil West é carente, deixando muito a desejar. No entanto, se você busca um jogo com foco na jogabilidade e não se importa tanto com a narrativa, então Evil West pode ser a escolha perfeita para você que so quer abrir o jogo e dar uns tiros e matar vampiros.

Prós:
- Jogabilidade satisfatória
- Visual do jogo bem feito

Contras:
- Jogo extremamente linear e repetitivo
- História carente em desenvolvimento

super fun game. it's a mix of god of war (2018) and doom eternal. as good as that combo evidently is, there are a ton of glaring flaws that keep this game from truly shining.

so when i say its a mix of gow 2018 i mean mostly it's design philosophy. very linear, no cuts type of level design. im not the hugest fan of that in gow but it gets the job done for what it was going for, a cinematic and intimate game with a gripping story. but in a game that doesn't take itself seriously, thats obviously styled after games from 2 generations ago, it doesn't really work. it leaves much to be desired. there's a story in evil west, alright. i skipped about 95% of cutscenes, though. the story is so dull and boring. if it had even a bit of flare/fun that the main game had it would be a different story, but nah it tries to take itself as seriously as possible. that leads to it being really dull, im not there for the story im there to kill vampires in fun ways.

that leads to the second thing this game copies from gow (to its detriment). realistic graphics. im not a snob who hates realism, for cinematic games realism works. but across all of evil west's marketing, it's boxart, it's trailers, etc, it promises to be a fun game first and foremost. so why does it try to be realistic? this might be a problem that arose because it was cross developed for ps4/ps5, but the ps4 was fucking chugging at points, dude. with all the clutter that gets on screen(and we'll get to that, dont worry) it drops to like 20 frames or lower enough for it to be a noticeable problem. if the game was stylized/cel shaded, that issue is alleviated. a few other gameplay issues i have would also be allievated. i mean, they already have a killer artstyle for the game, check out the boxart. if the whole game was stylized like that, itd be killer.

i touched on the level design/linearity earlier, ill expand on that now. i think that if the game was cel shaded as i mentioned prior, the no cuts level design would be able to be "cut" from the game, and would give the game much more fun traversal between arenas. traversal is always so slow(esp on ladders) because of it's no cuts camera, if it had stylization there could be tons of fun traversal mechanics and it wouldn't just be a slog from arena to arena. but i mean, something like titanfall 2 had realistic graphics and one of the best traversal systems in a game. i just wish inbetween fights there was a bit more to do than simply walk. the linearity is not the issue, that was honestly a saving grace. i knew another fight was always around the corner, so i pushed through. i think it is time we talk about the meat of this game, though.

the combat is a blast. it's simply fun to shoot monsters and be a cowboy badass. there's a surprising amount of depth(esp with melee combat), which i wasnt expecting. this is where the combat's biggest problem comes in though. well actually, i think it's a symptom of the shit i mentioned earlier. there is too much depth for you to grasp in a single playthrough, the game is constantly throwing new things at you. at least on normal difficulty, once you get the e-combo, the game becomes a lot easier, and i found myself resorting to ecombo-ing and supercharging my way through tough encounters instead of trying my hand at the (once again) incredibly complex gameplay systems. so balance with the e-combo is one thing that kept me from engaging with the depth. a second thing is just the length. id wager it took me 12 some hours to play it to credits, that's simply not enough time for me to want to engage with it's depth. for more casual players who just wanna shoot vampires, i doubt they'd want to engage with it more than i do.

a second problem with the combat i had was how all arenas are flat circles. the arenas in gow ragnarok were dynamic and fun, had verticality to them, too. even though kratos cant jump w/o a prompt. i had a blast with the arenas in that game, with the added verticality and environmental hazards you can use against enemies. in evil west, all the arenas are so bland, just a flat circle. you end up in a pattern of circle strafing and e-comboing lighter enemies. even less of an incentive to engage with depth, the big enemies are constantly on your ass too. the game is sending a message you need to kill these guys NOW. and frankly the depth that is present does not allow for a faster kill than ecombo + supercharge big enemies. the reason to engage with this depth, then, is just to look like a badass in different ways. which i will say, is great, but i wish there was extrinsic motivation to engage with the depth. the flat, circular nature also leads to: rolling near the boundary , you getting stuck on geometry on the outskirts of arenas, and enemies cluttering your screen and killing you unfairly. this happened a lot. i even got stuck on enemies themselves... there's a problem with clutter on the screen. the graphics don't lend themselves kindly to this problem, either. you cant tell the enemies are vampires, their designs look too generic, reminds me of generic trails monsters tbh but those get a pass because its an rpg. the whole point of evil west is killing vampires. speaking of vamps, enemy variety. not that much variety, but it didn't bug me too much.

i sound like i hate this combat, i really don't. its a blast, and if i hadn't played a ton of other great games this year it would be my favorite combat this year. you get into this flow state in the longer encounters and it just clicks and works. i cant explain that "fun factor", try as i might. you just need to play and youll understand that despite these flaws it just works.

i really loved my time here. despite a lot of flaws, theres tons of fun to be had in evil west. i picked it up at my library for free, i wouldn't get it if its more than 30 bucks. ps4 version runs okay-ish. there were a few audio bugs i noticed as well as the aforementioned frame drops.

Completely blown away by how solid of a game this is.

From it's reveal trailer, Evil West wore it's heart on it's sleeve as a straight up third person shooter taking inspiration from seventh-gen console titles like Gears of War where you play as a cowboy beating the shit out of evil creatures. It is as simple as that. It does what it sets out to do very well.

That said, I totally get why people say this is a shallow experience. It looks and feels like a 4K rerelease of an Xbox 360 game that never existed until now. Evil West is just a game where if you look at the trailer and if you feel nothing for it at all, there will be nothing for you if you play it.

I would hope whether or not this is your jam that there's an appreciation for it's up-front honesty. Especially because this is one the best optimized games to come out on PC this year and isn't overly long. It's here for a good time, not a long one.

I am chomping a the bit for more from this developer because they seem to have a grasp on making shit that looks cool, runs immaculately, and isn't demanding too much of the player other than to enjoy this videogame ass videogame.

disappointing.... lets just forget about the crappy story for a minute like I did cause I skipped all the cutscenes, lets forget about the boring braindead level design where they literally highlight where you have to go with these different things like planks that you climb up on or a ledge you drop down on that make no difference cause they serve the same function... let's forget about how every level could've been a corridor into a combat room into a corridor into a combat room and nothing would be lost. No one cares about the peripheral shit. We're here for the combat. The gameplay. What any decent game should have at the front. I thought this games gameplay would be fun and it sort of was until I realized it is, like the rest of the game, NOTHING!!!

of all the action games you could copy, you choose god of war 2018? really? I mean I guess it sort of makes sense since this is a mixture brawler/third person shooter, but we really have the tight ass camera angle and no jumping and walking and talking sections and, like I said before, random useless traversal like climbing ropes or whatever, a couple powers and perks and upgrades but it doesn't fix the problem of it being so lame. Your main tool that you don't even get till like level 3 is your electric gauntlet which lets you teleport straight at an enemy's face and stun them, or parry attacks and stun them, or grapple an enemy towards you and stun them, or just bring certain enemies into a guaranteed kill animation and health pickup. Look maybe I'm old fashioned but I want action games where I have to use different tools cause if I'm using the exact same combos on every single enemy because it works easily and the game isn't forcing me to change it up I WILL get bored. "ohh you should just change up your combat just for fun if you're getting bored doing the same thing" ITS NOT MY JOB TO HAVE FUN!! ITS THE GAMES JOB TO BE FUN!! MAKE ME HAVE FUN!!! IF I WANTED TO MAKE MYSELF HAVE FUN I COULD USE MY IMAGINATION AND CONJURE UP THE PERFECT VIDEOGAME WHENEVER I WANTED! DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND? Sorry I lost my cool there. But yeah. No encouragement to experiment, honestly bland combat that gets stale once you get past the cool electric and body parts falling off graphics, and everything that isn't the combat is nothing. Figuratively nothing. God damn I've been looking forward to this one since it got revealed. Why can't they just make an action game about a cowboy with an electric gauntlet fighting vampires and various assorted monsters and have it just be good? why does it have to be bad? Why is my favourite game of the year a visual novel about some depressed artist in medieval times visiting a small village in Bavaria? how far have we fallen as an artform?

isso aqui é um god of war 2018-like... nunca pensei que diria isso na vida mas é inegável que é o que esse jogo tenta ser. Porem, sendo bem mais linear e passa longe de ter uma história tão boa quanto a obra em que se inspira, no mais, os jogos funcionam iguais, porradaria e puzzle com a câmera bem cinematográfica por cima do ombro e uma liberdade quase nula de de fato se movimentar pelos cenários... ainda assim ele é divertido aqui e ali, apesar de um combate meio mal balanceado e puzzles que são mais do mesmo.

Game freaking rocks, made for hardcore action fans.
The core combat loop is very well made, there are plenty of moves to unlock and many skill trees, just what I wanted to see, and they all feel amazing to perform, specially the Zapper Dash, man it's so awesome. The game feels very polished all around, all moves smoothly tie into each other and you are very much in control of everything you do.

In terms of story and presentation, I'm liking it so far, it's not aiming to change your life or have any meaningful impact, but it's well made and well acted, the cutscenes look pretty good as well.
I must also point out that the game is very well optimized on PC, I'm playing in 120fps with no noticeable drops and it's super smooth.

If you're an action game fan and enjoy good combat, you can pretty much buy this game with your eyes closed, it's that good in what it is, I mean, at the end of the day, you play as a badass cowboy with an electric gauntlet slaying vampires, who the hell doesn't want that?

Evil West is a video game first and foremost. Nowadays people tend to say that in a derogatory way, but I mean it with as much affection as I possibly can. Let's be honest, not every game has to be a major thought provoking art-piece or a genre-bending defining experience to be good, sometimes all you really want is an action packed adrenaline fueled thrill ride where your main objective is simply "fight and kill all the bad guys" and that is exactly what Evil West excels at, providing a good old classic linear action game experience that doesn't try to be anything more than what it is. A badass vampire hunting cowboy kicking a bunch of vampire ass and looking cool while doing it.

Evil West takes place in a steampunk style alternate historical setting of late 1800s USA following Jesse Rentier the heir to the Rentier Institute, a secret government organization dedicated to eradicating all evil creatures of the night (Imagine the Belmont clan if they were cowboys and funded by the government instead of the church). One day a rival vampire clan attacks the Rentier Institute both crippling the organization and putting Jesse's father in critical condition. Now Jesse is on a quest for revenge and to save his father's life.

I'll be honest, the narrative of Evil West is nothing amazing, it is full of cliches and twists you'll see coming a mile away, it's far from a compelling story, but that doesn't stop it from still being a super fun and entertaining one thanks to how over-the-top it is with incredible action set-pieces, visually stunning environments and a solid cast of eccentric characters Jesse meets on his journey who all have strong voice acting performances backing them. Jesse himself is also a very good protagonist who is the perfect blend of gruff badass and wise-cracking smartass. The whole game plays out like a campy edgy action movie from the 2000s giving me major vibes of Hugh Jackman's Van Helsing or maybe Priest. My only complaint is I found the ending to be a bit lackluster.

Now like I said, the story while entertaining is far from the selling point. This is not an overly cinematic game only having about 1 and a half hours of cut-scenes across its 15 hour campaign. Evil West is part of a dying breed being a hyper linear action game which is split up into a mission based structure and through those missions there are a handful of secrets to discover mostly to give more context into the world and lore, but also caches of money for weapons upgrades. However exploration is extremely limited and there are even very few puzzles spread out in the game so the bulk of your gameplay time is going to come solely from the combat in which you punch and shoot hordes of vampires in many stylish ways.

The combat feels like the devs took the base of God of War 2018 with the over-the-shoulder camera perspective and focus on a single melee weapon (Hell, some of the animations themselves even feel copy and pasted from GoW 2018 lol), but then they expanded it to incentivize chaining together stylish combos in a DMC-like manner. Your primary weapon is Jesse's vampire slaying electricity powered gauntlet and you'll be doing a lot of punching as this is much more of a melee focused combat system than a shooter (It just has lots of guns for secondary weapons) so in the early hours it might even feel a little repetitive, but as you play more the game slowly starts to naturally open up more as you level up with experience and get perk points which you can invest in the skill tree to unlock an arsenal of secondary weapons and powers for Jesse to use like a revolver, a rifle, a shotgun, grenades, an electric shockwave, a whip like grapple, a tornado (Yep, you read that right) and even a minigun among others. By the end of the game you have so many tools at your disposal to cause as much damage and carnage possible that the combat never gets boring or stale and you might even want to jump right into NG+ to experience it all again on a harder difficulty with all your powers unlocked from the start.

Evil West is a nostalgic throwback to a bygone era in the best way possible, feeling like a lost gem of the 360/PS3 days. A no frills attached linear action game that focuses first and foremost on giving the player a satisfyingly rich combat system that is fast, fluid and fun alongside waves of vampires to test their combat skills on. While the narrative itself is nothing to write home about, it at least does a good job of being thoroughly entertaining with great action packed cut-scenes, some memorable characters and visually striking locations thanks to a fantastic art style. Evil West might seem dated to some and it certainly won't be for everyone, but if you're like me and often hunger for that simpler time of gaming then much like blood to a vampire, Evil West will help satiate that thirst for those good old days.

A fine time with moments of really engaging gameplay and even strategical elements to its combat. I liked their introduction of weapons and its upgrade system, I never felt overwhelmed learning new mechanics which is good. I mainly use the rifle which I felt had an annoying reload that clashed with its traversal system. Your character is slow and clunky so when your reload is that too and enemies are firing on all cylinders, it can be a juggle to avoid damage and reload in a timely fashion. I get that it adds challenge but I just found it annoying.

I love stories in games but if I’m being honest I tuned out of this one pretty early on. It’s cool that it embraced what it was but after a certain point it was the gameplay that kept me in this experience. Still I commend it for not taking itself seriously, it fits with the tone it established.

There are puzzles in this game but none of them are frustrating, difficult or stick around long enough to slow down the gameplay (I’m looking at you, Ragnarok) so this was a nice change of pace for me.

All in all this is a good game, and if it came out during the PS2 era (which is what it harkens back to) then maybe it would be 4 stars. I’d recommend it picking it up on a sale.

Evil West reviews read like the famously-memed Batman Arkham/Spider-Man reviews, "This game makes you FEEL like it's a Friday night in 2010 and you just rented this awesome Xbox 360 game from Blockbuster". We've officially reached the point where the early 2010's are nostalgic, good lord time is cruel.

I was really eager to finally play this one, it came smack dab in the middle of a few major releases last year and kinda got buried, but I knew it was going to be up my alley right away when I saw a trailer. Big chunky main character with big chunky movement and combat, linear levels and environments, glowing objects showing you exactly where to go and which items to pick up. It holds your hand very tightly along these straightforward little paths, but then let's you go to play hard in its various battle arenas.

This game feels very very similar to the new God of War games, no doubt. But it kinda feels like a mix of the new and old too; the exploration and tight levels, and wandering off the main path to find little chests and collectibles, felt like the original God Of War trilogy to me.

What really differs this is the super fun gun combat; throwing Kratos' axe is awesome and all, but getting to blast away with revolvers, a rifle, crossbow, shotgun and minigun, really bumped the game up for me. I constantly obsess about a modern third person action game with melee/beat-em-up combat, mixed in with tight over-the-shoulder shooting, and Evil West comes pretty damn close. I do wish they included the human enemies more, as they're perfect for gun-only combat. I know they're basically fodder for the player to wipe out easily but if they threw tons and tons of them at you to up the challenge, I would've loved to see that.

The battles are like a Doom arena where you're running and dodging and punching and shooting all over the place, with enemies coming in at all directions, attacking from afar or getting right up in your face, and there's even environmental objects you can use such as spiked traps and explosive crates. There's a really fun move where you can uppercut enemies and then punch them from the air into items or other enemies, but once I got the upgrade that makes enemies explosive once you do that move, I found I wasn't bothering with the environmental objects anymore. Nice to have them for variety though.

The plot is basic "monsters wanna take over the world, we need to stop them" stuff, but who cares. You're just here to pulverize vampires and werewolves and slimy-ass weirdos that wouldn't look out of place in Bloodborne. The game does feel a bit underbaked in its story presentation, where levels end abruptly, a cutscene plays out and then you're suddenly transported to a completely new level with little to no explanation. From a snow covered mining camp deep in the mountains to a hot desert town in the blink of an eye. The characters are mainly forgettable, aside from a nerdy sidekick dude I found endearing, and an over the top asshole guy who's there to piss off the good guys and try and foil the whole operation; who has by the far the funniest lines in the whole game. Main character is generic ruff, gruff n' tuff cowboy dude number 4754, but I enjoyed him nonetheless.

Evil West isn't a game you put dozens of hours into exploring a huge map and doing tons of shit, it's a blazing hot action-horror experience you get your kicks with and then move on from. Definitely something you'd come back to after a few years and play again from time to time, start a new game plus file and upgrade your moves and weapons to the max and try on a harder difficulty. And this game will wipe the floor with you if you want it to!

Overall, just come for the awesome combat - it's one of those games where the battles can look cinematic as fuck when you pull off the right moves and you realize you've forgotten to breathe for the past minute.

Evil West é aquele joguinho pra desligar a mente e apenas ir jogando e aproveitando o combate, até porque:

De história ele não tem NADA;

Trilha sonora existe mas é esquecível;

Level design te deixa mais em desvantagem do que qualquer outra coisa (só Deus sabe quantas atrocidades falei xingando esse jogo por isso), principalmente contra hordas de inimigos e boss fights;

Sound design é zuado, principalmente a dublagem em momentos de gameplay, onde a voz fica abafada;

Os personagens são clichês e genéricos e suas expressões faciais são... travadas, simplesmente não existe emoção em seus rostos.

Entretanto... o combate e as mecânicas dele é tão gostosinho, que consegue te acompanhar e te levar até o final. Além de ter uma sensação boa de evolução, você realmente sente que ta ficando forte e isso me induziu a continuar.

A estética também é bem bonita, por algum fucking motivo combinar a temática de velho oeste com steampunk fica muito bom (se bem que quase qualquer outra temática com steampunk fica bom).

Os gráficos são legais, da pra apreciar junto da iluminação, mas... essa mesma iluminação, em algumas partes de combate também não ajuda muito pra esquivar de golpes ou atirar (ou então eu sou muito cego) .

Eu joguei o jogo no difícil, e PUTA QUE PARIU QUE JOGUINHO DO CAPETA ESSE... é bem desafiador, ás vezes é até meio desequilibrado, então exige certa concentração e até estratégia em algumas partes. O jogo te obriga a usufruir mais das mecânicas pra continuar jogando, mas até eu perceber isso... eu acabei tomando todo tipo de surra.

Eu ainda não testei o modo multiplayer, mas jogando com um amigo provavelmente vai ser mais divertido e não sei se ainda vou platinar o game. A lista de conquista do jogo é desafiador, mas não é tão chato... o problema pra mim, é só ter que jogar no modo mais difícil e nem por um caralho (la ele) que vou me estressar sozinho de novo, provavelmente vou tentar jogar no modo coop pra platinar o jogo....

Se for jogar sozinho, recomendo ir no normal pra passar o tempo, mas se for jogar coop, então recomendo jogar no difícil, onde pode gerar mais entretenimento.