"I won't have it said I left you with nothing, kid."
As far as corridor shooters go, this is the best of the bunch for me. Now, my relationship with the Call of Juarez franchise is iffy at best. They go from moderately okay (Bound in Blood) to absolutely forgettable (The Cartel), so color me surprised when the fourth entry in this series won me over almost instantly. Gone is the unnecessary semi-open world that makes exploring pointless, gone is the clunkiness of the movement and the cheap attempts at physics-based "puzzles". They dissected each game, took elements that worked, stitched it back together in a blood-fueled sepia-tinted Wild West adventure.
I love this game. The way the colors pop out in an almost cel-shaded world. The crunchiness of each shot from all the weapons. The soundtrack that takes Morricone and cranks it up to 11. And the presentation, the grit and gruesomeness that gives Gunslinger a vibe akin to the grindhouse subgenre.
The biggest point that won me over during my first playthrough was, however, the story and how it tied into the gameplay. The game is being told from the perspective of its protagonist, Silas Greaves (amazingly voiced by John Cygan, RIP), who is recounting his days as a bounty hunter to the folks in a local pub. This is a classic case of the Unreliable Narrator but is done in such a way I have not seen in any other video game ever -- no idea, there probably is, I just don't know about it. The twist is that elements in the game change when the protagonist corrects himself in his narration or one of his listeners intrudes on the story. The result is that you must go through some paths in a level several times, but in different ways. Sometimes the type of enemy you fight changes, or Silas opens up a path through a Deus Ex Machina that would otherwise have remained blocked. It's the little things like this that make Gunslinger stand out.
One letdown is how short the game is. If you're decent at shooting stuff, this won't take you more than maybe 5-6 hours. There's side content, sure, but who the hell cares about time trials in 8-year-old game? I'd hate to have paid full price for this when it came out and ~13 bucks are still a lot for such a railroaded experience, but from the bottom of my heart, let me tell you, it is one of the best out there.
As far as corridor shooters go, this is the best of the bunch for me. Now, my relationship with the Call of Juarez franchise is iffy at best. They go from moderately okay (Bound in Blood) to absolutely forgettable (The Cartel), so color me surprised when the fourth entry in this series won me over almost instantly. Gone is the unnecessary semi-open world that makes exploring pointless, gone is the clunkiness of the movement and the cheap attempts at physics-based "puzzles". They dissected each game, took elements that worked, stitched it back together in a blood-fueled sepia-tinted Wild West adventure.
I love this game. The way the colors pop out in an almost cel-shaded world. The crunchiness of each shot from all the weapons. The soundtrack that takes Morricone and cranks it up to 11. And the presentation, the grit and gruesomeness that gives Gunslinger a vibe akin to the grindhouse subgenre.
The biggest point that won me over during my first playthrough was, however, the story and how it tied into the gameplay. The game is being told from the perspective of its protagonist, Silas Greaves (amazingly voiced by John Cygan, RIP), who is recounting his days as a bounty hunter to the folks in a local pub. This is a classic case of the Unreliable Narrator but is done in such a way I have not seen in any other video game ever -- no idea, there probably is, I just don't know about it. The twist is that elements in the game change when the protagonist corrects himself in his narration or one of his listeners intrudes on the story. The result is that you must go through some paths in a level several times, but in different ways. Sometimes the type of enemy you fight changes, or Silas opens up a path through a Deus Ex Machina that would otherwise have remained blocked. It's the little things like this that make Gunslinger stand out.
One letdown is how short the game is. If you're decent at shooting stuff, this won't take you more than maybe 5-6 hours. There's side content, sure, but who the hell cares about time trials in 8-year-old game? I'd hate to have paid full price for this when it came out and ~13 bucks are still a lot for such a railroaded experience, but from the bottom of my heart, let me tell you, it is one of the best out there.