Review - Call of Juarez Gunslinger

Call of Juarez Gunslinger

Techland
Ubisoft

Windows (reviewed), PSN, XBLA

Western, FPS, Arcade

May 21, 2013

The Preamble

I love westerns. Western movies, western comics, and the few and far between western video games. The Western video game is a rare beast, one that we have seen very few of over the years. Outside of Gun, the Call of Juarez series, and Red Dead Redemption, we've seen virtually no western games this generation.

And then here comes Call of Juarez: Gunslinger, out of nowhere. This seems to be happening more and more frequently: I wake up, open Steam, see a AAA quality game staring me in the face for $14.99. Not only does this game breath some life into a setting that is not seen very often, it presents it to the consumer at a smokin' price! 

More than ever before, we seem to be consistently getting these sleeper 15-20 dollar games, and the best thing is, they're damned good! Mars: War Logs, The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing, Dust: An Elysian Tale; while these games aren't perfect, they are surprisingly up to snuff with the latest AAA titles. It's an interesting trend, and one that I'm particularly fond, especially when it produces games like Call of Juarez: Gunslinger!

The Overview

The narrative of the game is relayed in an interesting manner. As the game starts, you watch a cinematic of an old gunslinger sitting down in a saloon for a drink. Before long, people notice that he is the legendary bounty hunter, Silas Greaves, and ask him to tell some stories about his adventures. You listen to Silas tell the stories to the patrons (and their reactions) as you play through his tale.

Call of Juarez: Gunslinger is set up more like an arcade game than it's predecessors. It's very linear and the FPS action is all of the shooting gallery sort. This ends up fitting with the style of storytelling very well in that each segment of the story Silas tells is its own chapter of the game. It all ties together very nicely into a snug 5-6 hour game. With the addition of a New Game Plus mode and a $14.99 price point, Call of Juarez: Gunslinger is a prime example of a Grade A middle tier game.

The Good

• Gunslinger isn't the first game to use a flashback-narration storytelling style (Bastion, ahem), but man does it do it well. The way that Silas gets carried away on tangents and misremembers facts throughout his tale makes for cool dynamic level redesigns and wacky happenings throughout the game. This was one of the most refreshing parts of this game.

• The guns look and feel amazing. When you're playing a Wesern game you really want to feel the weight of those two revolvers, or that double barrel shotgun. Gunslinger does a great job in bringing you some highly detailed, weighty guns, that feel great while you're shooting them.

• Duels are tense and truly test your reflexes. It's tough to make a good dueling mechanic, but Gunslinger has done a fine job. There's tons of tension building up to the draw, and to effectively win, you really have to be on top of your game.

• Silas' story is a rip roaring good time for any Western fan. You encounter Billy the Kid, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Wyatt Earp, and plenty of others. Silas supposedly knew all these folks, which means you get to play through the story of his adventures with them. Being a huge fan of all the movies involving these guys, it's an absolute blast playing through parts of the game with them by your side.

The Bad

• The game is pretty darn short. I can't complain too much about this because of the price, but if I have to gripe about something, I definitely wish there was more.
• It's a linear game. Again, for the style of game that this is (shooting gallery FPS) and the price point, I really can't legitimately complain about this. But I have to come up with something, don't I?

The Verdict

I'm sure I've made this clear by now, but this game is a beautiful orgy of Western lore conglomerated into a cohesive, fast-paced, blast of a shooter. If you are a Western fan of any kind, or just in the mood for a quirky, over the top shooter, I'd highly recommend picking this up. 

The Extras

Here's a playthrough of the first level. Keep in mind, this is New Game Plus, and also on the hardest difficulty, True West.

Review - Tomb Raider

Tomb Raider

Crystal Dynamics

Windows (reviewed), PS3, Xbox 360

Action-Adventure, Survival, Platformer

March 5, 2013




The Preamble

My introduction to the Tomb Raider games was on the original Playstation, fighting bears and doing cartwheels through massive caves and tombs. I played the first two Tomb Raider games when I was young and absolutely loved them. Since then, I've dabbled with some of the interim Tomb Raider games (Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light), but wasn't sucked in like I had been what I was younger.

I wasn't able to get around to playing the game until now due to the number of big releases during March. But I've finally gotten around to it, and since I waited, I was able to get the game for just about $15. This just goes to show, unless you really need to play a game at release, you're likely much better off waiting for a month or two after the release date to pick up PC games, you can often save a ton of cash.

The Overview

Crystal Dynamics has taken the reins in bringing us a brand new reboot of this classic series keeping the same name as the original: Tomb Raider. A lot has changed since our busty friend was raiding tombs back in 1996. The 2013 Tomb Raider gives us a different look at Lara Croft, as a person, and how she stumbled into this tomb raiding life.

The game begins on an exploratory vessel, the Endurance, where Lara and a group of colleagues are in search of the lost kingdom of Yamatai. After much deliberation with her crew, Lara convinces the group that they should head toward the Dragon's Triangle. As they venture into this mysterious place, they are thrown into a violent storm by unexpected weather, forcing them to crash land on a stray island in the triangle.

This is where the real adventure begins. Lara must find her lost comrades, survive the tumultuous island, and find a way home. You'll utilize Lara's innate survival skills, climbing expertise, and weapon handling to accomplish this task, all the while uncovering the secret that the island holds within.

The Good

• A Lara Croft you care about. While Lara's story arc doesn't provide a whole lot of realism, with the help of spectacular graphics fidelity and voice acting, we're able to see and relate to a much more human Lara Croft than we saw in previous games.

• The graphics are spectacular. Crystal Dynamics' Crystal Engine is downright beautiful. Lara and the environments with all the different particle effects look spectacular. Like BioShock Infinite or Far Cry 3, this was yet another game where I was constantly snapping screenshots for desktop wallpapers. The first thing that popped into my mind every time I started this game up was: "God damn, this looks great."

• A big part of what makes the graphics shine so much are the masterfully executed animations. Lara's movement is as fluid as can be. You can literally see the effect of every change in the environment on her actions. This type of polish and precision with characters and environment animation definitely makes this title shine.

• The voice acting is flawless. The voice acting for Lara is done by Camilla Luddington. While this beauty doesn't resemble a cart wheeling, rock climbing, bow wielding badass like Lara in real life (to me, at least), she does a great job of voicing her character.

Complete and utter badass.

Voice of... complete and utter badass?!

            

• Crystal Dynamics did a great job with the environment and set pieces in this game. Walking out into a brand new area of the map and seeing a great landscape of old structures and ruins to scale and explore is a great feeling. You will definitely appreciate the level design in this game.

• What's a Tomb Raider game without Lara's signature double pistols?? Well, those pistols aren't as prevalent in this iteration of the series, but with the addition of the bow, combat is better than ever. Bow and arrows seem to be extremely popular now for some reason (Far Cry 3, Crysis 3) and Tomb Raider aims to carry that torch a little further. They accomplish it with flying colors in this release. While the double pistols and various other firepower is available for Lara to use throughout the game, the bow is by far the most satisfying, and makes every combat experience a joy to jump into.

• As I mentioned before, the environments are massive and very well designed. There are often times numerous paths to an objective, and the openness of the areas make for a great feeling of true exploration. While most of the exploration isn't necessary unless you want to find the plethora of collectibles that are made available to you, traversing the environment alone is enough fun to compel you to explore every inch of the map.

• So what about the actual tombs?! Well, they're awesome. Just like the large, open areas of the game, the more confined tombs that contain intricate puzzles are an absolute blast to figure out. I just wish there were more of them!

• Minimal HUD and intuitive controls. Tomb Raider properly introduces you to controls by flashing the button indicators on your screen at first, but after a while, they disappear. While this may sound annoying, it's actually not. Less 'gamey' stuff on the screen makes for a far more immersive experience, and you are trained in such a way that the first button you go for in these situations is more often than not, the correct button. Great design in this respect!

The Bad

• What happened to hunting?? In the first mission, you are introduced to your bow by being tasked to take down some deer that are roaming the area. Outside of a couple scripted wolf encounters, you are basically never threatened by an animal again. One of my favorite parts of the old Tomb Raider games is having to deal with bears, moutain lions, cougars, and the like. Unfortunately, there is far more human killing than animal killing in this game.

• Tomb Raider has been transformed more into a third person shooter than a puzzle platformer. While the combat, especially with a bow, is really well done in this game, there's an awful lot of it for a Tomb Raider title. While combat sort of took the back burner in a lot of former titles, for better or worse, it's much more in the forefront in this release. This is fine with me, except for the fact that I was craving more puzzle content (see below).
• The puzzle tombs were great, but there needs to be more of them. These were one of my favorite parts of the game, but there were not nearly enough of them in this release. I remember there being countless platforming puzzles in prior Tomb Raider releases and in this game you can probably count all of the puzzle tombs on your two hands.

The Verdict

Tomb Raider is one of the best games that I've played this year. If I had to pick a GOTY right now, it would be a tough pick between BioShock Infinite and Tomb Raider. Even with it's flaws, this reboot is a must play for any fan of the franchise, or even the third person/platforming genre in general.

To set the hook even further, the price of picking up Tomb Raider on PC has dropped significantly since release. Keep an eye on Steam sales and sites like Green Man Gaming for amazing deals (in the past week I've seen it on sale for less than $20!).

All in all, if you want to see one of the more impressive games of this generation, do yourself a favor and pick up this game!