copyright © Jedo Dre 2011

Gun



Rati ng:



Impact: Average

I'm amazed how fast this game got reviewed. After 4 days since its release I already saw around 15 user reviews. Must've been those commercials on TV that caught our attention. The flashing commercial left us hoping for more than the game can actually offer. Even though I might be a little late with my review I must do a negative review some day and this is a good time for that.


Core


Storyline:


You as Cole are hunting together with your father to sell game to the passing by ships. Just as your dad takes care of some business with one of the ladies onboard, the ship gets attacked and he dies -> revenge, blah blah blah...kill everyone back...unravel a mystery....the whole deal.... The usual western movie storyline. The story is one of the game's strong moments. The game feels like a movie.


Gameplay:


Well there are two sides to this coin. It's both good and bad. You grow into the stroy and follow it logically. There's a large map that you explore as you complete the quests. Besides the main quest there are several side quests that include bounty hunting, small choirs, herding etc.


Several weapons are to your disposal including rifles, long range rifles, pistols, a bow, knives, shotguns etc. They become available as you progress. Each has a stat that can be increased by buying add-ons from the shopkeeper. The same goes for your character stats. They are also getting upgraded after each mission and some can be upgraded for money.


The action in the game feels very arcade-like. The enemy just sends hoards of enemies at you and you unload clips after clips into their bodies as your own health meter slowly (or fast depending on the game difficulty) goes down.


The HUD is relatively comfortable to use and so are the controls.


I disliked the collision system in the game. Plenty of times when I saw an enemy behind a rock and shoot him from behind my rock I would end up seeing a huge bullet hole in...the air right in front of me. It hit the rock..suuuuuure.


The gameplay of Gun strikingly resembles GTA San Andreas. That's what most people compare it to. Card games, quests, several towns and open land in between, secrets, driving (sort of) and shooting around. However compared to GTA this game would be considered very poor. There's just not enough of everything; Not enough quests, not enough NPC's, not enough things to do. All in all the game feels like it was done as a side project in between Tony Hawk Pro Skater games.


One thing I do not agree with is the length of the game. People have been complaining that it's too short. It took me longer than Splinter Cell and SC Pandora Tomorrow all together. It took me longer than Road to Hill 30 alright. I'm still not done with it completely.


The right thing to say is that it's shorter than its role model: GTA San Andreas (or Morrowind if you like to compare it to that).


AI


There's not much to say about it I guess. AI actions feel very heavily scripted in this game. In shootouts they will usually just sit behind cover and occasionally lean out to shoot you. At other times they act like total morons, replacing each other around the same corner for you to shoot them.


The city folk wander around randomly with no particular mission. The only thing you can do to them is grab them...or shoot them...


Visuals


If played on anything less than the maximum graphic settings the game looks appalling. Most textures reminded me the good old Counter Strike, except that Counter Strike was released many years ago.


The game hides the bad textures under different effects, but unless you got your Anti-Aliasing and everything else on full, you will be disappointed. I want more pretty colors!


Some things do look good like the characters and some of the effects. The game is very violent. Heads are being blown off and blood does attempt to splatter realistically during headshots but in itself looks bad.


The animation has two sides to it as well. The characters articulate correctly but many animations look awkward and many things clip through each other.


Performance


I added this section just for this game. Now unless you have a high end system I must warn you that the game will act horrifically. Even though my system was way above the minimum requirements and I tried playing it on minimum settings, the game acted like a dying person: twitching and falling in and out of conscience. At times it would be slower than my Power Point presentations. The textures were often just disappearing as I found myself hanging in the open air and very confused!


Sound


The game scores high here. The acting is very good. Voices sound like they should sound in the western prairies. Gun sounds are varied and include bullets bouncing off stuff. Wind blows across the land... Music is well chosen and as I noticed changes depending on the situation.


Conclusion


Value in this game is not very high. It's not exactly a budget game but at the same time doesn't give too much for it. Gun is an arcade game you can enjoy on a high-end system if you're a western fan. The unfinished feeling will haunt you though throughout the game. I wouldn't expect Activision to release a bad game but this is just too far from perfect. However western games are rare (does anyone remember any cowboy game at all?) so let's applaud Activison anyway.