If you can set your mind back to last November, you’ll remember that we gave Gun a generous 7/10. Now, our expectations of current generation software versus that of next generation software are on completely different tiers – as a piece of next generation software, Gun is pretty miserable. Heck, even Activision knew this – they did put it in a double pack with their other rushed port for the Australian launch, which tells us that somebody didn’t expect much of a consumer reaction to an overpriced port.
Welcome to the next generation, Activision-style
Gun’s story centres on Colton White, an all round do-gooder who works with his father Ned, hunting game for the cruise ships that run by their area. While loading their latest order onto the cruise ship, Reverend Reed and his gang of savage soldiers attack. Colton and Ned do their best to defend the boat, but it sinks in the melee. With his last words, Ned informs Colt that he is not his real father, and if he wants answers, Colt must to talk to Jenny in Dodge City. Moments later, the ship explodes, Ned is vaporised and Colton is knocked out, washing up on the beach a few days later.
Neversoft’s main influence during the development of Gun was obviously Grand Theft Auto, but after reaching the game’s first city, players will notice that the game lacks that “living, breathing” environment that elevates Rockstar’s game over the numerous impostors. While we appreciate that the population of towns in the old west wasn’t exactly comparable to a modern day Los Angeles, having only five non-player characters on screen doesn’t exactly make an environment come alive. The game offers little in the way of opportunities for compelling side quests, only giving players the opportunity to do a few mail runs, bounty hunts or a bit of prospecting for extra gold and some (rather useless) stat increases – don’t expect too much gratification for straying from the game’s main path; there’s plenty of opportunity to do so, but the environment is so desolate that it’s not really worth the extra effort.
Gonna paint the wagon, gonna paint it good!
In fact, it’s Gun’s main story that is its greatest strength. Taking a few influences from the grittier westerns of recent times, and with few nods from the Leone era, Gun distances itself from the cheesier westerns commonly associated with this genre. It actually features a rather surprising level of gore – we understand that this is the Wild West, and it wasn’t a pleasant place to be, but Neversoft has gone a little too far with the levels of graphic violence and vulgarity in the game. Not only this, but more sensitive players may find that the racist and misogynist overtones of the game take away from the overall experience.
The game puts players through a variety of missions throughout the story, from protecting a bridge from rampaging Apaches, to attacking a mine with a rail-bound cannon. There’s a reasonable variety of weapons – six shooters, rifles, shotguns and the trusty bow and arrow. Colton is always up against multiple foes, but players will find that every gun at their disposal is quite useful, even if they only stick to the six shooters and rifles. Quickdraw mode can be activated in times of desperation – the game slows down, and the player can quickly switch between targets and fire off rounds without having to aim or reload. The game is extremely generous with auto-aim, though it can be turned off at the player’s discretion.
Longevity is Gun’s main weakness. The story runs at a lightning-fast pace, you'll see the end credits after only five hours of play, and the additional bonus missions (should players feel inclined to do them) will only add another hour or two to the experience. The speed at which the narrative moves is a little silly at times; when you get to Empire, Colton is made a deputy, at which point you’d expect to have to do a few missions fixing the town and establishing some law and order, but the developers instantly send you off into the wastes to push the story right along. While we appreciate that Neversoft has set out to make a more cinematic experience, this is still a videogame, and should be approached as such – interactivity is king. To make things even more annoying, Gun never really offers any sort of formidable challenge on the default difficulty level – players are going to have to step up to the hard or "insane" levels for their progress to be hindered by the enemies in the game.
Gun on the Xbox 360 is like this bridge here - ugly and not quite finished, but still useable
On the PlayStation 2 and Xbox, Gun fulfilled the basic graphical expectations of owners of those two systems. The Xbox 360 is a different battlefield however, and Xbox 360 Gun just hasn’t received enough of a facelift during the transition to differentiate itself from its current generation brothers – other than a smooth framerate and higher resolution graphics, Gun on the 360 is the exact same game we experienced back in November. The game is still packing some pretty impressive production values, and an all star cast provides voices for the main cast, but it just can’t compare to newer Xbox 360 specific software.
Lazy ports of current generation games are exactly the sort of thing we don’t want to see on the Xbox 360, and Gun is a prime example of this. We accept that there is a perfectly playable (although brief) game here, but it pales in comparison to the other titles on offer on Microsoft’s latest toy. As a result of Activision’s blatant greed, we’ve got no choice other than to suggest that you give this one a miss.
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