Call of Juarez: Gunslinger - Quick Pour

Right off the bat, the art style in Call of Juarez Gunslinger is excellent and the voice acting throughout was near perfection. The gameplay is very much on-rails. The only thing separating this from an arcade-style shoot-em-up is the fact that this is a first-person shooter so you can move and look around freely in the levels. Even though most locations are in open spaces, you are funneled in from one section to the next. Exploration is encouraged by hunting for the nuggets spread around in random areas in the levels. Finding these gives you little bits and pieces of information about real-life events and famous personalities from the Wild West. While I appreciate that the game treats the player with quick history lessons about what happened apart from the events presented in the game, I often skipped out on reading most of these because they interrupted my gameplay.

Speaking of, the gun variety is decent and the feeling of landing an exact shot on your target is very satisfying. I resorted to the long-range rifle throughout the main campaign and other game modes as I found it to be the most precise and would one-shot kill almost all enemies. The enemies in the game are all bog-standard thugs, with their type decided by what weapon they wield. So pistols, shotguns, shields and grenades are what you will be dealing with.

The bosses also mix things up with some being cat-and-mouse chases around an arena, where strategic positioning and well-timed shots, while avoiding their gunfire are key. Alternatively, other boss fights pit you in a duel shootout, where you face them down, build up your speed and focus fast to be the first to pull the trigger and instantly kill them. In the beginning, I found understanding the controls quite tricky/difficult but after losing several times and practicing in the duels game mode, I got the hang of it and found these to be a thrilling experience. You genuinely feel like a cowboy in the Wild West in this mode!

The story is pretty alright and I find the design for the main character, Silas Greaves, really cool. But because Silas is the narrator of his story and does most of the talking, I find it detracts from his characterisation and I would have preferred if he talked a little less. The story does set it apart from most other shooters because Silas is an unreliable narrator and very often the game puts you in familiar situations with several twists, so I liked that it always kept me guessing what would happen next.

I enjoyed my 4-5 hours with the game and even though I was slightly keen on playing through the new game plus mode upon beating the main campaign as well as the arcade game modes, I felt like I had seen everything the game had to offer at that point and I was happy to end my time with it.