Gun (2005) (VG)

Writer:

Randall Jahnson (writer)

Release Date:

8 November 2005 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Western

Tagline:

Experience The Brutality Greed And Lust That Was The West.

Plot:

Gun takes gamers to the untamed West of the late-1800s where greed, lust and murder are rampant.

Plot Keywords:

Lust | Steamboat | West | Murder | Greed

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Thomas Jane	...	Colton White (voice)
Kris Kristofferson	...	Ned White (voice)
Lance Henriksen	...	Thomas MacGruder (voice)
Brad Dourif	...	Reverend Josiah Reed (voice)
Ron Perlman	...	Mayor Hoodoo Brown (voice)
Tom Skerritt	...	Clay Allison (voice)
Eric Schweig	...	Many Wounds / Fights-At-Dawn (voice)
Jay Tavare	...	Stone Hand / Native American 2 (voice)
Myrton Running Wolf	...	Native American 1 (voice)
Kath Soucie	...	Jenny (voice)
Dave Wittenberg	...	Soapy Jennings (voice)
Jim Connor	...	Campbell (voice)
Marc Graue	...	Hollister / Additional Voices (voice)
Bryce Johnson	...	Port / Additional Voices (voice)
Frank Collison	...	Honest Tom / Additional Voices (voice)

Country:

USA

Language:

French | German | Italian | Spanish | English

Color:

Color

Certification:

USA:M | UK:18 | New Zealand:R16

Company:

Neversoft Entertainment

Trivia:

The game features a number of characters whose names are taken from real-life Old West figures, including Clay Allison, Jose Chavez y Chavez, "Hoodoo" Brown, Dave Rudabaugh, John Joshua (J.J.) Webb, and Luke Short as well as Major Thomas Magruder who may have been based off of John Bankhead Magruder.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: When Clay and Colton are on the train going to the mining fort, they begin to shovel coal into the furnace to make the train go faster. They dig their shovels into were the coal is, the sound of coal getting scooped is heard, yet when they move the shovel from the coal holder to the furnace, there is not one bit of coal on the shovels.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Colton White: [voice-over] Montana, 1880. My name is Colton White. My father and I hunt game for the riverboats coming up the Missouri. It's not a bad living, if you can stand getting kicked awake every dawn.

Movie Connections:

References Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Probably the best Western game to date, but still room for improvement.

If Gun were two or three times larger and longer, it could have been truly great. It just seems to move way too fast. I wish the timing of the game was more like GTA or Mafia, and there was more to do. Even better would be a completely free-form western role-playing game. A Morrowind style game for the Wild West would be perfect.

They needed to do a little more research on the real Wild West, too. They did do research of course, but as they say, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Gun mixes elements from many historical eras of the American West with no concern for reality. It is set in 1880, but you have 1830s mountain men with percussion rifles and keelboats right alongside 1870s Colt Peacemakers and 1880s lever action shotguns. And 1850s Volcanic Repeating Pistols being presented as superb state of the art weapons in 1880 is laughable. The Volcanics were abandoned in 1860 as they were too underpowered. The basic design became the basis for the Henry & Winchester rifles. Also, Colton's arm tattooing is from the Eastern Woodlands Iroquois of New York and Ontario. Not the Apache of New Mexico.

Another thing that I HATE about Gun are the huge guiding words everywhere. For God's sake, let me find the wanted poster or the shopkeeper or the Marshall or Hoodoo Brown by myself. Don't show me huge words floating in the sky. If you really think most players are too impatient to search for themselves at least give me the option to turn the guide words off. The same goes for the constant prompting telling me what to do next. I can play my own game, thanks very much.

I love the blood and crsing myself, but I would also appreciate an option to turn off blood and profanity for when my kids play.

I also would prefer a primarily first person viewpoint with the ability to go third person as an option. Seeing my character on screen knocks me right out of the feeling that I am really there in the game world. Sure, it's nice to have third person for screenshots and checking out the costume, but playing first person is much more immersive.

Finally, making the renegades look like undead zombies was just stupid and probably meant to lure in kids who won't play a game that doesn't have fantasy or supernatural elements. I wish the renegades just looked like scummy desperadoes in tattered cavalry uniforms, and not like walking corpses.

But, all in all, having the chance to ride a horse and fight outlaws and wild Indians is worth putting up with all these problems. I really love Gun. I just wish it was bigger and you had more freedom and things to do.