Customer Reviews

GUN

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

I found this to be quite the opposite experience that the reviewer before me had. While i can agree that some of the textures could have been polished more, i think that ,for the most part, the game is beautiful graphically. Nice fire and smoke particle effects. Nice ragdoll effects on the bad guys.EX. Their bodies 'sway' away from a bullet hitting. You hit them in the right shoulder, then their right shoulder twists back and forces the opponent to stagger. However, the clipping/collision is unusually bad. Some things you can just walk right through. That's a strange weakness for games these days. I thought that issue was cleared up 5 years ago.
Now, onto the plot. It's a bit like an Indiana Jones Movie, except here you DON'T know what the item is your looking for.
At least, not for most of the game. Thick storyline with massive amounts of cutscenes. No troubles installing. No kick-backs to desktop while playing the game. A couple of issues with some of the manual. Not enough explanation in a few areas.

This comes on 3 CD-ROMS and takes up around 2 gig.
Very good vocal acting, and incredible horse-riding effects. You really feel the speed of the horse!
Once you get past the training levels and start seeing the 'actual' game, you'll see the true quality of gameplay.
I think it's very strong, myself, and, Well written!

Many prospective customers may be a little surprised when they start playing the game, after seeing the impressive advertising promoting it. The television advertising and most of the print advertising for GUN show the cut-scenes between levels. Very little of the actual in-level action is shown. I've not seen better PR for a videogame since the much vaunted BROTHERS IN ARMS.

For those who don't realize it, GUN is mostly a Third-Person Shooter similar to RED DEAD REVOLVER. First-Person Shooter (FPS) fans might be a little disappointed. There are a few FPS scenes scattered throughout the game, but it is mainly of the rail-shooter variety where you quickdraw your pistol and just stand fixed, while you aim & shoot at your enemies.

In comparing GUN to other Wild West themed games, GUN excels in its storyline and general execution of the game. The music soundtrack is very moving, obviously influenced by John Barry's DANCES WITH WOLVES soundtrack. The voice acting is top notch and right up there with the best games on the market currently. It's the voice acting in the cut-scenes that really get the player engrossed in the game. Otherwise, I think many players would find the gameplay rather dull and pointless without it.

For those who have been itching for a Wild West game featuring realistic horseback riding, then GUN is for you. Most Wild West games feature horseback riding in a rail-shooter format, if at all. In GUN, you must master horseback riding skills like jumping, spurring, bearing left and right, skidding, even managing your horse's energy level so as not to exhaust the animal.

Many PC users have complained that GUN suffers from a number of bugs. I've found that simply rebooting one's computer solves these problems in the short-term. Hopefully Activision will offer a patch in the future to address these issues. Until then, I've found the game very playable inspite of its problems. Other players have recommended the console versions of GUN (Xbox, PS2, GC) over the PC version as they are more stable. Whether that is true or not, I don't know.

Some players have complained of rudimentary graphics during gameplay. The default resolution setting for GUN is 800x600, which does make the graphics appear somewhat from the 1990s. If players increase their resolution to at least 1024x768, the graphics improve remarkably. Still, I'd say that graphics during in-level gameplay are more on par with WESTERN OUTLAW than a more refined graphics experience like DEAD MAN's HAND. The cut-scenes, on the other hand, have top notch graphics and acting.

PROS: Indepth horseback riding, superb voice acting in the cut-scenes, excellent music soundtrack.

CONS: Dedicated Third-Person Shooter instead of FPS (some players find this a PRO, not a CON!), somewhat unstable for some PC users, questionable in-level graphics detail.

CONCLUSION: Inspite of its flaws, GUN is still an entertaining game to play. In my opinion it is one of the better Wild West themed games out there.

Best Western Game I've ever played... even it's the only one I played, It's still great. Great storyline, fantastic game play, a good mix between third person shooter and RPG. Overall a Great Game!

Wow, what genre needs boosting more than the old west? Swinging the shutters on the town saloon, going to the barber for a bath after you gun down some dirt bag in the streets. GUN sets the stage for this beatifully. The back drops are great, fighting is fun and challenging. The story is interesting and well acted.
The world is almost completely empty, though. Four or five dogs follow the one or two npcs that aren't mission related. I busted into the Dodge City saloon expecting trouble.... and the place was completely deserted. Didn't even have a swinging door... This is a game that begs for more world building. I'm still playing, but it's not keeping me up at night.

I was really looking forward to Gun when I heard what type of game it was. "Grand Theft Mustang" to quote a few online gaming websites. Having played the game to completion I can say that the game does live up to the multitude of comparisons to Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto series. But where GTA excels, Gun falls very short.

GTA practically invented the action free-roam game. You control your character in a world wear a story exists, but you can help enhance your skills and selection of weapons by just walking around and doign what you want. Up to this point Gun stands shoulder to should with GTA. But where in GTA you can spend hours on end just walking around the massive cityscapes causing mayhem or trying to complete a myriad of extras tasks, races, or challenges; Gun stumbles and falls on it's face. There is barely anything to do when not on a mission. Only a handful of side missions are even available at any given point in the game ranging from poker tournaments to timed horseback deliver to helping out the local law enforcement. These get very repetative, and require very little skill to beat.

I also found the game ended too quickly. I had expecting a more expansive story spralling across a much larger geographical background and including more characters. Again comparing Gun to GTA, the latter held characters for at least a half dozen missions if not the entire game, whereas Gun really only involves its characters with the story for one or two missions tops. Relating back to my earlier comment on the lack of side missions, once you complete the game there really isn't anything left for you to do except ride your horse around the same areas over and over again. Even if you get the 100% and a rerewarded with a special gun and horse, you will not find too much use for either. I may be missing something at the end, but my interest dramatically dropped off once I won.

But given its flaws, Gun does have a very strong, albeit short, main storyline. And it is very fun to play. The voice acting is top-notch (Thomas Jane, Kris Kristopherson, Brad Dourif, Lance Hendriksen, etc...).

The uniqueness and fun of the main part of the game do warrant taking a look at this, but I would definitely wait until the price drops before investing in it. The best option is to rent it if you own Xbox or PS2, you will probably be able to finish the game before you have to return it.

I bought this game knowing it was a short game but worth a play from what everyone has told me ... & it was exactly that.

Graphics were good for it's time, not way too fancy but its good enough & the environments were very well done.

The gameplay wasn't too complicated from what I can remember. The targeting could have been better but wasn't bad at all.

The "quests/objectives" seemed redundant after a while but still wasn't too bad either. To be honest if they'd have added a bit more variety & made the length of the game longer it would have definitely garnered a higher score!

If you are looking for a cheap game that won't dissapoint for the price this isn't a bad game ... but I wouldn't spend more then maybe 15 bucks on it nowadays.

Love the side jobs and the game.Being and old cowgirl it was a fun ride.

The game didnt work well with Windows Vista. It would not let me remap my controls and the original control confuguration didint completely work. Its a shame because the graphics and story looked good. If you have anything before Windows Vistal I highly recomend this game.

POSSIBLE SPOILERS FOR THOSE WHO HAVE NOT PLAYED THE GAME YET. First of all, I'm probably one of the least experienced gamers to review this. For the most part this is an excellent game and fun to play. It also has a great storyline. As far as video games go, the whole premise of the game is pretty realistic. The weapons, clothing, characters,situations, etc... are all probably about as realistic as you can get with a video game.

The ending where you must kill the last of the bad guys is where the game fails, in my opinion. This game is being marketed as a realistic western, which it is for the most part. Then you get to the end and have to try and kill an almost invincible villian.

This part of the game isn't really in keeping with what's gone on before it. The game seems to shift from a western to something that resembles a sci-fi game. I'm sure it's to do with the armor he wears, but it's just not realistic like the rest of the game. It just seems like a cheap trick to make the game seem longer than it actually is.

I'm sure experienced gamers didn't have much trouble getting past this part, but as a novice it was frustrating to play a great game that flowed quickly, only to be stopped dead in its tracks at the very end.

To keep with the realism, maybe they should have made this an easy kill that would have shocked the villian who THOUGHT he would be invincible. Instead it's your typical "make the last guy the hardest (almost impossible) to kill".

what i mean here is about 3 and a half stars which in my little scheme of things means the good pretty clearly outweighs the bad and i recommend it with a bit of enthusiasm. 4 star games are very rare for me and this game made a good run at it. i can't even imagine a 5 star game. i've come to think there are too many inherent problems in games for 5 stars.

anyway, ahem, this is about gun. a very nice game i looked forward to a lot. i played it just after it came out and hopefully havent forgotten too much about it.

the positives:

graphics! this seems to be a bit controversial as some people complain about them, but frankly i sometimes think people overrate realism and detail. gun's detail was not like, i dont know, half life 2 or something. i didn't repeatedly go "wow, unbelievable todays technology!" but i really enjoyed them. they were pretty to look at, they set the scene well and they were extremely refreshing- bright, colorful, open western vistas instead of dark, gloomy, tense, industrial, claustrophobic and filled with horror creatures and commandos like, i don't know, 95% of all shooters. it was lovely to ride my horse around spotting buffalo and hot springs and such. i appreciated that quite a bit.

difficulty: well, i can't remember if this game had difficulty levels. but i like difficulty levels and make a bee line for the easy choice! i do not like dying! even if i can reload right away, and i am not too great at these games. well, so, up until the last part of the game (more about that later) i had no real problems and generally felt clever and talented but not coddled and unchallenged. the poker was too easy though and i could not get the hunting and gave up on it part way through (i thoroughly completed everything else).

characters/voice acting: pretty good characters helped by superb voice acting. i don't want any spoilers here so i'll just say the quality of the characters was let down by the storyline, but i still liked them. and they looked pretty good to me.

gameplay: it was quite fun and varied. it had some of the best bullet time ever (called quickdraw or something). i loved how you could flick target to target with a single button which not only made me feel more impressive but also raised the speed of mowing down enemies in a way that made it less ridiculous that i was beating 11 people in a gunfight. the horse riding was done very well and it was nice to pony express. i liked that poker was in it though found it a bit limited, and both the ranching and mining were really nice and helped fill out the world and the variety of things you do.

length: i may be an exception, but the vast majority of games go too long for me. the feel of them and the things i do in them become redundant and i don't finish, so i like that gun seemed manageable. for the most part i was pleasantly full when i finished though perhaps finishing things was a little too cut and dried, like the way you can get every upgrade possible.

the negative:

story: it should have gone a bit lighter, i mean, it seemed to think it was some powerful clint eastwood directed western but unfortunatly computer games are not capable of pulling off anything nearly that sophisticated. they just have too much on their plate vis a vis gameplay and choice. the cutscenes and acting were nice, and it started solidly, but storywise it progressively deteriorated, or i guess was completely unable to fufill its set up. it gets a little hard to discuss without spoilers but, well, more romance would have been nice and the boss battle that goes on and on was not just difficult for me (remember how i hate that!), but it was irritatingly stupid, and senseless to the reality of the game.

conclusion: wow, only one big negative, but the huge, long, ending boss battle really bugged me. really, good game though. oh, and by the way, i have a pretty midlevel computer (and fading fast) and didn't have any real technical problems, maybe a couple of ugly frame slowdowns, but mostly it was smooth. that's just, you know, for what that's worth.

anyway, if some of what i am talking about makes sense to you go try this game out.