The Gunstringer

Date Acquired: 9.13.2011

Date Completed: 10.12.2011

Thoughts: The latest offering from Twisted Pixel (creators of 'Spolsion Man and Comic Jumper) was originally supposed to be an xbox live downloadable title, but somewhere along the way the decision was made to make it a full retail relase. It was offered at what would normally be considered a bargain price of $40 (If you know, we weren't all expecting a $15-20 Download), and packaged with Fruit Ninja Kinect. Many were bothered by what they percieved as a cash-grab by Microsoft. Whether is is or not, I can't really speak to. It's possible the decision to make it a full retail release resulted in a longer and more polished campaign. Either way, I'm not really interested in what might have been. It is a $40 retail title and I will judge it based on that.

Probably the biggest question for this game is 'but how does it control?' And the answer is.... pretty well for the most part. It's not nearly as acurate as say, a controller would be, and there are many instances where the game didn't respond to my commands. But the game is designed to minimize the effects of these inaccuricies with a forgiving game design. You can take damage. It's ok if you keep falling off the cliff because your stupid horse keeps not jumping when you think it should be jumping. I can't recall having to restart any levels due to failing them. This is good and bad, you'd like there to be some challenge to the game, but you don't want the challenge to be entirely a byproduct of the control interface. I think the game handles this well. While the game never felt difficult, it wasn't about that for me, it was about the experience.

So how is the experience? Truthfully, it's a blast. I really, really enjoyed my time with this game. I was charmed by it's quirkyness, amused by it's humor, grossed out by it's beastiality (I wish I was joking, and am somewhat stunned that this game became a pack-in title with the Kinect, it is NOT family friendly), but above all, I really enjoyed the gameplay. I was 6 years old again blowing the bad guys away with my hand formed into the shape of a gun. All that was missing was Kinect voice support so I could yell 'pew pew pew'. Maybe for the sequal.I mostly played through this game at about 2 chapters at a time. I was worried about finishing it too quickly, and I wanted to savor it. I also didn't want to get burned out playing too much. Near the end though, I just poured it on and ignored my restrictions.

Conclusion: The game struggles through control issues at times, and it can get frustrating, but it more than makes up with these through it's humor, creativity, and incredibly fun gameplay.