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Gun Showdown Review - PSP

Introduction

GUN SHOWDOWN, for those who missed the first instalment, is a western shooter set in the mid 1800s. The game is a third person shooter, and is basically exactly the same as the original, which hit a few platforms, including PS2 and PC. The only thing setting the PSP version apart from those versions is the addition of multiplayer, and a couple more weapons and missions.

Gameplay

When you first select the single player mode, you’ll be treated to numerous FMVs that set the mood with the high quality graphics and an interesting storyline. The first mission is a rather bland task that makes you hunt animals, but it quickly improves from there. The missions are actually quite diverse, from horseback riding to standoffs in boats.

The storyline is quite intricate, but introduces so many characters at once that I found it hard to understand what was going on. Even after playing multiple consecutive levels, I realised that I understood what to do in the next mission, but not what that mission’s context was in the overall story. Unfortunately, the actual gameplay in the PSP version seems to have suffered from the addition of fancy graphics and these extra features. It is riddled with glitches and bad controls. On multiple occassions I found myself running into trees, wondering how I ended up getting there. The learning curve for a new player is definitely not up to scratch. One of the most annoying things is that the buttons are wrong in the menus. The game says that X will cancel an option, but in reality it accepts the choice. This is incredibly frustrating, and also happens with O.

An interesting feature that separates GUN from some of the other mindless shooters is the quick draw. As it implies, it allows the user to use its handgun quickly. In essence, it does the same thing as adrenaline in GTA, where you move in real speed but everyone else moves at a slower pace. Everyone knows that shooting someone with a shotgun is very satisfying. However, pumping several shots from a handgun into someone in a smaller amount of time is even more rewarding.

GUN SHOWDOWN boasts about its free roaming gameplay. To an extent, this is true, but only once you have unlocked the areas in the storyline. I found it progressed very linearly, with the next mission starting as soon as you finished the previous. To distract yourself from the main mission, you can try some of the minigames included exclusively in the PSP version. I don’t tend to give them any value in the overall package – if you’re going to buy a game for the minigames, you might as well buy a WarioWare title. GUN gives you No Limit Texas Hold’em and a few challenges like Quail Hunt (kill as many quails as possible in 5 minutes). Nothing to get excited about here.

Graphics

As mentioned above, the graphics on this (continued next page)