Buckle up for plenty of bloodbaths in an exhilarating vampire-filled western at the Evil West.
2022 is clearly the year of Focus Entertainment. This is unheard of because just last month, they had just released A Plague Tale: Requiem. There is a new sheriff in town, and the name is Evil West. The success of Requiem led it to become a Game of the Year contender. So, it would take the release of their latest game to reach those heights or even come close to it. Crazily enough, their next game is just a few months away; that is, the highly anticipated title, Atomic Heart will arrive. They are not messing around.
Enough small talk. Let’s talk about their latest game. Evil West gives you cowboys, vampires, blood, blood, and more blood. You are Jesse Rentier. You are a slayer. Your job is to abolish the vampiric army that is taking control of the old west and claim your title as cowboy superhero by saving the USA. As they say, by any means necessary. It’s not just the bloodsuckers that are in your way; it’s also the menacing bandits in this thrilling and extremely violent adventure. That sounds like a good time.
There are four difficulties to choose from, ranging from story to evil. Or if you think you’re beyond that and are up to the challenge, you can also pick the true death option, where all it takes is one death for you to lose all of your game progress and start all over again. If you think you can handle that, then by all means, go for it.
A competent story that is followed by nicely flowing dialogues and watchable cutscenes. Definitely does enough to get you interested. But, the non-stop action is better and, ultimately, the Evil West’s real highlight. And that’s not a bad thing at all. There’s the excessive despatching of vampires for you to fixate on the quality of the plot. Living up to an old school Shoot ‘Em Up and Beat ‘Em Up genres.
If you haven’t played any God of War games, you get the feeling that the fighting controls are initially obscure, but you’ll eventually get the hang of it. This is being said because, in a way, the combat system has some similarities to God of War, where for one, your core fighting moves are performed with the use of two buttons, and also because of fatality-like takedowns you execute on enemies. Again, this is not a bad thing.
With this system, you carry out a stable number of awesome combos and picture-perfect finishers. And if that isn’t enough, you can launch the enemies to the spike cages that will split them into mini pieces after uppercutting them while they’re airborne. Obviously, some of the moves are exaggerated, but those are the best ones. And would have you doing them infinitely without getting tired of it. Especially when they’re accompanied by cartoonish sound effects.
Do not worry too much about engaging in boss fights. Surprisingly, they weren’t too simple nor complicated. There was a balance that made it tolerable, and at the same time, players wouldn’t be void of a real challenge. And it gets easier by simply levelling up your character and buying all perks with money you’ll find lying around. Or at the very least, after you’ve perfectly studied their attacks. You can acknowledge the emphasis that Flying Wild Hog put into the combat and their animations.
Although, not too fond of having to click R3 to kick as the method of countering enemy strikes, stunning them, or knocking them down. This is frustrating at times. It gets worse in boss fights, and because of this, you are likely to become discouraged from using it often, and it feels much safer to dodge. And the button configuration doesn’t really help much either.
And your weaponry in Evil West is just as awesome. No need to fret about ammunition because they’re unlimited. That’s right, you can spray your guns all willy-nilly, and you won’t be punished for it. A revolver, by simply holding the trigger button, shoots fast and is incredibly reliable. Then there’s the shotgun that inflicts more damage than the former. Using weapons to mutilate enemies and shoot explosives near them are gratifying aspects of Evil West. And to make things much sweeter, you can upgrade on those bad boys and take your blood shedding to the next level.
But you should know that you can only reload when your mag is empty. In very rare cases, this might be problematic, but most of the time, you should be fine due to the weapons’ very low bullet and shell count. And you can just move around and dodge while automatically reloading. By the way, you have the benefitting assisted aim support, especially for those who aren’t exactly proficient marksmen.
There’s the astounding Zapper that causes a different plateau of mayhem which disrupts vampiric illusions. Electrocute, pull, block, slam, whatever tickles your fancy, your zapper does it and provides more incentive of showing no mercy. Plus, you can use the appreciable weapon as a part of your combos and serve much more agony for even the vampires to handle.
And you get to do all of this on a very large and stunning map that encapsulates a western that shows the vampires had their way with it. Some sizeable areas for you to battle enemies, but there is a fair few that are very small and make it quite uncomfortable during combat. That’s not to say there aren’t many attractive viewings. And what’s a wild west without characters possessing strong but also fitting Southern accents? Additionally, the western soundtracks are also a bonus.
Evil West is the epitome of thrilling and replayability, but unfortunately, it comes with flaws, some of which are glaring, too. The visuals are one of Evil West’s biggest blunders and are incredibly inconsistent. Most of the designs are delightfully pleasing, while the rest seem rushed. What you are witnessing doesn’t reflect what was shown in the gameplay videos, and it’s quite shocking at the end product of some of the artwork.
You will notice that, except for cutscenes, when you approach characters, they speak, but their mouths don’t move at all. And the pixilated flames look amateurish at best. They may seem pedantic to some, but it’s pretty shameful for a great game like this to have these many graphical errors.
As for multiplayer, although it is pretty enjoyable playing with a friend and it necessarily checks all the boxes from a subjective viewpoint. However, you are much better off playing the campaign solo. Evil West’s development seems as if it was specifically designed for single players only. The host is the only one who can progress through the story, while the friend is basically there to speed things up for you and unfairly isn’t getting anything out of it. This begs the question of what exactly is the point of having multiplayer if both players don’t reap all the benefits.
This, along with other issues, led to a rather underwhelming co-op experience. It doesn’t help that you and your partner will have to complete the very dragging tutorial that will take approximately at least half an hour.
Evil West is a phenomenal game and an incredibly fun slaying experience. If you are an older individual, it will have you rekindling your video gaming nostalgia. A great story, followed by old-school hack-and-slash moves and powerful weapons, is what the fans truly deserve. On top of that, the fact that Evil West is cheaper than the average retail price is another reason why you must get this. A culmination of these will make you scream yee-haw.
Evil West is available on PlayStation 4 & PlayStation 5, Xbox ONE, Xbox Series X/S, and Microsoft Windows. Also, follow our website for the latest gaming reviews.
