The walker you need! Evil West Review
Flying Wild Hog made a project that, in our time of open worlds and game-services, was impossible. Men with square jaws and foul language on their lips destroy hundreds of vampires in the Wild West for 15 hours. Sound cool? And it plays even better!
Evil West is a product from 2008, in every sense. During the game, you get pleasure not from the next plot twist, but from battles in closed arenas with a dozen bloodsuckers. I don’t care what happens to the characters – I want more battles and a variety of combat skirmishes.
The story is simple: the enemies burned down their own hut, and a tough cowboy with an electric glove goes to kill vampires. Stupid stereotypical heroes destroy evil spirits. You don’t even need to memorize names – this is an extra load on the brain of an average scribble. And it’s better to skip all the staged videos altogether – you won’t lose anything.
All this does not prevent you from enjoying the main advantages of Evil West – the combat system and character leveling.
The main character has in his arsenal: an electric glove for combat, a whip-shield “Clapperboard”, a revolver and a rifle. In the course of the passage, the player is provided with new tools for killing vampire offspring – bombs, a shotgun, a crossbow, a flamethrower and even a machine gun. The arsenal is vast and using it in battle is a separate kind of pleasure.
You fly into a crowd of vampires, pulling towards them with an electric whip and throwing electricity-stunned opponents up, and then slam the carcasses on the ground to cause a shock wave. It stuns enemies that run up from behind, which means there is a chance to turn around and fire a shotgun – this will deal increased damage and allow you to finish off the bloodsuckers in melee.
But now a mini-boss is approaching, whose attacks will not only have to be parried, but also have time to shoot from a rifle – this will interrupt them and give a window for the offensive. Boxes of dynamite explode from hits and carry evil spirits back to hellish depths. The mini-boss is stunned by electricity and the main character starts a finishing combo – hits are delivered faster and faster, the attack continues to accelerate without stopping. BOOM! The finishing animation went on, another evil spirit went to hell. Against the background, a shot is heard and a victorious “ding!”, which marks the end of the battle – you coped with another wave, adrenaline flows through the veins, the heart beats faster.
But the bosses are almost not remembered – when you understand the principle of fighting with them, they are killed in five minutes. Even the final main guard did not leave any memory of himself – battles with ordinary opponents are much more interesting and spectacular.
And cut into the crowds of enemies does not bother. The player is always given a test of strength: first, one juggernaut with a shield, then they will give him a vampire lord as assistants, and then they will release him along with a flying and shielding vampire-flower-overgrowth. And each time the number of opponents increases exponentially – because the player becomes capable of them.
The game design is predictable: the hero walks through the linear levels, enters the arenas, fights with enemies and moves on. Sometimes there are small branches with chests and bags of money, as well as additional abilities and skins for the character. And if you have to collect money to upgrade your character, then abilities and skins are unnecessary garbage that only distracts.
Weapon leveling is non-linear: if you have the right amount of money and the ability is available for purchase, the skill can be unlocked. And it doesn’t matter if the previous ones were bought. You understand this system towards the end of the game, when ability reset stations scattered across the levels allow you to effectively redistribute skills.
But with pumping gloves, this will not work – it is linear and the abilities are arranged in a strict order. This is justified by the combat system – the latest skills in the upgrade branch would not work without the earlier ones.
Yes, and the game will take just nothing – 10-12 hours for a complete passage at an average level of difficulty. I recommend playing Adepta for the first time – at the very beginning, the developers warn that they balanced the game with an eye to this difficulty. High and Max – for subsequent playthroughs of New Game+.
But there are questions about the technical part. The game was completed on PlayStation 5 in Quality mode for only one reason – in Performance mode, the picture turns into a soapy something during combat skirmishes. It’s like the resolution drops to 720-900p to keep the frame rate up. In the “Quality” mode, the picture did not suffer, but I had to put up with 30 frames per second. And Dual Sense is almost never used – an additional kick in the direction of the developer’s studio.
Diagnosis
Evil West in 2010 would have been dubbed the title of “prohodnyak”. A stupid plot about men with square jaws and killing vampires; albeit diverse, but operating on the same principles, from skirmish to skirmish, the combat system; unremarkable graphics; complete lack of catchy melodies or soundtrack.
But in 2022, such a product is critically lacking. In which you could sit down for a couple of evenings, turn off your brains and knead vampires non-stop until the very credits. The plot is stupid, the combat doesn’t compare to God of War Ragnarok and Bayonetta 3, the levels are linear and the leveling is predictable. But what a pleasure it was to launch Evil West! No microtransactions, no loot boxes, no donations for skins — just a finished, albeit average, product.
