Back in August the almighty Red Dead Redemption launched on Switch, reportedly performing admirably from a technical standpoint. It’s likely Guns and Spurs 2 – another open-world wild west adventure – was planned for the Switch long before RDR’s arrival, intended to be an on-the-go alternative. With the real deal now available, Guns and Spurs 2 finds itself poised as being a more casual cowpoke sim that’s easier going while requiring less investment of your time. It’s an honourable approach, we’ll give it that. Not everyone has 25+ hours spare to sink into RDR.
This is a mobile conversion, which is a perfectly acceptable proposition for the Switch – and we’ve come a long way since the days of Angry Birds. There’s no storyline to speak of here, just a premise. You’re the new bounty hunter in town, and after a brief shooting and horse-riding tutorial, you find yourself at the beck and call of the sheriff. There are numerous named ne’er-do-wells in the vicinity – a whole hierarchy, in fact – and it’s up to you to take them down, dead or alive. Preferably the latter, which bags a bigger bounty, although you do have to carry your lassoed brute to the sheriff’s office via horseback if they’re still squirming.
Cash from turning in crooks – or gained by completing delivery runs and similar sub-quests – can be spent on new weapons, typical cowboy attire, explosives, and ammo. Cash doesn’t flow freely though, and the enhanced arsenal you must invest in to progress smoothy is expensive, discouraging dressing up. Oddly, there’s no inventory, so if you want to swap between owned weapons, you’re forced to revisit the gunsmith and cycle through his stock. I can only assume he looks after them while you’re out blasting bandits.
In a rare humorous touch, a sci-fi “alien” firearm can be purchased for an astronomical amount of cash. Similar sparks of personality are seldom found – the rare snippets of dialogue are brief, and the silent main character has a completely blank persona, with no backstory.
It’s pretty clear from the outset that this is a low budget effort made by a small, albeit focused, team. Visually, it’s fine – but this isn’t a world that you’ll want to spend time in, with very little in the way of creative flair. Animation for both our hero and his horse is basic and stilted, with weapons held cackhandedly. Outside of quest givers, the NPCs can’t be interacted with, and while there is a bar and a general store in each town, there isn’t much to do elsewhere other than look for hidden horseshoes and cursed skulls – of which there are thirty to find. The sub-quests are a welcome enough diversion though, and it’s also possible to buy a property in each town – although fast-travel does make their intended purpose negligible.
Quickly, it settles into a loop of taking on a bounty, riding to said location and partaking in a sloppy and unsatisfying firefight, and then either carrying your bounty back to the sheriff’s office or fast travelling back to the bounty board – perhaps acquiring a new weapon or restocking ammo before heading back out. Gunfights take place in seemingly random, and barren, outdoor locations – such as in the middle of a road or halfway up a mountain – so cast aside expectations of visiting bandit camps and hideouts.
If you die mid-battle, you’re thrown back not to the last save point or the doorstep of your current property, but to the tutorial zone. There’s no manual saving here either – you’ll have to either complete a bounty or return home. At one point when saving a glitch occurred – a three minute mission to kill wild animals instead commenced. Trapped in a house, I had no choice but to wait for the timer to expire.
It’s worth elaborating on the shooting mechanics, as this is Guns and Spurs 2’s biggest downfall. Shooting simply doesn’t feel satisfying, exciting, or even particularly accurate. Playing on a Switch Lite, the “crosshair” is merely a tiny white dot that’s difficult to track and aim. Guns feel flimsy and weightless, and it’s very hard to judge a weapon’s range. The tutorial makes a big deal about using cover, but often there’s nothing whatsoever to hide behind – not even a barrel or cactus. If there’s a crouch button, I never found it. Success mostly relies on using the environment and line-of-sight to your advantage, such as backtracking down a slope or around a corner. Explosives do liven things up slightly, but even so, they aren’t as exciting to use as they should be.
Call of Juarez: Gunslinger did wild west shootouts a lot better, and that was back in 2013. Worse still is that enemies can respawn out of thin air, so if you backtrack to regain health (the gauge auto-recharges) any enemies that you’ve just taken down will likely reappear upon your return.
I admire that the developers set out to create an open-world game with no bloat and filler; one that’s respectful to your time, focused on just a handful of activities rather than dozens, with a clear goal to work towards. But the fundamental mechanics are either borderline basic or feel broken, and not even turning in a bounty feels like an accomplishment as every gunfight plays out the same. I expected raging shootouts in bandit camps and bars with bottles breaking, bullets ricocheting, and NPCs running for their life. Guns and Spurs 2 instead offers twenty second firefights in the middle of nowhere, where all you can do is aim and hope for the best. All I can suggest is setting expectations low. Not exactly a ringing endorsement, is it?
Soedesco’s Guns and Spurs 2 is out now on Switch. Coming soon to PC.