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Red Dead Revolver review

Game: Red Dead Revolver
Platform: PlayStation 2
Genre: Action
Developer: Rockstar Games

Reader review by True

May 07, 2006

Here are a few examples of bad before and after scenarios. Go work out, then when you’ve exercised yourself until you’re starving eat a bunch of cookies and candy bars. Put an entertainment center or bookshelf together using only tape, and then throw all of your stuff on it at once to see if it holds. And finally, watch a really bad “western” movie (The Quick and the Dead) then search fervently for a “western” game (Red Dead Revolver) to fill the mental gap that is now in your life. Remind me not to watch T.V. anymore.

I hate monologues. I believe I’ve expressed that feeling in more than one review and it’s a well-known fact. However, when a game is completely void of any storyline for what seems like an eternity, even I get annoyed.

My name’s Red. As a child, my parents were brutally gunned down on their own ranch--without cause and without reason. The only way I escaped was by blowing off the arm of the perpetrator using my father’s newly bought hand cannon. Now, years later, I’m a bounty hunter, scouring the earth and stacking corpses until I find the man that killed my pa. Each dead body is one step closer in the right direction. The name’s Red, don’t forget it…that is, if I let you live.

Simple, eh? Problem is, I didn’t even get that. Most of the story I gathered from thumbing through the instruction manual because by chapter fourteen, crazy me, I was wondering what the hell was going on. Not to mention trying to stomach the horrid dialogue and bad voiceovers of the townspeople, who never even told me anything. They just rambled on and on about sick kids and shooting contest, neither of which I ever saw.

And to add to my confusion and the over played “I don’t get it” quote, you detract from Red occasionally and play someone new. Great. I’m all for a little diversion from game play, but it just seems random. Like the buffalo soldier or the weird English guy “Swift”. You see them once for five seconds, play their level, which has nothing to do with the story, and then never hear from them again. It all seems a bit unnecessary to me and only manages to drag you away from the few key plot points you’re so desperately clinging to.

Maybe it is trying to add to the western feel by giving you insights into some of the cameos, but it just fails--much like everything else in this game. Another neat aspect that falls flat on its face is the modes--Dead Eye and Duel mode. Duel mode would be so brutal if only they tightened it up. You stand poised, your hand inches from your gun in an intense stare down with your opponent, you breath…swallow and draw…only to realize that Tweak from “South Park” could probably hold the gun steadier than you can. So you panic and tug the R3 button this way and that in hopes you can lock on to a lethal spot before he has time to yank his gun and finish you off. And there is usually more than one guy that you have to instantly kill before you're riddled with lead, so imagine that panic in a very high state.

Dead Eye is a bit like dual mode except you can do it anytime. Everything slows down and you can move the crosshairs all around your opponent until you’ve reached your limit. Once you have, Red lets loose as the slow motion ends, firing on each spot you picked in a flurry of bullets. Dead Eye looks phenomenal and it’s fun to do, but when it’s over you’re going to kick yourself for wasting time, mainly because no matter where you put those bullets few enemies actually drop.

Spotted Horse cannot be killed by bullet.

What is the deal? Man, that irritated me pumping slugs into some guy’s head until I had to reload, found out he wasn’t dead…yet and I just gave him the perfect opportunity to blast me with his shotgun and take half my life. I’ll admit some guys drop like a rock if you blast them in the head with a rifle shot but given Red Dead Revolver’s touchy and often horrid controls, mixed with a fast paced runaround, shoot ‘em up style you may as well just blast like a mad man and hope that you get a lucky shot.

And what is with the graphics? Everything is boxy, girls are absolutely atrocious, each rock in the canyon looks the same size and the bad guys have obviously just come off the set of “Queer Eye.” Not to mention the really bizarre camera with the lines and gritty feel that seems like it’s mimicking Silent Hill but fails horribly. It seems more like an episode of Mad TV’s “Dolamite” than an old school western. Everything just looks the same--bad. What happened to the PS2’s wonderful ability to create lifelike images? Someone I.E. the guy who did the graphics was napping the entire production time.

And sleeping right next to him was probably the sound guy. Aside from the horrid voice-overs mentioned above, Red Dead Revolver is marred by the worst soundtrack I’ve ever heard. Cheesy western porn music is the best way I can describe it. It’s dull, redundant and an ear sore.

The only thing Red Dead Revolver has going for it, sadly, is some of the gunfights. Most of them get rather intense, whether you’re ducked behind a wall as bullets scrape past you, battling atop a moving train or chasing down an armored wagon on horseback. Then again, sometimes you’re trying to outshoot a cannon or outrun a gatling gun. Intense? Yeah. Retarded and almost way too hard? Without a doubt.

Red Dead Revolver has a fair amount of guns, a few unlockables and an extra mode called “Bounty Hunter” where you can choose any character from the game that you’ve unlocked and run around killing everyone on the opposite team, but after a few times, it gets old. And everything really can’t drag you away from the fact you’re playing a mediocre shooter at best.

Which means I am destined to roam the earth until someone provides me with a game that will soothe my “western” fix because it was not Red Dead Revolver. It’s just too jumbled, too overbearing and too cheesy. When you consider all the other decent options fans of Third Person Shooters have, Red Dead Revolver just pales in comparison. So, as said before, remind me to not watch T.V. again. Ever.

Rating: 3/10

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