GUN™

On a more serious note, this game is, simply put, GTA3 with cowboys, similar to how RDR1 and 2 were GTA4 and 5 with cowboys, respectively. If you never played the console exclusive RDR1, GUN is a decent substitute.

I am giving it a single star, despite the fact that this is a good game, especially in its day, due to the fact that there is a bug as early as Mission 3 (Honest Tom - the Horse Race). It seems that for some reason his horse moves with the speed of light and my horse drags himself. I tried nearly 30 times to pass this otherwise easy mission (I vaguely remembered it when playing the game in 2005 when it came out) and it was in vain. Asking for a refund ...

If you always wanted to play Red Dead Redemption but couldn't because you didn't have a console, this is the closest thing to it available for PC

Playing this game on normal difficulty, I felt like I was playing on baby mode. A lot of missions take no longer than a minute to complete, and if you somehow fail at them, you can instantly restart them & try again. Missions are also far and few between as far as variety goes - there are only about three missions overall - kill a bad guy, defend a good guy, and the occasional mission where you get to do something halfway interesting. Gun, as its name might suggest, is a GTA clone set in the old west. And having seen quite a few GTA clones up to now, Gun seems to be the best copy so far. Not that it says much. Although you can engage in hunting, gold digging & poker playing, they're all easy and don't offer much of a distraction from the main game. You can try to roam the map, but it's rather small & uninteresting. As far as plot goes, it doesn't really matter. Not to say it doesn't exist - the game tries to be as cinematic as it possibly can, with its limited graphics, but I was never made to care for the bland main character. And with cutscenes taking longer than the actual missions, I oftentimes skipped them. You don't need them to know what to do. Sadly, for a GTA clone, Gun is incredibly rigid. Meaning you either complete a mission how it wants you to do it, or you'll struggle to complete it. In many missions you'll have your hand held, with you having someone to follow, or you having to reach certain checkpoints. It doesn't help that the first series of missions are tutorial missions you don't really need nor want. My only other major gripe is with expectations vs reality. Having a game set in the old west I expected a gritty realistic take on an iconic era. Instead I got Gunsmoke and Bonanza, with dubbing that was either stereotypical or out of place. I did get some enjoyment out of shooting 3 baddies in a row while riding my horse, hearing atmospheric music in the background, but I wanted more. Also, I'd prefer less glitches, stuttering & crashing.

This was absolutely great in its time and it got me into westerns. It's worth a play-through if you haven't played it but after that the world becomes incredibly tiny, especially if you've already played Red Dead Redemption 1/2. Just go for Red Dead Redemption 1 or 2 if you're not sure.