Desperados: Wanted Dead or Alive

Dive into a Spaghetti Western like game with an intricate gameplay steering six different characters with their unique abilities! Well, this game is way over 20 years old and its graphics may appear UGLY to some modern gamer – but not to me! I like the style, you can see how much love they put into it considering the means of their time. The BAD thing with this game is that it is extremely hard to play, at least for my experience. I never played a game where had to use the auto save function (F5) so often. But it's there and only a click away. This hard and complex gameplay is also the GOOD thing, you really need to think about what you are doing and reading the extensive manual doesn't hurt to learn the hotkeys. But the game is cleverly made, you start with one character and will be introduced to the others step by step during the game by means of short tutorial missions. I found myself overwhelmed by the amount of information and controls whilst reading the manual, but if you start playing, you'll see that they are well-thought of and easy to adjust to. Unfortunately, there's still a bug in mission three, introducing Sam and his skills with the Gatling gun. You've got to do some actions before the wagon drops, otherwise the mouse cursor vanishes and you can't play further. See more on the forums how to circumvent this. Under Linux, you might have to install some libraries which are not included in the standard repositories, depending on your system. But it's easy enough via PPAs if you're running Ubuntu. Those two issues made me consider of removing a star but because the gameplay is so fantastic I gave the best note to the game anyways. Its atmosphere is highly immersive, from the second level on. So if you're not to picky about high-standard graphics and want to play a sophisticated gunslinger game, here you are!

I was very excited to play this game when they released it back in the day, since I am a big fan of Commandos series (mostly 1 and 2, not so crazy about Commandos 3). However, although the mechanics of the game are similar, they are not as smooth, and it feels very clumsy all the time. Please note that I'm not referring to difficulty here, I have played harder games that were more pleasing to play. For me, this game is more like a good idea with an average execution. However, if you're a fan of this type of game and like westerns, you might enjoy it anyway.

Still a great game in 2024!

When I was just a kid, I played the demo (featuring an exclusive mission, try it first) back in 2001, I didn't understand the game mechanics much at that time but its charming little 2.5D world had me coming back to it until I finally figured it out. By the time I got the full game I was totally hooked; this is the first game I was truly addicted to. I remember playing the rainy mission and my mother asked me to get ready for school and I said to her "..but, but it's raining!", that's how deep into the game I was. Although difficulty-wise very unforgiving, I liked how you had to use your brain to stay alive in the game. Just get it, don't miss out. Gameplay: 9.5 Visual: 9.5 Music: 10 Story: 9 (including about 20 video clips!) [I haven't tried the GOG version yet but don't listen to the old reviews; GOG removed this game several times from their catalogue, I'm sure they tweaked it to perfection by now.] *Also, check out Robin Hood - Legend of Sherwood if you like this type of games.

Win 7. Can't play. Blinking.