My first exposure to this game was through the demo, storming a town with a repeater rifle and pistol, and I couldn't get enough of it. It's from the Dark Forces school of FPS, where you can look up and down and not quite aim straight at extreme heights, but it's at the point where it feels fully realized: a shooter where enemies can come at you from above and below and you can actually shoot back. The enemies for the most part are cut from the same cloth, but their different taunts and clothing make it feel varied enough that all you want to do is find a corner to hide behind until you work up the nerve to gun them down. Some weapons have alternate fire modes, so you can unload your six-shooter quickly by holding the trigger and slapping down the hammer, and most enemies don't need that much firepower to take out. The obvious analog is, at least on harder difficulty levels, combat is deadly for you, too, and you have to be smart, cautious, have decent aim, and use resources wisely. The game is patterned off of Italian Westerns, with a brilliant musical score and a lank, stylized cartoon graphical style that reminds me the most of the old Wild Wild West TV show's animated credits. But the game's mechanics actually make the Wild West feeling even stronger, and the occasional chance to blast some hooligan off a platform and have them land on the ground in front of you is straight out of just about any Western you could think of. Not all the levels are made equal, and some of the Handful missions feel a bit disjointed compared to the main narrative, but in my run through this game each of the main missions had definite character and felt worth revisiting, especially the classic town, with its secrets and multiple entry points. If you're not too picky for modern tropes in your FPS tastes, or looking for something that feels different than the usual, Outlaws is great fun, and is one of my favorite FPSes of all time.
I already downloaded it from the copyright owner's website a bit ago, and have played through the first full sequence. The game is generous in letting you configure the type of ship you want, and from round to round your weapon choices change, so you can stumble across a blast that will cover holes in your defenses or take up less power, allowing your shields to recharge quicker. At times I'm disappointed by not getting more of a choice as to which planets I assault, and I don't have the patience to skim through the datacube text (show don't tell, please) but every level has little surprises you can find through diligent killing and quick thinking, and the ship configuration and secrets mean that playing through the game again will be likely be rewarding.
