Pure brainless action game, Evil West puts us in the shoes of a cowboy in charge of fighting vampires. And we love it!
There are video games that do not pretend to accumulate crazy promises, at the risk of copiously disappointing when they are available (hello Cyberpunk 2077). These productions prefer to go straight to the point, without overselling qualities, concentrating on one or two elements sufficiently mastered to convince. Published by Focus Home Interactive and expected for November 22 on as many platforms as possible (including old consoles), Evil West is one of those.
Better, Evil West has everything in store to become a real guilty pleasure for this end of the year 2022. It comes with a universe completely dork, where manly cowboys are actually bloodthirsty monster hunters. We are clearly sailing in a wacky western, where strictly nothing should be taken seriously. The goal of the developers is not to tell you an immersive story and to innovate, but to play on the rope of pure and simple stress relief. We played it at gamescom, and we want more.
Evil West, or the stress relief par excellence
To hell with subtlety, conventions and grand presentations: in Evil West, we knock out first, then we ask ourselves questions. The game will not bore you with great explanations, including on the gameplay of formidable efficiency. Best of all, you won’t even have to worry about ammunition, your arsenal recharging itself. To regain life, all you have to do is trust a potion that eventually fills up after use. In short, everything is done to free the mind as much as possible so that we can concentrate on a single objective: kill, kill and kill. In style if possible.
Behind Evil West, we find the Flying Wild Hog studio, known for the Shadow Warrior trilogy (again, we’re betting on frenetic and brainless action to seduce). And he knows how to do it to offer immediate pleasure, whether at a distance with an arsenal of circumstances (a pistol and a rifle to start) or in close combat. Evil West does not intend to settle for being just another shooter, and also relies on gory and impressive executions in close combat. The most gifted will quickly take their marks, eliminating these vile vampires with great enthusiasm. Of course, you have to like graphic violence and high-paced experiences. On many points, Evil West recalls the masterpiece Doom Eternal. There is worse in comparison.
To hell with subtlety
Whether Evil West flourishes in its promise which does not fly very high, it is above all because Flying Wild Hog relies on technical solidity to establish its point. The result is a game with exemplary fluidity and ultra-fast animations. Controller in hand, it’s very pleasant: our cowboy reacts to the finger and the eye, which encourages you to always move to come out alive from the many clashes. This gameplay with little onions is enough to make you want to see more, provided you seek nothing other than the pleasure of eradicating everything that appears on the screen. Sometimes it’s better not to think.
Finally, the studio has apparently thought of varying the sets: in just under 30 minutes, the buildings typical of the western genre quickly give way to depths close to horror. We’ve also been promised more exotic environments (with snow!), which will add some variety to a game that I’m likely to devour with great appetite, like a vampire sinking its fangs into a frightened victim. We repeat: to hell with subtlety.
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