Ubisoft proves that they are not only good at making action adventure games.....
However Call Of Juarez Bound in Blood proves all wrong. In terms of gameplay its right up there with the likes of Modern Warfare or Half Life.
The story of the game is western based and about three brothers, two of which always end up fighting for girls. The third one and the youngest among the three is the one who is the most sensible and intervenes every time when the other two end up at each other throats.
The story starts off very well goes through interesting characters. Juarez who is one of the more interesting characters is a dacoit lord who you will meet at around 30% of the game progress. Though i can tell you that the main antagonist is someone else and that's where story has its twists and turns.
Graphics are awesome. The gun textures and the canon textures are good and the effects of shooting are even better. The shaking of camera when explosions take place, the motion blur and the rain effects in particular are some of the highlights of this game.
Gameplay is one feature which i would love to shed a light on. It seems that this game has been underappreciated for its gameplay. But let me tell you that in terms of gameplay its right up there with modern warfare and i personally found the gameplay more enthralling and enjoyable than Far Cry and Crysis.
The fact that you have to be constantly on the move keeps up the pace of the game and the best feature of the game which i feel is one of the best features in any FPS game is the Cover System. You just have to lean towards the wall with you direction keys then again use directional keys to peep in or out. Its not only versatile and automatic but its also extremely easy to use. Plus entering and exiting cover system is totally out of the picture as there is no button per se for entering or exiting cover system.
Plus add on features like Open World environment and buying and selling weapons also enhance the gameplay. Ofcourse there is also the exciting part which has to be there if the theme is western is the one on one stand off shoot out. That really makes you feel like you are watching some part of Good Bad Ugly or Indiana Jones.
The one thing that prevents me from giving this a 10/10 is the poor use of the Open world or the lack of it. When you compare this with ubisoft's other open world games like Assassin's Creed atleast from the standpoint of the use of the open world, you actually just use it when you have to do silly side missions like killing some bandit that too for a meagre 100 or 200$s. Plus during the main missions the open world actually becomes a Linear world unlike in other open world games where you actually get to choose the path to the mission.
Inspite of its shortcomings, Call Of Juarez - Bound In Blood is still a solid First Person Shooter with great graphics, decent story and most importantly a Solid Gameplay. It may not be one of the best Shooters of all time or an Instant Classic though it certainly got close but it is still a game that will make you want another installment in the franchise......