Guntu Western Front June, 1944 is the worst gun game available for the Sony PlayStation. Pathetic graphics and lame level design will have you reaching for your real revolver long before you ever pick up the light gun to play this one again. In fact, don't even read this review. Just click the back button and we'll both forget you even asked about this piece of junk.
All right, if you really wanna know.... Graphically, the game is extremely primitive. We're talking 8-bit at best - like early 8-bit. None of the enemy soldiers has distinguishable features. All the tanks, planes, buildings, and backgrounds are blocky and devoid of detail. And there's little, if any, graphical variation from screen to screen, level to level, so get used to looking at the same tired army encampments.
And plan on looking at the same individual screens for what feels like hours. The level design is abysmal. Certain screens just plop you in one perspective, staring at a bunker and some large brown squares - presumably shipping crates? - for literally 15 minutes at a time. You're stuck there, endlessly shooting the same bunch of guys in the same eight positions and maybe a lone artillery unit that lobs an explosive device at you every ten seconds, like clockwork. It's so repetitive, there's no way it could possibly be challenging. You can figure out the pattern in seconds: shoot three guys, shoot toward artillery to blow up the explosive charge, shoot three different guys, shoot toward artillery - endlessly. It seems silly, really, with Time Crisis less than a year old, that a designer could backtrack this far.
Mysteriously, you need to hit targets twice to kill them. Mysteriously, many of the game's screens scroll by, not caring whether you take out enemy soldiers before the camera passes them or not - you can just let them disappear offscreen, never to be seen again. Mysteriously, you are awarded bonus hit points by killing enemies and blowing up incoming explosives before they harm you. So, you can completely ignore the gunfire of some of your enemies in order to take out incoming explosives, since you're generally given bigger hit point bonuses than those you lost by absorbing bullets in order to make the shot.
Guntu has one of the worst reloading interfaces in light gun gaming, and coupled with the game's autofire, it makes for extremely unchallenging play. The trigger, by default, is set to autofire, and ammunition is depleted as long as you hold it down. Reloading occurs instantly upon releasing the trigger. This setup encourages thoughtless, skill-less, slaphappy playing, since the most effective style of play is to just hold the trigger down and wave the gun around at the screen, watching the little yellow burst line up with each target, occasionally lifting the finger for a fraction of a second to reload. It feels more like hosing down your driveway than shooting Nazis in World War II.
In the words of the immortal Luke Skywalker, "What a piece of junk." There's just no excuse for this level of thoughtless game design. The graphical elements are archaic and ugly. The level design is so repetitive, it borders on sadism. The gun interface is just plain dumb. By all means, if you're looking for a gun game, take a good look at Time Crisis. If you already have Time Crisis, well... play it some more. And hopefully, this one will never hit US shores.
