The Wild West is one of the definitive narrative archetypes across pretty much all forms of media. Whether it’s books, shows, movies, or games, if you’re in the market for cowboys pulling six-guns at each other beneath the scorching desert sun, there’s at least one entry for you to sink your teeth into.
For games in particular, that particular entry is most likelyRed Dead Redemption, basically the peak of what’s possible with a cowboy theme, a big open sandbox, and a lot of money.
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While Red Dead is an excellent example of Wild West media, though, it’s not the only one out there by a long shot. There are plenty of games with varying degrees of that sunny ol’ flair, occasionally intermixing with other genres like fantasy or sci-fi.
If you’ve had your fill of Red Dead for a little while, but are still hankering for a can of beans with the posse around the campfire, try these games instead.
9Westerado: Double Barreled
Nothing Like A Little Frontier Justice
Westerado: Double Barreled
More than a few films in the heyday of spaghetti westerns revolved around the concept of “frontier justice;” basically, the Wild West was so disorganized, that if someone wronged you, there was basically no chance of getting law-sanctioned justice.
The only recourse would be to take matters into your own hands, and that’s what forms the backbone of Westerado’s gameplay.
Westerado: Double Barreled is a game of investigation, deduction, and old-fashioned Old West grit. In order to find out who killed your family and burned your home, you need to travel around the desert, gathering information about the mysterious culprit and piecing together identifying characteristics. If the locals aren’t cooperating, draw your six-shooter to illustrate your point a little more clearly.
Westerado is best described as a roguelitedetective game. Every time you win or lose, the game starts over, with a new culprit and new townies to interrogate.
If you’re so inclined, you may shoot anyone who mouths off at you, though that won’t exactly make you popular. It’s a fairly simple game, but that moment where you finally have a full picture and find your perp in town is quite a rush.
8Call Of Juarez: Gunslinger
Spinning A Tall Tale
Call of Juarez: Gunslinger
It’s well-known that the vast majority of stories about the legendary outlaws of the Old West were exaggerated at best and outright fabricated at worst.
Even so, a little extra pepper on your steak makes it tastier, and a little exaggeration goes a long way toward making a shootout more climactic. If you prefer your western shootouts to be more action-packed, you can live through a tall tale inCall of Juarez: Gunslinger.
Gunslinger is an arcade-style first-person shooter where our grizzled bounty hunter of a protag recounts his many (likely false) endeavors across the frontier and run-ins with legendary figures like Billy the Kid, Jesse James, and Pat Garrett.
The game abandons any particular pretense of realism at the door, and honestly, I think it’s more fun for it. With just a couple of revolvers, you can blast your way through a small legion of bandits, scoring higher for quick and accurate headshots.
Call of Juarez: Gunslinger has a big emphasis on reading bullet trajectories. In basic combat, simply positioning yourself in the right spot can save your life as bullets whizz dramatically past your head. You even get into one-on-one duels with powerful gunmen, having to both prepare your hand to draw and focus your aim on his vitals before the draw signal.
7Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath
About As Weird As The West Gets
Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath HD
The Wild West isn’t just a place or time period, it’s a state of mind. Any sapient race on any world with a thriving frontier can develop a similar culture. This, apparently, includes the mythical planet of Oddworld and its many bizarre inhabitants, including the titular protagonist ofOddworld: Stranger’s Wrath.
Stranger’s Wrath is the most overtly action-focused of the Oddworld series. The Stranger, who speaks in a cadence not unlike John Wayne or Clint Eastwood, is an extremely mobile character, able to dash through long stretches at high speed, clubbing foes with his burly fists.
Of course, you can’t bring your fists to a gunfight, which is why Stranger uses a crossbow loaded with “live” ammo, as in literal living creatures like insects and small animals, each with their own unique effects.
The core of the gameplay involves hunting down outlaws using your various ammo types, plus a pinch of stealth and subterfuge. You can either kill your targets or take them alive, with the latter yielding better bounties when you return to town. There are no moral hangups here; you can play it whichever way you find most fun, which I appreciate.
6Wild Guns Reloaded
Everyone Loves Cyber Cowboys
Wild Guns Reloaded
It’s always fun to put cowboys in anachronistic settings. Genres like sci-fi and mecha, where you would probably never see such similar frontier culture and action, ironically become much cooler when you still see people in stetsons slinging revolvers and rifles around.
It also helps that combining cowboys with sci-fi usually results in steampunk, and I love me some steampunk. If you want some steampunk western action, you can get it fromWild Guns Reloaded.
Wild Guns Reloaded is an enhanced version of the original Wild Guns, an arcade shooter released for the Super Nintendo in 1994.
The original game featured co-op gameplay, with players commanding orphaned heiress Annie and bounty hunter Clint on a hunt for revenge for the deaths of Annie’s parents. Reloaded cranks that up to four players, adding Doris the grenadier and Bullet the sentry dog.
You’re positioned in the foreground, while enemies shoot from the background. You have to both aim and fire at targets, while also maneuvering your character to dodge oncoming fire from guns, cannons, and giant robots. It’s wild, hectic fun, perfect for a multiplayer session with the posse. Man, I wish they’d make an anime of this. It’d be awesome.
5West Of Loathing
As Immersive As It Is Silly
West Of Loathing
Western flicks weren’t just serious stories about revenge and justice, a lot of them were very hokey and silly. Heck, one of my most favorite movies of all time is still Blazing Saddles, and it doesn’t get much sillier than that. Well, maybe ifWest of Loathingever became a movie somehow, it’d give Blazing Saddles a run for its laughs.
West of Loathing is quite possibly one of the most aggressively ridiculous games ever made, and I adore it. It’s ostensibly about a young frontier adventurer striking out from home to make a name for themselves, but quickly spirals into abject madness as you do battle with demon cows, rowdy skeletons, and the occasional normal bandit as you save the desert from abject weirdness.
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West of Loathing has memorable graphics and writing, but stumbles when it comes to its turn-based RPG gameplay.
Despite its simple appearance, the gameplay is surprisingly deep, with a variety of character classes, RPG-style gameplay and character management, and an entire map of towns, locales, and dungeons to visit atop your crazy-eyed horse. It’s a western game for those who want to have fun above all else, and there’s lots of fun to be had.
4Kill The Crows
Bullets For Everyone
Any games that employ a cowboy character will almost always give them some manner of quick-draw, hammer-fanning mechanic for precisely gunning down up to six punks at once.
Everyone loves a deadeye desperado, especially when, just moments before, it seemed like they were hopelessly outmatched. That’s the kind of scenario you’re getting from Kill the Crows.
Kill the Crows is an arena combat game in which you, as a lone gunslinger, have to take on waves of mad cultists in a shantytown with just a single six-shooter. Firing from the hip will kill individual enemies just fine, but when the crowd starts to thicken, you may activate showdown mode to fan the hammer and snipe multiple targets in a single, swift motion.
As you clear out the cultists, you unlock extra gear like new guns, new showdown types, and passive perks to change up your kit. Fair warning, this game is a little intense on the ol’ wrist, so make sure to play in short bursts, just like a good hammer-fanning.
3Blood West
In The Desert, No One Can Hear You Scream
Blood West
Despite how romanticized the Old West is, it was not a fun place to live for a lot of people. Being on your own out in the frontier was scary at the best of times, and with isolation came quite a few chilling tales of ghost towns and marauding horrors.
None of those stories were true in real life (probably), but if they were, such as in Blood West, it’d be pretty upsetting to live through. Blood West is animmersive sim FPSwith a big emphasis on stealth, in a similar vein to games like Thief and S.T.A.L.K.E.R.
The open world is teeming with Lovecraftian monsters who won’t go down easily, even to a bullet, necessitating a mix ofsilent takedowns with melee weaponsand overwhelming force delivered via powerful, enchanted firearms. You can take whichever approach you prefer, but don’t be surprised if going loud gets a little hectic.
Blood West is a nice experience for those who want a little vertical slice of games like Fallout or Oblivion, employing similar perk-based character progression and inventory management with a much more compartmentalized combat and exploration system. Less speech-checking, more shooting, basically.
2Sunset Riders
Would Be Perfect For A Saloon-Themed Arcade
Sunset Riders
While perhaps not to the same extent as other genres, there was a relatively consistent Wild West presence in the old-school arcade gaming scene. You know, when arcade gaming was still a thing. In fact, one of my most beloved arcade games of all time, and a consistent all-timer for“games I really, really want to see make a comeback” is the Japanese-made, western-themed Sunset Riders.
Sunset Riders is a sidescrolling beat ‘em up a la Streets of Rage or Turtles in Time, albeit with the obvious difference that you’re firing revolvers and shotguns rather than throwing hands.
There’s no reloading; just point your gun and mash that fire button as fast as you possibly can to fill the screen up with flashing bullets. Most simple enemies die in one hit, as one typically does when shot, though this also applies to you and your buddies, so you need to be mindful about which shots are coming from where.
Despite being a relatively short arcade game, Sunset Riders has some of my favorite arcade setpieces, hitting all the classics of Wild West shootouts like train robberies, balcony battles, gatling guns, and more. Experience all the Wild West has to offer for just one stack of quarters.
1Desperados III
The Thinkin’ Man’s Shootout
Desperados 3
As cool as it would be for a lone gunman to charge into a posse of outlaws and gun them down singlehandedly like that bit in Tombstone, actually attempting something like that is much more likely to get you shot than anything else. If you’d prefer not to get pumped full of holes,Desperados IIIis the game to do it in.
Desperados III is a top-down tactical stealth game, encouraging the lost art of subtlety in your bandit battles instead of charging in, guns blazing.
Making use of cover and visible sightlines, you need to carefully sneak up on your foes to get the drop on them, either with a knife or a gun. Every kill is a calculated risk, especially with your shooter, as the sound may alert guards and hunters to your location.
Different characters have different abilities to carefully pick off foes, such as setting bear traps or employing distractions. If you may lead a few outlaws into the right spot, you can even take out a bunch at once with environmental traps. As fun as the simple approach is, I admit, there’s a certain appeal to outsmarting Wild West thugs.
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