[360] The Gunstringer Review (Kinect)

[wyeast]

Gunstringer (Kinect) Review

Title: The Gunstringer
Platform: XBox 360 (+Kinect)
Developer: Twisted Pixel
Publisher: Microsoft Studios
ESRB: T (Teen)
MSRP: $39.99 for X360
Editor: Andy 'wyeast' Roe

What's Hot: Creative style; Packed with humor; Childhood glee pointing your finger at the screen, going "POW! POW!"

What's Not: Hampered by clunky Kinect controls.

Everyone did it when they were kids. Run around in the street, chasing each other with your hands shaped like a gun, shouting "POW! POW!". That same action lies at the heart of Twisted Pixel's freshman Retail outing with The Gunstringer. Crafted by the folks behind Comic Jumper and 'Splosion Man, you control an undead cowboy puppet, hell bent on getting revenge on his old posse' for betraying him.

Disclaimer: This reviewer's typical gaming setup is likely "less-than-ideal" for Kinect. Cramped space, and couch is not directly square to the sensor. YMMV.

For your $40, you'll find not only The Gunstringer game, but free access to the DLC The Wavy Tube Man Chronicles and there is also in-box a download code for the XBLA Kinect game Fruit Ninja Kinect. (more on those later)

Starting Up

The first time you fire up the game, you're treated to a fairly lengthy prologue introducing the premise of the storyline. Basically, you see people coming into a theater, while stagehands set up The Gunstringer for his first scene. This was a little bit on the long side for introducing the premise, particularly if you have eager kids chomping at the bit to play. Thankfully, you do not have to sit through the whole setup every time you play.

Controls & Gameplay

From there you're set up with the premise of the story, then you're off and running into the "puppet show". You're quickly introduced to the controls: Your left hand controls the "puppet" - moving left and right. Pop your arm up, and the Gunstringer will jump. A quick slap to the side, and he'll do a little dodge/roll to the side.

Your right hand is the gun (or your left if you opt for "Lefty Mode"). On-screen, you see not only your blue undead cowboy, but a red circle with several yellow "caps" around the edge. This reticle is controlled by your right hand, which you use to "paint" targets. Flip your arm up, and your gun will fire in rapid succession.

Bear in mind, you don't have to hold your hand like a gun. In fact, the Kinect will have an easier time reading if you hold both hands up with your palms facing the screen, rather than "realistically" as holding a marionette and a gun. It's just not as fun that way.

In some scenes, you'll sit behind cover, using your left arm to pop out the left or right side to fire. In other scenes, you'll be treated to dual-pistols (with your left hand controlling a similar blue cap-ring) firing continuously. At one point, you're swinging your arms wildly as your cowboy runs through enemies whirling dervish-style.

Gameplay is deceptively simple within any particular section. Mostly you're going through as a sort of 3-d Platformer. The boss battles are pretty straightforward, with the "punch-out" style encounters in particular being pretty quick. Some passages, where you have to finely control where your puppet is running while shooting at things, can get a little bit hectic with your arms flapping like mad.

The Gunstringer does support 2-player co-op, although I did not have opportunity to test this out at the time of this review.

Your opponents range from cows to the usual baddies and a variety of stylish and varied bosses. For what could have been released as an XBLA title, the environs and gameplay are pretty diverse. The artwork is rich and vivid, sort of a Toy Story 3 meets Viva Pinata. Everything comes back to the premise of a puppet show, so you'll notice everything is scaled down, with "trees" made of paper towel tubes, and paper doll npc's.

Kinect Factor

As common with many Kinect titles, the controls are a bit coarse, although The Gunstringer does try to lessen the blow in places. During the main menus you can see your silhouette put up against an "ideal" marker - this helped me to understand why the menus were struggling with my seated position. Use of the "paint and shoot" scheme likewise takes away what could have been a futile effort in accurately pointing at the screen. Other actions, such as swinging your fists, or the ever popular Monty Python-esque "Fist of Justice" provide just as much amusement for others in the room as they will for the player. After an hour or so of holding your arms up, the fatigue gets noticeable. Perhaps no worse than any other Kinect title, however.

However, in some spots, the controls really sort of fell flat. With Kinect it's easy to have a little bit of lag in registering your actions, so dodging/jumping over obstacles can be prone to timing errors. Fine control of position isn't my forte' on Kinect, so my puppet was often falling off of ledges/catwalks/boxes when I wasn't meaning to.

The dual-pistol scenes in particular also seemed to be very sensitive to hand position - enough that I would literally have to stand up from the couch in order for it to get a reasonable fix on both hands - and even then it was easy to miss some enemies because of the jumpiness in controls. The "shotgun" sequences rely on actually aiming your shots (as opposed to painting the targets), which can lead to frustration if the reticle is jumping up to the top of the screen every time you're trying to shoot.

In one particular boss encounter, you're contending with your puppet flying around in front of the stage curtain, avoiding being hit by your opponent. Somehow my puppet ended up being caught on the wrong side and got stuck, despite any movement I tried to make with my hand to free him. Eventually he got free on his own, but not after wasting several moments flailing in vain and watching his health plummet.

However, for the most part, The Gunstringer is very forgiving with these errors. Even in those scenes where I felt I was flailing badly I still managed to clear it with at least a Bronze medal. If you lose all your health, you die, but you can opt to pick right back up where you left off, so the show doesn't have to grind to a halt.

The game does incorporate "modifiers", including a "Hardcore mode" for those who find the game too forgiving. Along with the modifiers, you can similarly unlock a whole range of bonus content, including commentary soundtracks, photos and videos taken during production, artwork, and the like. The currency of choice is the virtual dollars you earn with each stage you clear.

Beyond the Kinect-based controls, the nitpicks were relatively minor. You can enable closed-captioning of the gameplay narration, but the text on my 32" non-HDTV was very small and difficult to read at the recommended 10' distance from the screen. The occasional throwback to the "theater" setting, viewing audience reaction brings a welcome rest for weary arms, but also felt a little distracting.

Mini-Review: The Wavy Tube Man Chronicles

Why does this DLC warrant a mini-review? Well, because it's not really part of The Gunstringer. That is, it's not an additional play or sequence related to your blue undead puppet. The Wavy Tube Man Chronicles is well... something special.

It's a homage to cheesy LaserDisc-based arcade light gun games from the early 90's. It's Mad Dog McCree meets Mad Dog Morgan. Yes. THAT Mad Dog Morgan. It's silly. The acting is over the top, the cinematography is purely bargain basement. It's everything a modern video game is not, but if you grew up pouring your allowance into those LaserDisc games, this is going to bring back memories.

I won't give away too much of the storyline, as that's all this mini-game has, but you will go through town rootin' tootin' and a-shootin'. The details, from the jumpy camera action between scenes, all the way down to the scolding you get when you shoot a "good guy", is down to the letter with those old games. Twisted Pixel, you magnificent bastards!

Mini-Review: Fruit Ninja Kinect

As mentioned, The Gunstringer also comes bundled with a download code for Fruit Ninja Kinect. Pretty much a direct port of the popular mobile phone game, this plays out pretty much exactly as you expect.

In the game itself, the controls work fine, and it's thrilling for anyone looking to hack up some fruit. You have a handy silhouette on-screen to help you figure out where exactly you're swinging.

The downside is this is pretty much a straight port. Meaning that while you have a good time hacking up fruit, you can have a pretty weak time trying to manipulate through the in-game menus via the Kinect. Two places in particular I noticed this. First is in Sensei's Swag, where trying to flip through your choices often gets mixed up with the "slash" motion used to make a selection, which can get aggravating when you're repeatedly slashing instead of scrolling, or vice versa.

Second is something I noticed with my kids, in that the proportions of the expected "adult" figure meant that they had a hard time reaching some areas, like the "back" button down in the corner. They would hold their hand out (and thus, reach only part way down the screen). Leaning over to reach the button, the game would try to "recalibrate" and recenter back onto their torso rather than recognizing they're still trying to reach the button.

Conclusion

The Gunstringer is an amusing romp back into your childhood days. The stylish artwork and humor draw you in so you hardly notice you're pointing your finger to the sky or thrashing fists against your virtual opponent. It is, however, a Kinect game, so YMMV with the controls. If you have a Kinect, you've probably experienced this with other titles, so there is no surprise here. Thankfully the game doesn't throw too many roadblocks in your way even if you flail about.

Some people may balk at the retail price of $40, but The Gunstringer is a solid value as a Kinect title with a flair and sense of humor that is not common among the more typical Dance or Sports games. Throw in Fruit Ninja Kinect and Wavy Tube Man Chronicles, and you've got a pretty good package, if you can overlook (or are not as affected as this reviewer is) the wonky controls.

Score: 4 out of 5 CoGs
(3 out of 5 if you already have / don't want Fruit Ninja Kinect)

Andy says, "Solid fun, despite the quirks of the controls. Good buy if you're interested in a funny unusual platformer, possibly wait on a sale if you happen to already have (or don't want) Fruit Ninja Kinect. DLC is a real gem for nostalgia."

[Karak]

Man I guess Spigot and I lucked out big time on this one. I was surprised that he also had excellent controls. Ahh life. What can you do? Excellent review and fair to all things.

[MagGnome]

How does movement work in this game? Forward motion has to be on rails, right? I can't imagine any other way in which it could work with Kinect.

[wyeast]

In those sequences where you're moving forward, it's at a constant speed.

If the perspective is from behind, you can move side-to-side and/or jump. If it's isometric (usually you're climbing ramps or going down a river) it's jump only.

In other sequences you're behind cover and using movement to peek out from side to side.

... in the DLC, there's no control of movement (at least as far as I've gotten). It's a-shootin' only.

[Zanzibar]

I think I'm gonna get this. Wish it was $10 cheaper.

My wallet hates me.

[Spigot]

It's too bad you were playing on a non-optimal space for your Kinect, Wyeast. I played through this last weekend and absolutely loved it. There were a few instances where the stages required a little too much precision in order to navigate unscathed, but those weren't deal-breakers (though they might have been if I'd tried it in Hardcore mode).

Otherwise, the game was a great implementation of Kinect hardware into a more traditional game. And the presentation and story were pure Twisted Pixel insanity. I shall never look at another Wavy Tube Man without feeling like they are an entity of evil again.

On a side note, Wyeast, have you thought about trying that new Nyko Zoom attachment for the Kinect? I've heard good things about it and it's supposed to really help people who don't have the space usually required by the system?

And lastly, did you play sitting down or standing up? I tried playing sitting down but found my accuracy and the general feel of the controls taking a major hit. Standing up? Very few issues.

And the soundtrack is up for free on the TP website for those interested.

[Spigot]

One other thing. I would not have paid for the Fruit Ninja Kinect game on its own but my god, my kids love that thing to death. It's the first time I've had to tear them away from the Kinect since I bought it. They were doing spin kicks and crazy chops for an hour or so the first day we tried it out.

You can't fault Twisted Pixel for skimping on the extras with their games!

[wyeast]

While i did harp on kinect quite a bit, i did try to keep it a neutral factor in the game's score since i knew that my own setup could he contributing. However, in some places, the action seemed unrelated to my setup. The kinect clearly registered the upward movement, but the overlap w/ the movement of the cursor made it prone to error. Similarly, the snafu during the oil baron (i think?) boss fight was not related to knowing where my hand was. The wooden cross above the puppet's head moved around onscreen just fine, but no matter where i moved it, the puppet was firmly lodged between the baron and the right side.

Like I said, they do a good job keeping these things from being a showstopper (although I did die during the baron fight)

I played a mix of sitting and standing, for sake of review and because it does suggest playing seated in-game. A couple of times it did seem to have an issue playing seated: any dual pistol scene, and curiously the opening menus.

[Spigot]

That's cool. By any chance, did you have direct sunlight streaming across the area between you and the Kinect at all?

I only ask that because that will make things go insane whenever it happens around my place. The afternoon that I was playing through the majority of the game, my kids kept running in and out the back door (which would leave a big band of sunlight on me and/or the floor between me and the Kinect) if I didn't happen to close the drapes quickly. That usually led to me bashing into things or having some kind of spasmodic jumping fit that I didn't intend. Playing in the evening was better because of the lack of sunlight but then my living room isn't incredibly brightly lit, which could lead to other slight hiccups.

All of that aside though, I found things much more precise than in other Kinect games I've played (though I do need to play more of Child Of Eden with Kinect rather than the controller).

[wyeast]

Nope. The area I play in is free of stray sunlight.

[MagGnome]

Originally Posted by wyeast

Nope. The area I play in is free of stray sunlight.

Thank you for confirming that you do all of your gaming in your grandmother's basement.