Outlaws

The Good
While "Outlaws" is overall a huge disaster, it has its bright moments. The credit sequence, that is part of the introduction, is an example therefor. It's quite a cool rip-off from the opening credits of "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" - the famous ending to Sergio Leone's "The man with no name"-trilogy, that made Clint Eastwood a star.

Yep, "Outlaws" is a video game, more exactly a first-person shooter, that's trying to be a homage to a cult movie genre, namely the Italian Western. The opening credits are one of the rare examples, where this experiment shapes up as a success. Another one is the soundtrack, written by Clint Bajakian, who stuck to the musical works of Ennio Morricone, that emblazed many famous Italian Westerns. While the quality of the pieces isn't anywhere near those composed by the great Maestro, Bajakian managed to deliver a decent imitation. All the elements of Morricone's epic Western scores show up: the whistling, the choirs, the trumpets, the guitars, the typical rhythmic and melodic figures. One could call it barefaced plagiarism, but who cares? The music enhances the atmosphere greatly.

When it comes to gameplay, "Outlaws" is your standard-shooter with weapons a little different. The designers chose a rather realistic approach here: you don't have any rocket launcher to your pleasure, but mainly different guns and pistols as well as some additional gimmicks like throwing knives or dynamite sticks. What's more you have to reload every single bullet manually. If you forget about that, you will make the experience of standing in front of your enemies, while your shooting device will not make "BOOM" but only "click". I found this annoying at first, but came to appreciate it as authentic little detail after a while.

Last but not least, there is a good variety in the settings, that are used as levels in "Outlaws". Speaking of levels, the game features only nine of them, but they are quite spacious and will keep you occupied for a while. You will fight in a ghost town, a mine, a canyon and on a moving train among other.

The Bad
Be warned, that I have a lot to say in this section. To shorten myself a little, I will let the game's visuals aside, although they certainly deserve criticism, as even contemporary games tended to look a lot better. But I still could have lived with the graphics, if the game had been able to catch my imagination. But this is not the case. Story and atmosphere – exactly those things, others praised all the time – offended me the most. Many critics stated, that "Outlaws" would be a great homage to the Italian Western and would resemble the movies of Sergio Leone. I happen to love those movies and therefore I know, that this is just not true. I hope, I can make my point clear by explaining the differences.

A hallmark of the Italian Western is its unique way of displaying violence. I'm talking about those famous, well-known duels, where the key to survival lies more in keeping the nerves than in anything else. In those scenes, the actual act of violence erupts suddenly and is a matter of split seconds. Much more important than the flying bullets is quite actually the prelude: for example the duelists feelings, their concentrated expressions, as they stare each other into the eye. The violence in "Outlaws" is almost exactly the opposite. You won't have the time to take a look into your enemies eyes. And even if you take the time, which normally leads to immediate death, you will only get the impression of a mushy heap of pixels. The actual gameplay is very simple: you're constantly moving, moving, moving (because you must not get killed) and shooting, shooting, shooting (because you must kill). That constant moving and shooting is only occasionally interrupted to make way for some of the games "clever" little puzzles, that have you doing things like using a crowbar on a locked door (I figured this solution out without consulting a walkthrough and I'm still mighty proud – ha, ha, ha). Seriously now, the actual gameplay is your typical brainless shooter stuff. I discovered nothing that would make this in any way superior to "Doom" and the like.

Even when the locations quite frequently change, "Outlaws" is a very repetitive game at its core: it's just firing and killing and almost nothing else. In fact, not even Loco, that merciless headhunter Klaus Kinski once played in "The Great Silence", would have ever dared to dream of sending as many people to hell as Marshall Anderson does. By the way, I act for the theory, that the game throws so many enemies at you, because LucasArts realized, how dumb their AI was. Those stupid gunslingers run around like deranged Lemmings begging for bullets and would hardly provide any challenge, if they wouldn't come in such enormous masses. Exterminating these zillions of foes can even arise some philosophical questions like: where do all those bad boys actually emerge from? And how comes it, that I'm the only brave soul in this whole Wild West society, while all the others are criminal, child-kidnapping bastards? I found no answers to this questions, but one thing I'm sure of: a mindless nonstop mass killing like this does in no way resemble a Leone movie. Period.

Let's put the actual gameplay aside and come to an even more overhyped aspect of "Outlaws": the story. Just as anything in the game, the story aims at resembling an Italo Western and just misses its target. Think only of the protagonist's motivation for forcing the action: while Clint Eastwood just does it for the dirty dollars, Marshall Anderson embarks upon his record-breaking killing spree to save his oh-so-sweet little daughter and her oh-even-sweeter little dolly... OUCH! Can it get any worse? Oh yes, it can. The whole story is just an awfully incompetent, disrespectful rip-off from the plot of "Once upon a time in the West": Anderson's wife is killed and his daughter kidnapped, because his land is in the way of an unscrupulous businessman's railroad-plans. This worn-out idea is presented without any skill or imagination. Not only are the characters flat and uninteresting. Also everything was cut out, that made the arrival of the railroad such a brilliant motif in "Once upon a time in the West".

It is important to understand, that Italian Westerns are no simple action movies. Although they are not exactly talkative, they are always telling you something. It is well known, that Sergio Leone was absolutely crazy on tiniest little details – and when you watch his works carefully, you can notice that. Every scene in his movies makes sense in some way, that not always has to be related to the main-plot. His Westerns were also remarkable for bringing on a cinematic view of the West, that was very different from that of the American Western. When directors like John Ford were virtually romanticizing the Old West, Sergio Leone was systematically deconstructing this rather naive, sentimental view. Think only about his disillusioned vision of the American Civil War in "The Good, The Bad & The Ugly" or of the Mexican Revolution in the often underestimated "Duck you, Sucker!". His movies were quite often dealing with difficult themes and thereby showed no fear of breaking conventions. His quite sarcastic, immoral revisionist picture of the Old West is an integral part of all his Westerns.

How does "Outlaws" stand in this tradition? The answer is simply, that it doesn't even make an attempt to make any greater use of its setting. The Old West is just a battleground for Marshall Anderson's private war. There is no attention for details, no interesting story, no interesting character to be found. Actually it is quite difficult, to establish any interesting character, when the protagonist immediately kills every person, he comes across. As the story of "Outlaws" works this way, the player is left with Marshall Anderson as the only character, he can relate to. And what a flat one he is! His creators must have thought, that anybody who doesn't talk much but smokes all the more, would have to resemble a typical Italian Western hero. What they obviously forgot (or didn't even notice), is that those characters, that Clint Eastwood, Franco Nero or even Bud Spencer embodied, also had distinctive personalities. What made them cool and despite their brutal and selfish nature in my eyes even likable, was for example their humor. The protagonists of the Italian Westerns were anti-heroes: they were greedy, filthy and cynical, but (when we leave Bud Spencer aside) they were also clever. And here "Outlaws" fails again: if the Marshall wasn't such a gun fanatic, he could easily bore his enemies to death by talking to them. Actually it would be much more painful for them. The Marshall's remarks are blatant nonsense, "humor" seems to be a foreign word for him and his head appears to be empty except for his lust for vengeance. He is the guy who raises his eyebrow and says: "I've never met an innocent man". It's so pathetic, so dumb, so sad.

I also remember countless people slobbering over "wonderful cut-scenes" in reviews of this game. And indeed they are made in nice comic-style. Even I have to admit, that they are quite pleasing to the eye, after having suffered through the in-game-graphics for a long level's duration. But what do they tell us? Well, here is a little synopsis: Marshall shoots villain, villain goes down and babbles stupid last words, Marshall makes equally insightful remark, villain dies, Marshall gets on horse and rides to next level. This petty little scheme is reproduced in almost every cut-scene until the very end. There are only few exceptions and they aren't any better. There is no substantial story-telling, no noteworthy content to be found in this entire game. And as if they were applying to some sick rules of dramaturgy, the people at LucasArts saved the most disgusting movie sequence for the finale. There, in a sugar-coat romantic image, the Marshall rides towards sunset, together with his oh-so-sweet little daughter and her oh-even-sweeter little dolly. If anyone dares to say, this ending would in any way capture the spirit of the Italian Western, I insist, that we immediately meet and shoot it out. (Not literally, of course)

It is amazing, how far "Outlaws" is away from what it's trying to be. Sometimes this is according to differences between the media. In my eyes it's extremely doubtful, whether a video game can ever accomplish something similar to Leone's movies. For example, his slow-paced, individual art of direction is very hard to emulate – especially for a first person shooter. But still, "Outlaws" is a disappointment not only by fate. If it wasn't such a thorough misconception, it could at least have failed a lot less miserably. I sometimes was really enraged by the careless and silly ways, this wanna-be-homage treated its subject with.

The Bottom Line
As "Outlaws" still has a good number of fans, maybe I'm not making new friends by writing this. But anyway I really don't understand, why this game was (and still is) praised so much. That question gave me a hard time and finally I can only come up with the uncertain theory, that people were so used to raving at everything wearing the LucasArts logo, that they, regardless of what was served, just couldn't drop that behaviour. Nowadays it is near to common knowledge that this once so creative company sank to mediocrity, but the beginnings of that trend were mostly overseen. I think, in games like "Outlaws" it already showed. When I consider that "Duke Nukem 3D" and "Quake" were already released, I don't see how this pseudo-western had deserved any nice word by critics when it came out.

I do not intend to repeat myself about how miserable the game is at imitating the style of the Italian Western. But let me tell you that: even if you don't give a damn about things like story, atmosphere or Westerns and if you really just wanna shoot, there are numerous better games within the genre. "Outlaws" is neither pretty nor is it innovative – if you're looking for great ideas, you should search elsewhere. Only when you don't care for creativity either and really just wanna shoot shoot shoot, then I guess, this game might be right for you. It's your average, primitive bloodshed – this time with a cool soundtrack.

The Good
Actually there was alot to like about Outlaws. The western theme was unique for any FPS and the storyline was classic. A peaceful man driven to violent vengeance against the outlaws who took his daughter and killed his wife - sounds good to me.

In addition, the weapons were unique for the time this was released, classic Colt .36 Peacemaker Revolver, legendary Winchester .30-30 Repeating Lever-Action Rifle, simplistic Double sawed off 12-guage shotgun, and of course, throwing knives and dynamite, all very interesting and fun.

And while the soundtrack was certainly much inspired by already-made western film scores, I enjoyed it immensely.

The Bad
But sadly... the actual game didn't work, the graphics engine was very sub-par for the time and though this game was later patched to include 3dfx support, it still looked horrible, but it played pretty smoothly on the Pentium 150 I had at the time.

Probably the worst thing about this game was it's level design, the maps were really quite pointless, mission objectives were strewn about in foolish and illogical fashion and all it seemed to be was "Go over to one side of the map, find key, go back to other side, open door, find next key, repeat." Not very exciting if you ask me.

A strong competitor with the poor map design was the absolutely laughable AI. When your supposedly mean and gritty enemies turn their backs to you in order to walk 2 paces left then slowly turn to shoot at you and miss, you can't help but break out in laughter.

The Bottom Line
Great concepts, poor execution. The AI and Map Design stink, the graphics engine is lame. However the story, weapons, and music are good. I still have the first cd but I threw away the 2nd to make better use of a double CD case.

The Good
After making adventure games for years, LucasArts decided to take a rest from them and focus on creating a first-person shooter that has a Wild West setting. It is called Outlaws and it tells the story of Marshal James Anderson, who has just retired from gunslinging and bought himself a plot of land, along with a beautiful wife and daughter. Bob Graham (a.k.a. The Gentleman) wishes to get rid of this land to make way for a railroad, but Anderson refuses to budge. Then one day Anderson returns home from town, only to find his house burnt down, his wife murdered, and his daughter kidnapped.

All these events can be viewed in a CG-rendered cinematic, and this sets the game up nicely. Similar cinematics are displayed in between the game's levels and has someone telling Anderson where his daughter is and also has him riding his house to his next location. Special filters are applied to make the cinematics appear hand drawn, similar to what has been done with The Last Express.

There are about nine levels in the game, and each one is populated with cowboys. The aim of each level is reach the bosses and destroy them to get to the next level. As common with most first-person shooters of its day, there are certain doors that require a key. Outlaws is one of the last games to feature a map, which you can use to get around the level and navigate dark areas without the need for oil. Not only can you zoom in and out of the map, but you can find out how many secrets you've discovered and how close you are to the boss.

The game includes some realism. Nearly all of the weapons you can pick up - pistols, shotguns, sniper rifles, dynamite - are common back in the Wild West era, and you have to manually reload them instead of the game automatically doing it for you. I like the little stamina meter on the HUD, which goes down while you are performing specific movements. If you keep jumping around, Anderson will start huffing, and this adds a nice touch to the game.

Outlaws has some great graphics and stunning locations. In the first level, you browse a village that consists of a couple houses and I loved looking through these; and in the next, you are shooting through a town that consists of buildings that are common back in the era, such as saloon, bank, telegraph office, and jail. And in the third level, you get to shoot cowboys on a moving train. Each level has clouds that serve as a skybox. You can make the clouds move by enabling hardware acceleration, but doing this caused the game to crash on my system. Oh well, you can't have everything. Finally, the backdrop used for the credits look stunning, especially when you view them at the end of the game.

LucasArts may have stopped making adventure games after 1995, but that doesn't mean they couldn't incorporate adventure and puzzle elements into the game. In almost each level, you have to find certain items other than dynamite, health, or ammo and use them in a specific area that will direct you to the level's boss. As for the puzzles, the most challenging one has to be on level five, where you need to alter the water flow of a channel that will lead to different areas.

The game's music is stored as CD Audio tracks, a technique a few game companies used in the mid-nineties. The music is brilliantly composed, and fits the western theme of the game quite well. Unlike other games that also use CD Audio tracks such as Quake II, the music doesn't loop while you are on a certain level, but instead plays the next piece of music in the queue, and since the music used for the entire game is split across the two CDs, this means that if you get sick of the same tracks playing, you are free to insert the other CD and listen to other tracks without consequence.

The sound effects are nice. Each weapon in the game has realistic sounds, and when you pick up an item, the game makes a rattlesnake sound. The cowboys in the game taunt you, saying lines such as "Don't be a fool, marshal" and "Hey, Mr. Law Man". Only the bosses use specific lines. I found the Indian known as Two Fingers hilarious, as he says such nonsense like "You are a dead man walking" and "Too slow. You will regret that".

The game features an extra mode called "Historical Missions", and this mode chronicles the life of Anderson before he became marshal. There are five levels, in which you go around shooting cowboys, solving puzzles and killing a leader. One of these is the "Marshal Training" level where you can enter what looks like outhouses, and one of them features characters that totally look out of place in the game, and they do a pathetic job at killing you. I decided to play these missions before doing the actual game.

The Bad
You have to swap discs during the game, because the first half of the levels are on one disc while the other half is on another. I don't see why LucasArts couldn't ask you to do this during the installation, then have the soundtracks as MP3 files. Also, I agree with John Romero in his review: you are forced to go to the game's menu if you want to save or load a game, and this becomes tedious after a while.

The Bottom Line
Outlaws is not the first first-person shooter LucasArts made. Dark Forces was released two years earlier, and Outlaws uses the game's engine. The game incorporates CG-rendered cinematics which add more depth to the story, and both the graphics and sound (including the soundtracks) blend in with the game's wild west theme. The gameplay, meanwhile, is a mixture of action, adventure, and puzzle-solving. Realism is added in the way you have to reload your gun manually, and your stamina levels decrease over time if you do certain tasks. Although there is a fair amount of CD swapping, this is a good game that every fan of Western games should play.