This is an ongoing series where I attempt to play and complete every game ever to determine where it ranks all time. Check out previous blog entries for other games.

I learned that as I got older, I have found that my favorite genres are more cerebral instead of fast action. Perhaps it is because I am a slow old man, but I like being able to take my time, plan what I am going to do and then execute. No where was that more clear when I first played the X-COM remake for the 360. It quickly became one of my favorite games, and then spawned a love for a genre I foolishly ignored for most of my life. It combined both my love of board games and video games together, but it also allowed me to think through my actions before having anything happen. I played that game to death (eventually getting all achievements), only to then be wowed by X-COM 2 war of the chosen. Those games, while not perfect have spawned a love for the turn based strategy game that I have then carried elsewhere. Fire Emblem, Wargroove, Empire of Sin, the list goes on. Even if I haven't played them (or beaten them) I am a sucker for these games and can buy them usually sight unseen if I know it is going to be a turn based strategy game.

However, this is not a review of XCOM, but rather of Hard West. A game that mentally used to sit in my mind as wild west XCOM. A game I knew I was eventually going to play, once I got around to it, and one that I assured myself I would love, because its wild west XCOM.

Hard West tells the tale of a Father and Son who start off the game a duo beleaguered by bad luck and misfortune, but end the game at odds. You will take turns playing through chapters as either the father or son and seeing what each group is getting up to, until their stories cross again. Outside of all the shooty bits, is an overworld where you travel to different locales and interact with locals or the environment to piece through the story. Perhaps you have enough money to pay for a map to some treasure, granting you new guns or equipment that might help you in the strategy portion, or you end up going down the wrong path and get injured leaving your character with less health for your next mission. These are interesting gameplay mechanics that I think can open up the world of Hard West and future TBS (turn-Based strategy) games. I like having persistent story, injuries or problems that can weave into the shooting aspect as another thing to think about.

Out in the world, you can collect playing cards that can grant you bonuses to characters that I loved the idea of. Give a player a pair of kings and they might have a slightly longer vision cone, but give that player a straight flush and they might have more health. I was excited at the prospect of really trying to figure out and weigh balances as I hand out cards to each member of my party to get the best I can. However, it quickly becomes apparent that the card bonuses are relatively pointless. About halfway through the game I was able to equip a royal flush onto my main party member, and its bonus was something akin to a measly +50 luck, +2 range.. Which when we get to talking about the strategy aspect is nothing. I played with all combos I could make, and i felt that either the idea needed to be fleshed out more (by making the cards randomized, or harder to get) and by making the rewards greater. I should have to agonize whether I want someone to have 4 of a kind, or split the cards into two pairs, but when the rewards for both are like +1 defense or +1 sight then it doesn't really matter. The first of many ideas I wanted to engage with more. During or after any battle, I never thought "Thank heavens he had that + 1 sight," and usually after setting the cards on each character, they never got changed.

Inside the actual battles, is where the game falls apart, and its really disappointing, because I think the mood and story are pretty decent. Similar to XCOM there are two moves each character gets, which can be used to move twice, or move and shoot, or etc. After your turn, then the enemies all take their turn and mostly have the same actions as you. Some characters have special moves where they can ricochet bullets (cool) or shoot through fabric in order to hit enemies that normally you would not be able to target. Another solid idea that I feel gets outweighed by the absolute worst addition to Hard West, A luck bar.

We have all played an XCOM game where we should be guaranteed a hit, but the invisible die is cast, and we miss a 90 or 95% chance despite being right next to the enemy. Well Hard West decided to call that aspect out where each character has a set amount of luck which is expended when they would normally get hit, but instead get to "luck out" of taking damage. In theory this is an amazing system, you could be prevented from getting a cheap death, because your character might now be able to luck out of taking damage regardless of the enemies % to hit. However, that is not how the stat works. Instead every shot that is taken in the game reduces the luck of the person who is being shot at. Even if you are taking a shot that should not hit, you will remove luck from an enemy. Once their luck is removed, they will automatically take a hit on the next shot. this obviously works for you as well as against you. The luck removed is usually proportionate to the % of the hit, so if you had a 50% chance to hit, you would remove 50 luck. This means that no shot is a wasted shot, and you can have one character lower someone's luck, and then another user take a shot to hit and potentially kill an enemy. When a character is hit, they recover some Luck, but outside of items there is no other way to recover it besides taking a bullet. Now the issue is that you are almost always out-numbered in every mission, which means there are multiple enemies chipping away your luck and health regardless of how you choose to engage. It also means that there is a relatively reliable rate in which you will always miss the first shot on an enemy regardless of the % it shows. If you flank an enemy and have a 70% chance to hit and kill, that first shot will almost always miss resulting in their luck decreasing instead of their health. When you fight enemies with health totals greater than the damage your gun can do, it can mean a long prolonged fight, that results in chip damage.

Hard West also removes the equivalent of "overwatch" from your move list. I understand that maybe they wanted a counter to seeing XCOM players who move an inch at a time and place everyone in overwatch every turn, this does leave you susceptible to incoming attackers (which happens a lot). For instance, if you are holed up in a building firing out an open window at attackers, but one is just offscreen, you can either leave your safe confinement to try and get a shot off, or do nothing. Then on the following turn, knowing you were going to be attacked, the enemy can walk in the door and get a clean shot at you with no objection. This removal of overwatch, with the "luck" based attacking, makes playing defensively a non-starter. Perhaps that keeps the action moving, but I found that it also removes a lot of the strategy of the game as well. You can't ambush, and you can't get a jump on any attackers. You either start the mission already under siege, or in "recon" mode, where you can do some light sneaking to get to a better starting position. Keep in mind that the first shot you fire, every enemy on the map will know where you are and will probably be making their way towards you. It is something that I didn't appreciate about XCOM until playing Hard West, is that you could have little engagements across a whole map, not knowing when you might cross an enemies path or they yours. In Hard West, you could be in a remote corner of the map, darting between buildings long after the first gunshot goes off, but enemies will still know where you are and usually engage you when you are vulnerable.

I think what makes the whole game damning is that in theory I think the improvements could have been something really unique and interesting. I also think simple tweaks could have made the game a much more enjoyable experience. Perhaps luck only goes down IF you would have been hit, not just a bullet fired at you. That could make cover much more useful, and allow you to find great vantage points to shoot from instead of just constantly moving closer in an attempt to break the luck system on the enemy. Or, they could have removed luck on all enemies but bosses, making your shots just rely on % to hit, rather than leaving you wondering if you should waste your rifle shot on someone if they still have too much luck. I really do want to like Hard West more, but even after beating the campaign, and seeing where the story goes, I can't help but think about how much better the game COULD have been.

Is this game the Greatest game of all time: not today

Where does it rank: This is the new #19 greatest game of all time out of 26. It is one below "When Vikings Attack," and above "Timberman Vs." It pains me to put this as low, but I never finished a gunfight and felt good about how it went. Maybe that is the point, but in other strategy games, I can feel smart, powerful, or lucky to finish a mission/fight, but in Hard West I just felt upset.

Up Next: Psychonauts

Anyone looking for it: here is the link to the list and more if you are interested in following along with me (this is not a self promotion). Here

Thanks for listening.

Nice write up, thanks for this. I have had this game in my unplayed pile for ages; as a fan of the XCOM reboot, and Westerns too, I've been close to starting so many times, now I might still keep it on hold. It's a shame it doesn't quite meet the expectations that it lines itself up to.

Looks awesome!

I think I probably enjoyed it more than you, but it's been, oh, 3 years or so since I played it, so I might not remember everything about it.

I remember actually liking the luck system a fair amount, especially when you started getting into weapon types, cover, ricochet shots and especially the deck of cards/magic stuff. Even if the deck building for stat bonuses doesn't amount to much, that's not really the point, the active and passive abilities were more meaningful.

Also, overwatch is technically there still, but mostly only for enemies, because it's more proximity based than line of sight based, to prevent point blank max hit chance shots from being abused. Enemies just never actually get that close to you. I don't think the lack of overwatch necessarily removes strategy, but refocuses it. Problem with xcom is the correct thing can often be, creep up and overwatch ad nauseum. If something is too useful on its own, that also in its own way reduces your strategic options, because the answer to too many questions becomes "why not just use this?".

In general I found the system worked really well in terms of narrative for a singleplayer, story based thing. You can have big firefights, and feel like you're both making progress against enemies and in danger yourself without that visual of "this guy just got shot 6 times and is still going". Not that you don't also get shot a lot, but that's where the spooky magic comes in. I had some really scrappy firefights that were a lot of fun because of that.

I do like Hard West quite a bit, but I think it's mostly because it has a "neat" gameplay system on top of a fun setting, theme and story. It's not as refined at what it's trying to do as Xcom is at what Xcom does, but it's not actually trying to be xcom. The overall structure of an xcom campaign has different demands than this mostly linear story based thing with non-randomized short chapters and frequent story mandated party mixups (your party of characters changes completely quite often as the story shifts perspectives). Things aren't as unfair when you're not at risk of losing or stonewalling hours of campaign progress like in xcom.

@stantongrouse: thanks for the read. Obviously it goes without saying, but you might like it more.. its hard not to compare it directly to xcom and between the two its an obvious choice for me

@brackstone: i appreciate the read, and im glad you like it and disagree with me. I probably went in with too lofty of expectations and played it after both xcoms which just blew me away. I do really like the story and non combat aspect of hard west, but it just never clicked for me. I agree that the concept and setting are great (give me more western games), i just wanted to feel like my shots were going to land more, and the luck system gave the appearance of me missing shots that i felt i shouldnt.

@imunbeatable80: Yeah I don't think Hard West's gameplay is perfect by any means, but I think it was interesting and perfectly fine for what it was trying to be. I think the shots landing vs not landing in this is awkward cause it mean misses were perhaps more common than xcom, which is bad, but your misses aren't complete wastes of your turn, they make you more likely to hit later, which makes it feel slightly better. It's a wash I think. It's rolling dice vs a dice deck, to put it in tabletop/board game terms.

Not greatest video game ever, but I think it's an interesting one I had a pretty good time with. Haven't played their followup game at all, though I heard more mixed things about it and frankly the setting isn't quite as interesting.

Hard West isn't a game I'd recommend for people who want a turn based tactics game, it's a game I'd heartily recommend for people that want a western or more specifically, a spooky western game. There are some spooky westerns, but not enough, and this one I think is pretty high up there.

I loved this game, and I think it's underrated.

This game was the one and only project ive ever backed on Kickstarter. I remember reading about it in some article Patrick wrote about indie games worth checking out. The game itself was meh, but I loved the idea and concept and art behind it and it was cool to watch the progress through the campaign and development. I have honestly never heard or seen anyone else ever talk about this game, so seeing it in forum titles took me back!

Related, I still get emails relating to the Kickstarter, and just this morning and got an e-vite to check out the developer's next game: Yacht Mechanic Simulator. Huh.

@cornfed40: thanks for the read. From cowboys to yachts, the only natural move.

This is awesome! I always loved the idea of a “weird west” XCOM, but it sounds like this is a game that would benefit from the refinement of a sequel. I got this game for free from GOG at some point and always meant to give it a shot. Based on your review, I don’t need to worry about prioritizing it.

Looking forward to your thoughts on Psychonauts, one of my favorite games of all time!

@cameron_friend: hey thanks for reading.. Hard West is tough, because i want to recommend it because i think how it handles story is really neat, but if you are coming off xcom then the battles are just not nearly as enjoyable. As for Psychonauts, ill probably put my thoughts up later today.

Glad to see one of your posts seem to blow up more. Might still pick this game up since it keeps going on sale for a couple of dollars on switch. Honestly expected it to be a lot worse.

@djrebyb: thanks man.. you can say you were there from the start.