Game: Lead and Gold: Gangs of the Wild West
Publisher: Paradox Interactive
Platform: PC
Price: $14.99
Pros: Excellent gameplay, robust for a $15 game
Cons: No voice chat
Verdict: You can’t ask for more for $15
If you’ve seen every John Wayne movie no less than three times and you have trouble deciding which cowboy hat to wear when you leave the house, Lead and Gold: Gangs of the Wild West is definitely for you. In fact, even if you don’t meet those qualifications, you’ll probably still enjoy this class based shooter.
Two teams of up to five players square off in a variety of game modes like team deathmatch and territory control. There are six maps, but depending on which game mode you’re playing, you may only wind up playing in two or three of them. The maps are all well designed, but if you favor a game type that only utilizes a couple of the maps, they begin to feel stale very quickly. The game’s developer, Fatshark, has been vocal about their commitment to supporting the game with DLC, so there’s a fair chance that problem will be fixed in the future.
Each time you hit an enemy, or complete an objective, you get experience. As you level up, you gain boosts to things like damage and accuracy. Your level isn’t persistent – it resets at the end of each round, but XP is gained fairly quickly, so you won’t have to wait very long to level up. The downside is that the most lethal players become more powerful as the match goes on. Sometimes, this can lead to one or two players ending the round far ahead of everyone else.
The various game modes do a good job of encouraging teamwork. Powderkeg, for example, requires one team to drop a powderkeg at a specific point controlled by the other team. The person carrying the explosive moves slower, and can’t fire their weapon without putting the powerkeg down. To make matters worse, if the powderkeg gets shot, you’ve only got a few seconds to put it down, and get away before it explodes. In order to successfully plant a powderkeg, one player has to take it from point A to point B, while the other four members of the team defend them. If just one person runs off to do their own thing, it can be disastrous for the attacking team.
The four classes in Lead and Gold also do their part to encourage teamwork. Each class radiates a Synergy Effect giving nearby team mates a skill boost. The Gunslinger radiates accuracy, The Deputy radiates damage, The Blaster boosts armor, and The Trapper ups their team mates’ chance for a critical hit. A well rounded, and tightly knit team can be extremely lethal.
It’s surprising to see that a game focusing so heavily on teamwork would be lacking voice chat. It’s a fairly common feature at this point, and any shooter with a healthy sense of teamwork should have it right from the start. Fatshark is definitely bringing voice chat in a future patch (along with dedicated servers), but we can’t review the game based on what it will become after a few patches. For now, you’ll just have to settle for Ventrillo, or Skype if you want to talk to your team.
It’s also worth noting that Lead and Gold seems to experience a fair amount of lag. We’ve experienced everything from jerky animations to hits not registering any damage. Again, Fatshark is committed to patching the game to fix the problems, but for now, it’s something worth considering before making a purchase.
Despite a handful of flaws, Lead and Gold: Gangs of the Wild West is a rock solid third person shooter. All of the various elements in the game come together to encourage teamwork in a way that few other games can. If you like Team Fortress 2, or just about any game in the Battlefield series, you’ll most likely appreciate Lead and Gold. There’s a very robust feature set packed into this fifteen dollar downloadable game, and Fatshark is dedicated to bringing even more features and content to the game through patches and DLC. Unless you have an irrational fear of the old west and / or cowboys, you should definitely give this game a try.
Sharing: It’s Win/Win
