The only way to get strong enough to face the challenges on your path are your cards and equipment. If that sounds like overkill, trust me, it isn’t. On top of those, there are charms that you can equip that give yet more bonuses. Using simplified Poker rules, you can combine cards to get additional bonuses. Things get interesting through the addition of card decks that can give your characters both passive and active bonuses such as the ability to hide in the shadows and to chain shots for as long as you have bullets and keep dropping enemies. Combat itself is fairly standard and revolves around seeking cover and shooting baddies before they shoot you. You would expect that to slow the game down but the constant sense of danger kept me at the tip of my chair for the majority of the game.Īctually, the very fact that death lurks in every corner is perhaps the most compelling reason to play Hard West. Cover and careful maneuvering are key to your survival and you will soon learn to spend enough time to consider your moves.
The punishment for tactical mistakes can be severe. It also means you’ll be working hard to get to that point. It all sounds incredibly harsh but the reward comes in the shape of a true sense of euphoria when you finally manage to successfully complete a mission with your team still in one piece. You start from scratch, often with just a single character, making you fight every step of the way. The game is split up into scenarios, each starting with an inventory reset that gets rid of all the good stuff.
If one dies, you either opt to leave him dead or go back to turn one.Ī single shot can kill or maim and some wounds are brought along for the ride unless you find a healer who can patch you up in between battles. You cannot save and load during combat to revive your fallen crew, you can’t even tell them to retreat out of the battle scene when they are severely wounded. A few healing herbs that can be used only once, a buff that lets its wearer heal a few hitpoints by feasting on downed adversaries, a few potions… there really isn’t much to bring your guys back to health and you’ll learn to use them sparingly. With the exception of the introductory levels, you are virtually guaranteed to play a sizeable portion of the levels multiple times if you want to walk out with your entire team unscathed. The game’s designers are obviously sadists with a penchant for Dark Souls type games - and I love them for it. One level in particular I restarted more than ten times. I honestly cannot recall having played any turn-based games in which I had to restart levels as often as I have in this title, and I’m playing on the medium difficulty.
No matter whether you are in a combat session or traversing the campaign map, there is a real sense of foreboding, of things not being right in the world. This is quite possibly the creepiest strategy title I have ever played.
Which is actually a fair description of Hard West’s ambiance as well - it will make your skin crawl. You will also learn that there are dark forces at play, meddling in your life in ways that would make anyone’s skin crawl. As the story unfolds, you’ll find yourself facing hard questions, tough choices and even yourself. Mom died at a young age and father - though hard working - never quite recovered. Set in the wild west of gunfights and horses, Hard West tells the story of one very unlucky young man and his equally unlucky father. Hard West is a confident turn-based strategy title that has enough going for it to stand firmly on its own.
While I would love to continue the illusion that Hard West is XCOM in the wild west, it simply isn’t. If you are reading up on Hard West before making the purchase you will be seeing a lot of references being made to XCOM.