POSTED 3/10/11


THE GUNSTRINGER

Twisted Pixel/Microsoft
Xbox 360/Kinect

Dreaming of becoming a puppeteer in today’s wintry economic climate? Well Craig Schwartz, have we got a gig for you!

Yep, The Gunstringer lets you exorcise your marionette-wrangling fantasies... with no strings attached (SLAP!). Ow.

From the utter fucking nutcases at Twisted Pixel, you control an undead skeletal cowboy fella questing for combackance over the posse that done left him in the desert to die – three feet under. It’s presented as an actual puppet show, from campy video audience shots to stagehands and their massive gajomphing fists that intervene occasionally to help. Or, usually, hinder.

It’s essentially on-rails shooterishness, but has more variety than John Wayne had white hats. There’s third-person-ness, Donkey Kong-inspired bits, chasms to jump, horses to ride, paddle steamers to steer, stuff to punch and, vitally for a shooter, shit to shoot – and we’re talking some wonderful-world-of-weird shit, too.

From traversing Dry Hump Canyon to deadenating Wavy Tube Men and witnessing the kinda lovin’ folks just shouldn’t speak of, The Gunstringer regularly induces giggles. It’s narrated-as-you-go all Bastion-like, but works better due to genre-authenticity. Well, that’s what we be reckonin’.

It’s our new fave Kinect toy, and works marvellously. Hoick Bonesy around with your left hand, and use your right one like a pretend pistol after selecting your target(s) with a wave. BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!

How much would you expect to pay? Don’t answer! You also get around 2,000,000 kilobytes of downloadable Mad Dog McCree-inspired, ham-acted sci-fi/western shooty nuttiness, free! Made with no budget kings Troma, it’s full motion all the way and a cack a minute.

But wait, there’s more! You also get a download code for natty produce-slasher Fruit Ninja Kinect. All this for a ker-ay-zee lowball price – we nabbed ours for A$28!

Got Kinect? Grab this, do justice. Toodle-oo, y’all.

CLICK THIS!



CLICK THIS!