Mad Dog McCree PS3 Review

Mad Dog McCree is a western themed first-person lightgun shooter available for download from the PlayStation Store for the PS3. American Laser Games was originally founded by Robert Grebe in the late 1980s under the name Institute for Combat Arms and Tactics (ICAT) with a system built for the purpose of training police officers which was later converted into arcade game technology. Mad Dog McCree was released in 1990 and was the first game developed by American Laser Games which was the first of many lightgun games to come from American Laser Games between 1990 and 1994 before changing their approach to specifically develop games for girls under the name of Her Interactive in 1995 which ultimately meant their fundamental loss of identity from what they had made their name from developing and while Her Interactive continued developing games; American Laser Games closed its doors. Digital Leisure purchased the development and publishing rights to American Laser Games’ entire back catalogue in 2000, followed by proceeding to remaster their games that had once released in arcades as well as on 3DO, CD-i, SEGA CD and DOS computers with the remastered releases appearing on PS3, Wii, iOS and more besides. Can Digital Leisure’s remaster of Mad Dog McCree improve upon the western themed first-person lightgun arcade classic?

The story is set in the American Wild West and is told from the perspective of a silent lead character referred to only as stranger as a dangerous outlaw named Mad Dog McCree is on the loose in a rampage he is orchestrating with a gang of many wanted fugitives, although no-one else has been able to stop Mad Dog McCree and his gang; the gun slinging stranger sets out to do so.

There are some important gameplay mechanics such as scoring points for shooting enemies without missing or reloading with the more consecutive shots hitting leading to a higher score, although to earn a maximum score would most certainly require players to collect the bonus objects and play on a higher difficulty level, while bonuses are earned by shooting cow skulls and spittoons that are positioned throughout the town which provides extra bullets to shoot at enemies.

Intense showdowns are effectively duels with enemies from Mad Dog’s men are authentic to the Wild West as they are one-on-one encounters in which the player and the enemy A.I. must holster their gun, while waiting with a hand close to the gun to draw at the appropriate moment in which drawing too early will lose the showdown and drawing too late will most probably result in taking a bullet.

Character design is essentially a re-enactment of the Wild West period in which the characters are dressed appropriately for the time period with weaponry limited to pistols which is also correct for the time period. Meanwhile, environment design ties in with the character design by depicting a town set in the Old West with multiple routes to choose from such as a corral, saloon, sheriff’s office and bank which can be visited in any order, followed by further environments in the latter half of the game.

Mad Dog McCree is a lightgun game perfect for PlayStation Move with a control scheme consisting of utilising the gyroscopic motion sensing functionality to aim at enemies by positioning the on-screen crosshair over an enemy and pressing the trigger (T) button or move button to shoot, while showdowns require players to point their Move controller down towards the floor as though it was in a holster with it only being drawn at the last second, alongside shooting off screen or shaking the PlayStation Move up and down reloads ammo. Calibration of the PlayStation Move controller is rather efficient and feels just like playing a lightgun game in the arcades with accurate representation of movement from the gyroscopic motion sensing functionality, while vibration offers added immersion when shooting the pistol at an enemy, although there is no vibration when the playable character is shot by an enemy.

Graphically, Mad Dog McCree consists of the same live action film of actors and actresses featured in the full motion video (FMV) from the original version of the game which has been remastered in 720p HD, therefore providing better visuals in comparison to the original release with the appropriate effect of entering slow motion when the final enemy of an area is defeated preserved as it was in the original release, while the crosshair and heads-up display have been noticeably improved.

Mad Dog McCree’s presentation has received an overhaul since the original release with a great user interface across various menus such as the main menu, settings menu, online leaderboards and gameplay menus with support for navigation via the gyroscopic motion sensing functionality and the trigger or move buttons of the PlayStation Move controller. Menu backgrounds consist of a variety of images from the locations the game is set within such as bars and homes constructed with wood and carts scattered around the town.

There are naturally voice-overs from the entire cast of actors and actresses which provide a B-movie style delivery throughout the variety of scenes in the story and the wisdom of a mortician after every occasion the playable character suffers a death, while sound effects include gunfire, walking or rolling along the ground and general ambience, alongside music authentic to the period of the Wild West with the audio being maintained to a decent standard, although there is still the occasional temporary audio glitch.

The trophy list includes 8 trophies with 3 bronze trophies, 3 silver trophies and 2 gold trophies. The easiest trophy is the Cheap Shot bronze trophy for being shot by the hidden shooter in the window with the majority of the trophy list being relatively easy to achieve due to story focused trophies that are naturally earned by progressing through the game such as the Hey, Stranger bronze trophy for saving the prospector from the bandits. The hardest trophy has to be the My Mistake, Twelve Coffins gold trophy for shooting 12 enemies in a row without missing or reloading during single player. It is estimated that depending upon skill and a good trophy guide to provide some helpful tips that it would take between 1 to 2 hours to 100% the trophy list.

There are 4 difficulty levels including practice, deputy, sheriff and marshal with the major differences between each difficulty level including a reduction in the amount of time players have to respond after having seen an enemy before they shoot. However, regardless of the chosen difficulty level; players will need to return to the previous checkpoint if the character is shot even just once and reaction times have to be fast, especially as some areas contain randomly positioned enemies which can change from one playthrough to another with the indoor area of the corral which can potentially prove frustrating.

Local multiplayer supports 2 to 4 players in a co-operative mode with a crosshair that is clearly assigned to each player by glowing in the same colour as the orb on top of the respective Move controller and a set of the standard 6 bullets for each player, although the lives are still limited to 5 which will reduce regardless of which player was closest to shooting the enemy. Local co-operative multiplayer is entertaining, although it would have been even better to have a score based competitive multiplayer mode in which each player was attempting to achieve their own personal high score that was higher than the rest of the surrounding players by defeating enemies before the other players; all whilst simultaneously retaining a focus on co-operative gameplay to gain the best total score. There is no online multiplayer which could have reflected the approach of the local co-operative multiplayer and the further possible improvement of a competitive multiplayer mode.

Online leaderboards are focused on worldwide rankings, local rankings and friends rankings for the story during single player with each leaderboard containing each player’s rank; name (PSN ID); and the score accumulated with the positioning of each player based upon the score they have successfully achieved and your personal positioning and best score on the online leaderboards, although it would have been even better to have additional online leaderboards such as co-operative leaderboards for 2, 3 and 4 players for those who have played through the story co-operatively as well as single player and co-operative leaderboards for such details as the amount of enemies defeated and the lowest amount of shots received from enemies.

Mad Dog McCree’s replayability stems from multiple features such as local co-operative multiplayer for 2 to 4 players, competitive online leaderboards, 4 difficulty levels to test your skill against easier or the hardest A.I. the game has to offer and a random order of when enemies appear in certain areas which provides a challenge on any difficulty level due to the unpredictability it brings to the experience which collectively makes up for the relatively short running time of the full motion video and keeps players returning long after a single playthrough.

Analysis