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Now here’s a game with some pedigree. When I’m talking about NES launch titles, most
hail from the mid-eighties, but Wild Gunman goes back. So far back that it used film projection,
rather than a TV screen, to display the action back when it debuted in 74. That’s serious
business. That original Wild Gunman, later re-created as a collapsible model that you
may have seen in the WarioWare series, was designed by none other than the legendary
Gunpei Yokoi, a longtime Nintendo visionary and inventor of... well, the freakin GAME
BOY for one. So, yeah. Pedigree. Now DRAW.
Wild Gunman’s all about reaction time. A smarmy wild-west type sidles up onto the screen,
sets down, and some music plays to kill the time before the command to fire is ordered,
and then you shoot the joker before he shoots you. Fortunately, through the miracle of User
Interface, you can tell exactly how long he’s going to take to fire, as represented by that
number there. And a second might not seem like all that long a space of time... but
if you’re a practiced gamer, that second might as well be an eternity. Never having
stepped to this challenge before, I found my average reaction time to be well under
a third of a second, topping out at a quarter of a second.
In a rare move for an NES launch title like this, the command to fire is actually shouted
at you, using digitized voice. And digitized voice wasn’t all that great on the NES,
especially if you remember Bases Loaded or... eeh... Ghostbusters. But if you’re dueling
with some stereotypical cowboy-type, you don’t want a buzzer, or a beep, or a tone to tell
you when to fire. You want to see the glimmer of malice in the other guy’s eyes, and you
want a voice to say, “FIRE.” And in that respect, Wild Gunman shines. It says FIRE.
The second of the NES-standard three game modes pits you against two opponents, each
with their own draw time. Usually, it’s just a matter of “Pop the faster guy first”
but don’t get too complacent; one of those guys might not actually fire, and it’s not
sporting to shoot unprovoked, now is it? We’ve got LAWS in this state for a reason. Though
it’s not like aiming is that difficult, either; all you need is to hit the correct
side of the screen (or, in the case of the single-shooter theory, anywhere on the screen
at all).
But aim comes back into play with the Gang mode, which rounds out the options by giving
you a saloon full of hostiles, a set number of bullets, and the imperative to stay alive.
And even in this mode, a kind of prioritization applies; the faster outlaws are worth more
points. But this mode is much more of a shooting gallery, as there’s no indicated time to
fire. You just stop foes before they get to fillin’ ya full of lead. If you do get winged,
you have to start that entire wave over again, too, so it behooves you to be fast with your
shots and careful with your aim. And if anyone ever asks you where you learned to shoot like
that, you just tell ‘em: “7-11.”