Buy Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood

Fresh off of the first Call of Juarez, I wanted to delve into the prequel's story of McCall brothers. However, what I encountered was a buggy and unplayable game. The game started up fine, but it either shows a black screen or incomplete graphics when in the game.

Take a look at these screenshots:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=737328783

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=737328879

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=737330767

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=737331007

I would like to know if there are any fixes for this? Most fixes I searched for don't seem to work.

This was quite an enjoyable little game. I don't really take to linear shooters much, but this one tickled my fancy and did its job very well. Simply put, this is a good western game. Few enough of those around!

This is often found on sale with one or more of the others in the franchise- pick them up when this happens. The first one is okay, this one, the second, is pretty good, the third I have heard is garbage and the fourth is an entertaining blast of color. This one is my favorite, because I enjoyed the story.

Awsom game, 1 of the best stories i have meet in a game.

This game is how sequels should be - it takes everything that was good about the first game and improves it, builds on the old characters, and smooths out the rough edges of the original. The two brothers play differently enough to give an incentive to play through it twice, so there's plenty of value to it. The only reason I ever had to not recommend it before was because the field of view was extremely low (46 degrees) with no way to fix it, but thankfully a mod has finally fixed that recently, allowing you to go up to 75 (which is still pretty low, but a lot more manageable). http://www.moddb.com/mods/call-of-juarez-bound-in-blood-realism-mod I don't recommend using the date-changing part of the mod (the read-me and description explains how to only apply the gameplay changes), but everything else about the mod is great. With this mod, I can finally completely recommend this game.

Also, on another note, if you have problems with the voices sounding like they were recorded in a bad microphone, you may need to lower the audio quality of your sound device in Windows. It probably won't be a problem for most people, but if you have a high quality sound system and use 24-bit audio, you may need to switch to 16-bit, 44100 Hz for this game.

Call of Juarez®: Bound in Blood is the second game in the series and story-wise it's a prequel to the first game. It is a story of a younger Ray McCall and his brothers Thomas and William.
Like its predecessor, the game is a first-person shooter with the Western setting. And like the first Call of Juarez it has a captivating story, a little "dark" atmosphere, two playable characters with two different playstyles (and this time - the ability to freely choose your character for a given episode, except for the first two "tutorial" episodes and the one near the endgame) and lots of gun-blazing action.
What I am going to say is that this game is in my opinion the best Call of Juarez game and one of the best western and FPS games I've ever played. Almost all the flaws from the first game are gone here, Bound in blood runs smoothly, has beautiful graphics, great atmosphere and soundtrack, cool plot that will keep you in tension for the whole game, epic finale that will probably make you shed a small manly tear, and two badass characters to play.
About the characters: Ray McCall plays almost the same as he did in the first game being able to dual-wield pistols and throw dynamites, although personality-wise here he is not a preacher and acts like a total badass. His brother Thomas is a little similar to Billy Candle - he is the agile guy of this game, he can do some lasso swinging, he can use throwing knives for stealthy kills (although you won't need to be stealthy in this game as much as it was needed in the first) and he can use a bow with arrows. There are still not that many weapons in the game, but there is definitely more, than it was in the first CoJ, and you can buy upgraded versions of the same weapon.
In the end, there is really nothing serious I can point out as bad things, I was completely satisfied with the game. If you liked the first CoJ, this is a must. If you like Western theme this is a must. If you want a cool story and a decent FPS game this is a must.
VERDICT: 9/10

+ Interesting/Captivating Story (even though a little cliched)
+ Very satisfactory shooting
+ Unique cover mechanics
+ High replay value as you can play each chapter with any one of the brothers (except the first 2, which are like an intro/tutorial to their abilities)
+ Nice environment, decent visuals.
+ Good controller support, with decent aim-assist. (I played with a KB/M though)

- Lots and lots of shooting, sometimes gets tedious
- AI is kinda wierd, they will keep throwing dynamite even if you run 1000 miles away from them.
- Not many guns/customization available
- Maybe the Option to SWITCH brothers at WILL would have made the game even more fun to play

Verdict: MUST BUY. The game easily justifies the 10$ retail price, I got it for 6$ in sale and was a steal at this price.

Do You Recommend this game?: HELL YES

New Hats, Old Tricks:

The original Call of Juarez, though ambitious and great, was a bit unpolished. Bound in Blood serves as a prequel to the original's story, and it manages to polish some mechanics from the original game, but it does not try to reach as far as it's predecessor.

Bound in Blood tells the story of the McCall brothers and it covers some familiar ground. Ray still charges in headfirst with guns blazing, while his brother Thomas acts as Billy Candle's surrogate, taking up the stealth and whip mechanics with a focus on long range weaponry (including the bow).

Overall the game feels very familiar, but with some slight gameplay changes. You can now (for most missions) choose which character to play prior to starting to the mission. This choice will slightly alter how you play a level (distraction vs. stealth), and it will also drastically change how you play. The mechanics of the two characters also feel a bit more fleshed out ( the slow down for Thomas is not limited to the bow, and Ray has more than a bible and breastplate to set him apart). One neat addition is that the brothers are usually working together and the AI is fairly competent. Though their one-liners outstay their welcome before the credits role, its neat to hear the brothers call out to each other and actually have them help, rather than the mostly isolated experience from the first game.

A few other slight changes include equipment. You will find and be rewarded with money that you can use to buy more ammo and better guns. You can also make extra money during a few little open world sequences where you can hunt down bounty. I never found myself too concerned with money, though I would run out of ammo every now and then, but I was always happy to get a better weapon. Overall though, the money is more of an optional bit of fun rather than a necessity.

The story, much like the first one, is not the absolute best narrative, but it serves its purpose well. Some of the ties it makes to the first game (both in the levels and characters) are pretty interesting if you were a fan of the first game. The lore and charm that the game is steeped in shines clearly in this entry, and it feels familiar in a good way.

Bound in Blood makes great use of its Old West setting to tell a story of sibling rivalry through solid FPS mechanics. Fans and strangers alike should give this entry a try.

Bound in Blood is a much smaller game than Red Dead Redemption, but it is still one of the best wild west themed shooters.

The Good:
-Decent story with good voice acting.
-The gameplay mechanics are solid, and not too repetitive.
-Graphics: While many things look average, some of the environments are truly beautiful (at times on par with Crysis 1).
-This game does not shy away from christian themes, which fit well with the story. And it does so without seeming unpleasantly pro or anti christian.
-A good manual save system (no annoying checkpoint reloads).
-No Ubisoft Uplay account required!

The Bad (mostly minor):
-A very low Field-of-View (not fixable) due to being optimized for console TV screens.
-The first level (tutorial) has clumsy scripting and mediocre graphics, but it gets better with later levels.
-Bodies disappear the moment you look away, due to silly Xbox360/PS3 RAM limits.
-AI is mediocre (not a big problem since most things are scripted)
-screen vibration effects severely overdone during scripted explosions.
-Enemies move like ants (no movement inertia), making aiming a pain sometimes.

The Ugly:
-No COOP mode! With the two protagonists working together, this game would have been perfect for co-op, and yet there is no co-op mode! What a missed opportunity!

Overall, I can easily recommend this game, especially in a sale.

For a game dated back to 2009, COJ:BIB shows that the developers, Techland, have learned some lessons from their previous COJ games and concentrate on shooting people rather than playing Indiana Jones or Tarzan, and they certainly built up a bunch of characters that have a bit more dimension than typical western shooter fare, and it is only surpassed by the latest COJ: Gunslinger.

BIB has the McCall brothers, with family in Georgia, fighting as a part of the Confederacy trying to hold back the Yankee army against General Sherman's raid. You'll spend most of the first part of the game shooting Yankee soldiers defending your homeland, so to speak, and later, fight your way home to save your brother and mother... against orders to withdraw, which makes both of the McCall brothers deserters. Without too much of a spoiler, by the time they arrived, mother's already dead, and the younger brother actually is a priest and will not fight. After fighting they way out of Georgia, McCalls drifted to Arkansas, enraged the local sheriff (by spoiling his daughter), who challenged them to a duel, got killed, and the entire town started to hunt them forcing them to run for Mexico, where the senior McCall, Ray, told them about the alleged treasure of Juarez, and how they can claim it and use it to rebuilt their family.

The two brothers have different specialties. Ray, the older and stronger brother, is a close quarters combat guy with dual revolvers and dynamite. He can use concentration (COJ's "bullet time") to designate targets for rapid salvos killing a whole slew of targets at a time. Thomas "Tom", the middle brother, prefers a ranged and stealth attack. He is deadly with a rifle, he can throw knives for silent kills, and he can use a lasso to raise himself to a better elevation for better sniper kills. He can also use a bow later in the game. He also has a concentration mode but he can only engage up to 6 targets in a "quick draw".

At the beginning the scripted missions are one following another, and sometimes you can choose which brother to play in the mission, with slightly different branches and levels, as it's two different POVs of the same game. Later, when the game opens up, you can roam the land and take on side missions for extra cash, treasure, and so on, and encounter traders with better weapons available for sale. There are even random encounters.

There are quick drawn duels in the game where you need to keep the guy in view and keep your hand near the pistol, and use the mouse to "draw" the pistol and shoot. This mechanic was vastly improved in Gunslinger though.

The game, being old runs fine on a 3 year old gaming laptop even at higher resolutions. While the tasks are a bit monotonous (shoot people) it's what makes Western a Western, right?

I personally prefer Gunslinger. Skip the Cartel, IMHO. Play this and Gunslinger should be enough COJ.

Want an engrossing single player experience?
Want cool guns?
Want it cheap?

Here you go.