Collection essentials #285: Wild Guns (SNES)

Here we have a terrific arcade-style game (never actually released in arcades!) released by Natsume (“Not-Sue-May”), whose work has been featured in this series already with games such as Pocky & Rocky and Shatterhand. This action-packed game takes the idea of a gallery shooter that one might play with a gun and changes it up, mainly by having players control not just where bullets go, but also a character visible on the screen rather than having action take place from first-person view. For this reason, Wild Guns is played with a controller and not a light gun.

Controlling both a crosshair and a character at the same time sounds like it could be a nightmare, but they executed it so well that it’s really not a problem. If you want to move the crosshair but not the character, you have to simply hold down the fire button (as opposed to tapping it repeatedly) and your character will stand in place while you fire wherever you please. While in this state, you can quickly do an evasive drive left or right by simply pressing a directional button. And an exclamation point will appear over your character’s head to indicate a bullet is coming your way so you won’t be so easily surprised. It works really well. You can also avoid being hit by bullets by shooting at them, as your bullets will cancel out those of the enemy. It’s riskier to avoid damage this way, but there is a payoff because canceling enemy bullets builds up a meter that gives you a temporary super gun once full. There are plenty of other fun gameplay elements, such as finding guns that are stronger than the default gun but have limited ammo, a stock of bombs that fill the screen for those desperate situations, a lasso you can throw to immobilize enemies, the ability to throw back dynamite that the enemy tosses your way, and a melee attack for enemies that try to get up close and personal.

This game’s got style too. It uses a bit of a steampunk theme, with most of the game resembling the old Wild West, but with many cool robotic enemies. And the soundtrack is amazing, with high-tempo beats that get you hyped for the action. 

The biggest issue with Wild Guns, I suppose, is that there isn’t a whole lot of it, though that’s not too surprising for a game of its age and type. There are only a handful of levels, and if you’re skilled you can see all that there is to see in a fairly short time. But the game is very replayable, and I have always had fun every time I go back to revisit it. There are at least three difficulty levels, so you’ll likely want to play multiple times and work your way up to hard mode. And if you hang out with friends who enjoy co-op video games, it always makes for a fantastic choice.

I got my copy of Wild Guns back in 2012. I had been aware of it for a while before that, and my late friend Brian Castleberry had covered it on his YouTube show “Substance TV”. I got super lucky and got a great deal with it on Craigslist. Someone was selling a few SNES games and featured a complete copy of Secret of Mana as the highlight, but Wild Guns was the game in there that I really wanted the most. And I have always loved the game ever since then.

There was a remake of Wild Guns several years back that I will cover here eventually. I’ll save the details until then, but in short, while it’s a cool remake worth checking out, the original version is the way to go. If you have a Nintendo Switch Online subscription, you can go play the original version right now for free, so go check it out, especially if you have a buddy to play with. (And, heck, me and you could play it online together. Why don’t we??)