The best in the West – the Wild West

These games all take place in an open-world setting with gunfights, hunting, dirt, and TNT – they are the Wild Wild West games of the modern gaming era.

You better have your wits about you playing these titles, there is no such thing as a second chance in the old West.

Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood – PS3, PC, Xbox 360

Metacritic: 78

There are a several titles that fall under the Jaurez series – some are great and some not so great. Bound in Blood was my favourite.

Released in 2009 and developed by Techland, Bound in Blood featured two playable characters, bounties, stand-offs, and everything that you loved about being a cowboy.

Bound in Blood was the Western of its day, and its showdown mechanic proved that every shot really does matter. The game impressed critics and score highly all round.

GUN – PS2, PC, Xbox, Xbox 360, GameCube, PSP

Metacritic – 76

Gun was the open-world western of the PS2. Set in the 1800s, you play as Colton White, a gun-slinger seeking revenge while dealing with the trials of living in the Wild West.

Bandit attacks, robberies, hunting animals, and cattle herding are all staples in the game, and it featured the ability to switch between third-person and first-person views – which was revolutionary at the time.

The melee combat was another great addition, with the ability to use bows, knives, sabres, and tomahawks, to fell your enemies very useful.

Red Dead Redemption – PS3, Xbox 360

Metacritic – 95

Words cannot describe Red Dead Redemption’s amazing gameplay, strong story, and tragic ending.

You need to explore the Wild West in all its glory, hunting, gathering, searching for bandits, and causing a Gunfight every now and then in this genre defining game.

One of the stand-out features was the cover system, which went hand-in-hand with the Dead Eye mechanic, allowing you to slow down time, target a few enemies, and then blast them away.

Couple this with the ability to throw your horse off a cliff it didn’t want to jump off and, later in the game, the inclusion of zombies, and you have a title worth of all the 10/10 scores it received.