Jesse Lentier is a stubbly, action man who makes every situation black and white. He is the type of man who is constantly reminded that he is not suited for a pencil-pushing desk job, as if you would not know by looking at him that he has trouble holding a pencil without snapping it in half. In other words, he lacks sophistication and imagination, but he is solid, focused, and capable of epic violence. The expression applies equally well to Evil West.

In late 19th century America, Jesse is a top agent for the family business, Rentier Laboratories. His enemies hate the sun, so a midday gunfight is off the table, and Jesse goes on an expedition to track down the bloodsuckers and smash them to pieces, along with his pet werewolves and other abominations they have manufactured. As explained in cutscenes interspersed between the game's 16 missions, beating the undead is always the primary concern.

Indeed, "Evil West" adopts a "get on with it" approach throughout. The main paths connecting the game's combat arenas are marked by glowing silver chains that provide direction while allowing for light exploration. Some levels have open sections with branches and loops, and sometimes you have to look for levers, push mine carts, or obliterate the landscape with your rifle before proceeding, but there is little that could be called a puzzle. In some ways, "Evil West" is blessed because it is less bloated than, say, "God of War," but on the other hand, it seems to lack ambition. [This conservatism also affects Flying Wild Hog's westerns, which are strangely colorless, not to mention old-fashioned, except for a few striking landscapes. For example, the saloon that serves as a front for the Institute's base is filled with stock-image (white) cowboys and courtesans, and "Indians" appear only in passing, with only a few references to their mystical legends. Jesse's distaste for intellectual expertise, coupled with his habit of saying things like "Welcome to America" when vanquishing enemies, and the characters of government officials who symbolize the corruption of the nation, give the film a somewhat regressive political tinge. Also, the dialogue does nothing to add nuance; the characters growl in sentences laced with tiresome invective, an act of clumsy homage that aims to evoke the atmosphere of the macho action movies of the 1980s.

Fortunately, "Evil West" is more comfortable on the battlefield. Its monsters are monstrous, and Jesse has a wealth of tricks up his sleeve. Normal blows can stop even the largest monsters in their tracks, and a charged uppercut will launch smaller monsters into the air. At the same time, though, Jesse is also a gunslinger, and in this game, he successfully moves between gunfight and melee, often in the same encounter. Some enemies' weaknesses are revealed only when they attack you, and if you are tactful, you can finish them off before they make their move. [But there is a limit to just punching and shooting, and Jesse has about as many weapons as a marine through the expedition. He can electrocute his enemies with electric shocks charged on his gauntlets and magnetically attract them and vice versa, allowing him to draw one out of the undead horde and hit the rest before they arrive. Soon you have a shotgun, the first in a series of weapons and devices that work on a cooldown timer and help with crowd control. Eventually, there are so many options that it is difficult to remember them all while continuing to dodge and parry.

Nevertheless, "Evil West" will encourage you to use every means possible to survive, so its complexity should come naturally. Vampires and their friends (some of them imposing in size) rush at you from all directions, so you must keep moving, stun them with electric currents, and maintain an itchy trigger finger. Then, as more powerful creatures emerge and the battle grows in scale, they will engage in a one-on-one battle, an accelerated arms race until one side runs out of strength. When the fight is almost out of strength at the end of the battle, you can't help but smile, but the last resort, the supercharged finisher, is reserved for electrocuting the last stubborn vamps.

Evil West's offensive prowess can be surprising and frustrating due to their sheer numbers. In general, it is easy to catch the off-screen enemies as they swoop in behind you, but there are moments when you are subjected to an unreasonable concentration of assaults, or when there are too many obstacles in your way to target a weak spot. Also, while the performance is not as shoddy as it could be, explosions and particle effects can cause sporadic frame rate loss, and on rare occasions, glitches can cause Jesse to dunk into the floor or monsters to remain suspended in mid-air.

But aside from these minor glitches, for the majority of the game, Evil West's combat remains robust and painfully enjoyable, at times bordering on brilliant. It is only in the final third that it begins to wane, as the vampires run out of new creatures to throw at you and instead endlessly regurgitate familiar ugly face combinations. As the final showdown approaches, you may find yourself wishing it would end sooner. At least Jesse will have learned a thing or two by then. Perhaps if there is a sequel, he will combine his mastery of vampire hunting with his desire for a richer, more sophisticated world.