For those of us who enjoyed the recent Wild Wild West movie with Kevin Kline and Will Smith, the PC game The Steel Assassin from Southpeak Interactive is probably the only sequel we will ever see.
The game is a huge point and click adventure that expands upon the universe of the film (not the original TV series) as you take it in turns to play Gordon and West on four missions each and the grand finale where you alternate between the two protagonists. The story is fairly complex but boils down to the fact that Gordon and West have to stop an assassination attempt on President Grant at the theatre where Lincoln was shot. Gordon proceeds from one end of the puzzle, sneaking around, disguising himself and using his gadgets to solve various puzzles and discover information, whilst West takes the more direct approach, riding around on his horse and shooting bad guys (but also solving problems "Arte - style").
The animation and look of the characters are very good, particularly in the movies intercut with the action, and the two voice artists who play West and Gordon (Andre Ware and Jim Ward respectively) are excellent sound - a - likes for Will Smith and Kevin Kline .
The detail of the environments that the adventures take place in and the wealth of minutiae that expands on the universe of the movie make this a great game above the normal "pick items up and use them creatively" games.
But�this is not a game critique as such. Rather, here I am exploring the different environments seen within the film and showing how they expand on the Wild Wild West movie.
I cannot go further without acknowledging the help of the walkthrough I found on the internet by "Mohammad (cool guy) Abdelgafour" that saved me a lot of headaches in completing the game!
The whole game, and each mission, begins on the Presidential train, The Wanderer which both Secret Service Agents use as their base. You can find a complete guide to the train here.
As Jim West you can also access the Government Shooting Range where you can test your guns to see which you prefer and what they do. There are also a couple of convenient chickens that you shouldn't shoot but�they're just standing there�the clucking makes it hard to concentrate anyway so it's a good excuse to blast them!
A daytime and nocturnal mission in the same location. Jim West has to explore in and around Street's Tavern, on the trail of Booth, the assassin of Lincoln who visited here before the fateful shooting. There are some puzzles to be solved, a maid to befriend (not seduce, thank goodness it's a 'G' rated game!), a secret lair to discover and lots of bad guys to kill and search in the surrounding grounds.
We don't see much of Surrattsville except for a little of the main street and the surrounding buildings. The Tavern is the large red building.
Unfortunately you can't explore the whole tavern on either mission: just the reception, dining room and hallway leading to the cellar.
There's a wonderful cork puller that you have to fix on the counter.
Pretty dingy down here, but it does access the Bull's secret room and the surrounding buildings. You know that the people who run the tavern must be bad guys because poor sweet Misty the maid lives (and dies) here.
This is reached through the wardrobe in the cellar. Loads of details on the walls you can't access. Darn!
These shots really show the beauty of the backgrounds in The Steel Assassin. Here you can see a range of outbuildings and a windmill on the ground behind the tavern and across the street.
Here West picks up more clues about Booth and gets to do some serious damage to the Bull's weaponry. The only buildings we see on this mission are the explosives building, an abandoned army post and a barn.
You get to ride through a lot of beautiful countryside on this mission. You have to kill baddies, dodge the Bull's cannons and pick up some dynamite but you can still stop to smell the roses.
It's falling apart but there's lots of fun details in here.
Just one level, but a great tractor in the corner that you get to fix and ride.
The secret headquarters of The Bull. An almost - abandoned town that's due to be blown up mere minutes after West arrives. He has to solve a devious chess puzzle to gain access to the town, is knocked out and imprisoned. You have to help him to break out of jail, avoid the Bull's henchman, gather evidence, survive entombment and get out of town before it's blown up!
Right from the start you can see Broken Hopes is a spooky town. You enter through the neck of the narrow pass that the town is built into, but to gain entrance you have to solve a devious chess puzzle. One wrong move and you get zapped by the lightning towers or one of the bull shaped knights on the board�
Broken Hope is perfect as a hideout for scum and villainy. Protected on three sides by high cliffs, the only entrance is via the chess puzzle. There are a lot of buildings here, many of which you can enter.
Starting at the 'bottom' of the town, through the pass is an old abandoned church and cemetery (which houses the entrance to a secret laboratory in the tomb). Next to this is the City Hospital and Undertakings building, which you can enter.
Next to the Undertakings is the Carriage House, then the Hotel. Opposite the Hotel is the Saloon.
Next to the Saloon is the Saddle shop, and opposite this is the Jailhouse, and next to the Jailhouse, Dusty's House. Dusty is one of the Bull's henchmen who is sleeping. After you break out of jail you get to sneak into his house and steal some items.
After the Saddle shop is an unidentified building, and then the Warehouse, the most northerly building in the town. Beyond this is an old abandoned mine.
By far the most complex location in the town is the secret laboratory, situated below the tomb in the cemetery in the south of Broken Hope. After descending a secret staircase and then climbing up into the mountain you get to explore an East and a West chamber.
This is the larger of the two chambers and contains a huge mock up of Ford's theatre, presumably so the bad guys can hone their assassination skills and do some dry runs of their master plan to kill President Grant. The chamber is guarded by a sinister automaton that must be disabled.
This smaller chamber contains a huge array of complex machinery, guarded again by a murderous automaton, this time a facsimile of Grant that splits open and fired rockets. Once disabled, it is possible to examine a detailed blueprint of the automaton system, and then to escape from the laboratory and the town by abseiling down the cliff face behind the table.
On to Part 2 - Artemus Gordon's Missions
This essay copyright 2001 Sarah O'Donoghue. All images taken from 'The Steel Assassin' PC game by Southpeak Interactive. 'Wild Wild West' belongs to Warner Bros. This essay is for education and entertainment purposes only and no profit is made from it so please don't sue me! For full disclaimers please see The Ticket Office.
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