A Fistful of Gun

The character selection screen with the two possible control schemes for Abel visible

A Fistful of Gun is a top-down shooter game with a Western setting.[1] It features eleven unlockable player characters, each with a unique weapon and custom control scheme for up to two of three input devices: mouse, keyboard, and gamepad.[2][3] The type of weapon affects each character's attributes, such as their shooting and movement speeds.[4]

The single-player story mode follows a plot in which Clayton Boon, an evil railroad tycoon, has made a deal with the Devil and must be eliminated within twelve days.[5] The mode consists of a randomised sequence of arena battles, where the player character fights waves of enemies in a destructible environment. In addition to clearing each arena of enemies, the player can sometimes select a level objective, such as pushing a cart to its destination, engaging in a duel, assassinating a particular foe, or rescuing people from a stampede.[4] The player can increase their score by collecting gold dropped by enemies when defeated.[3][5]

When in a neutral zone, such as around banks, the player is not attacked. If they still start a fight, they obtain a wanted level and must defeat the sheriff or receive a handicap for the next fight. Collectable power-ups have positive effects, such as whisky slowing down the game and increasing the damage the player inflicts on enemies. Mountable horses increase the player's movement speed and shield them from one hit by an enemy.[4][5]

In the arcade mode, up to nine players (locally or via online multiplayer) engage cooperatively in fights with all player characters available.[4][5] Following each fight, the players are rewarded with ability bonuses (such as explosive bullets, increased movement speed, and more accurate shots) for the next battle. In the online versus mode, players fight against each other.[4]

A Fistful of Gun was developed by Australian developer Paul Hart (formerly Greasley) under the moniker FarmerGnome.[6][7] After the closure of many prominent game studios in his native Brisbane, he had moved to Wellington, New Zealand, in 2009. Hart chose "that cheesy Clint Eastwood gunslinger Spaghetti Western vibe where everybody has a moustache, everybody is grizzled" as the game's theme.[6] Hart announced the game as Already Dead in September 2012 via TIGSource's forums, later changing it to A Fistful of Gun while looking for name suggestions.[8] He released the game's first version as freeware in December 2012,[8][9] distributing it via his website and later through Game Jolt.[10][11] This version featured gameplay for up to three players on the same personal computer, each using a different input device.[12][13][14] Alongside the initial release, Hart had posted a request for a composer and sound effects designer, leading Surasshu to join the project later in December 2012.[15][16] Hart continued developing the game and intended to release future versions through his site's mailing list.[12]

When a Twitter user pointed publisher Devolver Digital to a video about the game, Hart jokingly suggested that they collaborate on releasing the game despite intending to complete it by himself. However, he and the company began discussing the idea and eventually agreed to a publishing deal.[6] Devolver Digital announced its involvement in August 2014, scheduling the game's release for early 2015.[7][17] The new version, subtitled "For a Few Gun More", was expanded to feature eleven playable characters and up to nine players in offline or online multiplayer.[9][17] The 2012 alpha version remained available for free.[7][9] A Fistful of Gun was exhibited at the Indie Megabooth of the 2014 PAX Prime event and at 2015's PAX East.[18][19]

In August 2015, Devolver Digital announced the release date for A Fistful of Gun as 24 September 2015.[10] Later that month, the company released a trailer introducing the player characters, followed by a launch trailer in September.[19][20] A Fistful of Gun was released via Steam, GOG.com, and the Humble Store.[21] The game's servers suffered from outages during the weekend after the launch.[2][4] A Halloween update, Undeadorado, was released on 29 October 2015.[22] Surasshu released A Fistful of Gun's soundtrack, featuring one track with vocals by Eldad and lyrics by Eldad and Lee Williams, via Bandcamp on 29 April 2016.[23]

A Fistful of Gun received "mixed or average reviews", according to the review aggregator website Metacritic, which calculated a weighted average rating of 60/100 based on ten critic reviews.[24] Stephen Turner of Destructoid found that the game's "only major errors lie in its repetitive and muddied action, all blasted through an ADD pacing", leading to a lack of replay value.[4] Vandal's Ramón Nafria praised the game for challenging the player without resorting to bullet hell gameplay.[5] Both were fond of the art style, calling it "charming" and "very pleasant", respectively, but criticised the obscurity of important elements like characters and reticles during busy combat scenes.[4][5] Nafria further described the game's sound as apt for the Western theme.[5] Kotaku Australia's Mike Fahey believed the multiplayer modes to be the game's highlight, but noted that he was unable to play them because of sparsely populated lobbies.[2] Nafria and Turner similarly cited poor online play caused by too few players.[4][5]

• Official website at the Wayback Machine (archived 12 December 2022)