Call of Juarez: The Cartel

It's depressing to think that Techland took a popular franchise, came up with some brilliant ideas for a new entry, and then botched the execution-but that's exactly what happened.

Perhaps with more development time, The Cartel would have been a more compelling experience but, with a game engine that's showing its age, a confused new identity and a fair few technical issues, it falls sadly short of most FPS fans' high expectations.

This might be a horrible back-handed comment on The Cartel, but playing it sparked me to go back and play some Bound in Blood, which has a far better single-player experience and I'd rather ride a horse in first-person than drive an SUV in first-person.

Quotation forthcoming.

Some distinguishing features give this shooter a touch of class, but bugs and execution flaws cast a long shadow over Call of Juarez: The Cartel.

Call of Juarez: The Cartel, isn't a very good game when you get to the basics. Its low production values and simple gameplay drag the experience down, while an erratic pace to the storyline makes it worse.

Compared to the previous Call of Juarez titles, The Cartel is a colossal disappointment.

The two previous Call of Juarez games were good games, but this third game is a bit of a disaster on different aspects. The audio will stop sometimes, visually it's looking pretty bad, the game is full of bugs and stupid mistakes. This game needed just one more year of development time to be a lot better. A shame.

The Cartel is a mediocre game. Something disappointing because we know the Call of Juarez saga, with much better games and far superior action.

What I played this last week was one of the least enjoyable video game experiences I've ever had, and I would be extremely surprised if there were to be a fourth game in this franchise. Not only is the game full of miserable characters, it's also lacking the polish consumers should expect of a finished game.

Chasing a Mexican drug cartel through the streets of Los Angeles is boring at best, with outdated graphics and gameplay that feel a generation old. [Oct 2011, p.81]

A rental at best, but better we just sweep The Cartel under a sombrero and forget about it.

Far from polished enough. We miss the Old West.

Call of Juarez: The Cartel moves into dangerous territory by dropping the Western-setting. It loses that special something and what's left is nothing more than a unimpressive modern shooting gallery. The story mode, however, though filled with clichés, is high on content and has some great ideas. Unfortunately, it won't pull you through its rough bits.

I was interested in this next step for the Call of Juarez series, and I really think it could have worked; but good ideas can only do so much, solid execution must also prevail, and that just didn't happen with The Cartel.

The style, attitude, and ideas are all good, and the graphics aren't too bad. But the game is way too slow for a shooter, the faceless enemies never miss a shot, the AI is terrible, collision detectiion is iffy, and the extra features designed to let the game shine fall flat.

It's shallower than the shallow end of a kiddie pool during a drought, and dammit, it's such a disappointment, because the series has delivered compelling storylines and settings, if nothing else, up to this point.