14 DAY TRIAL // 
What if we would take Desperados, keep the spaghetti western setting, but replace the larger than life heroes with an ordinary boy and his mom, the guns and beartraps with a slingshot and toy soldiers, and throw in the mix next to the bad guys that need to be outsmarted, also some other kids to inspire? We get El Hijo A Wild West Tale, a real-time stealth game with an endearing story, suitable for younger audiences as well.
El Hijo A Wild West Tale makes it clear from the very first minutes of gameplay that it focuses on stealth and misdirection, rather than violence or brute force. This is a natural effect of the two protagonists being a seven-year-old kid and his mom, and not some desperados armed to the teeth. This is a tale of hope and youthful inspiration, rather than the gory recollection of a lone cowboy’s bloody vendetta. The result is quite interesting: a pacifist gameplay focusing on using your puzzle-solving skills in a western world reminiscent of those dreamt up by Sergio Leone, settings heavily relying on violence.
It all starts with some tragic scenes presenting the family ranch being burned down, the mom and her son being forced to run for their lives. The desperate mother leaves his only son in the care of some not very kid-friendly monks, hoping that he will be safe in the monastery carved in a mountain. But since we know that feelings and resolve are often stronger than logic, our pint-sized hero decides to escape and find his mother at any cost. To accomplish this apparently impossible task, our protagonist must dodge, evade and distract the vigilant monks to get back to the outside world, having no clue about what awaits him in the world.
Achieving the great escape, you can use some rocks and toys to distract the guards, but you cannot pacify them for good. Not even using fireworks, the most dangerous contraption from your arsenal. These will dazzle your “jailers” for a while, but you will still have to rely on agility and wits and apply careful tactics to avoid detection. El Hijo emphasizes pacifism even on the levels where you control the mother, whose most “lethal” weapon is a slingshot. You have to accept that you are outnumbered and outpowered, and your only chance for success is to get by unnoticed.
El Hijo is completely innocent and family-friendly. From the basic concept, through the gameplay and ending with the cartoonish graphics, this is a tale of innocence, about a son searching for his mom. He is not interested in revenge, rather in inspiring the world around him. This is best expressed through the kids you can encounter in the monastery. Usually burdened with chores, our hero can make their way cheering them up, teaching them to juggle, or by showing how to fly paper airplanes. The conditions will become direr in the outside world, the game briefly touching the topic of forced child labor.
Your main objective during the 29 levels is to get from the beginning to the end, without getting caught, no matter if you tiptoe in the monastery, if you hide in a bandit camp or if you rush through a mine riding a minecart. The stealth elements are combined with challenges that test your puzzle-solving ability. To avoid the ever-vigilant gaze of the opponents, you can stick to the shadows or you can distract them. But, to come up with the best plan you will heavily rely on a small dove that maps your close environment and reveals the viewing cones of the surrounding opponents.
At first, it will be enough to rely purely on timing and an endless supply of pebbles, and a bit of luck, but as you progress through the game you will need to take into account the behavioral patterns of the monks and bandits and rely on more advanced items such as toy soldiers. You can carry a limited number of items with you, that can be replenished by opening the chests scattered in the levels. Having different tools at your disposal usually suggests several ways in which you can solve a particular level. Unfortunately, this is not the case in El Hijo: most of the levels try to force you to follow a certain path imagined by the developers, and stick to a certain course of action and timing, leaving very little to no room for improvisation.
Despite some limited interactions with your surroundings, you cannot actually impact the game world. In many instances, it feels that the puzzle elements have been paid much closer attention to by the developers, than the stealth mechanisms. You have various actions to help you, El Hijo being able to hide in oversized pots or under sombreros, but there the players are not getting enough freedom to use these diversions at their full potential. Things are made worse by the highly inconsequent level of difficulty: some sections are like a walk in the park, while others will sweat even the most experienced players, with a random escalation instead of a gradual one. It is not a good fit for a title that wants to be family-friendly.
Artistically El Hijo is very consequent in painting a setting that exudes spaghetti western in each of its elements: visual style, locations, sounds, and music. Graphics-wise it is obviously an indie title and it shows: from a distance the game looks colorful and enticing, but the close-up reveals many of the details lacking. There are also some weird collision issues, that make it quite hard to plot a path for toy soldiers near corners. The same goes for the sound part, where the music is spot on and matches perfectly the atmosphere, but the voice acting that is reduced to some basic mumbling feels like a step back.
The Good
- Spaghetti western atmosphere
- Cute story and characters
- Plenty of challenge
The Bad
- More linear than it should be
- Inconsistent difficulty level
- Mumbling as voice acting
Conclusion
Although it targets the whole family, it can be recommended only for those who are looking for the challenge due to the steep difficulty level. Still, El Hijo A Wild West Tale radiates candor and innocence, two qualities that recommend it to everyone.
