If you enjoyed Heroes (the first part), buy this. Bounties is an improved version and nothing major got worse.

If you are concerned about the bugs mentioned in the other reviews, they were fixed. The dev is active, so if anything is found later, it will be fixed too. I had my problems with Japanese IME but got around with it.

I have to tell that this doesn't conclude the saga, and there aren't many new soundtracks.


This game is one of "Mother's Children", or a game inspired by Earthbound / Mother, the legendary SNES RPG. Probably the most royal one to the parent as far as I know. If you loved the classic and wanted to revisit the feeling, like I did, you won't regret getting this.

For those who have no concern with nostalgia... I still recommend it. If you are not quite turned down by things already shown in the game description, I don't think anything in the game will. And the BGM is AWESOME. Just remember that this game is the sequel of Boot Hill Heroes, and the story will NOT conclude in this game.


This may sound shallow, but I have to say visual appeal on combat scene is quite lacking, if not repelling. Its background is smeared version of overworld map arts, and enemy sprites are low-res pics rather than proper pixel arts. This is baffling when overworlds arts are very well made.

I really feel the devs misplaced their effort. Every mob has their unique appearance... but, there has to be more obvious and important things to polish. Moreover, I don't think players needed character portraits to be added, especially when they clearly don't meet the level of the pixel counterparts. Same things can be said about the box art. It doesn't look as professional as this game really is. I'd throw just the title logo and probably add some pixel art.

This game took me 15 hours to complete the story. I haven't touched a single side quest yet and have yet to retrieve everyones best gear. That 15 hours of story was simply amazing. If you're a fan of the first one pick this one up. You won't be sorry. Time to get back in there and see how many more hours I can squeeze outta this badboy.

10/10 will play the story through again.

Disclaimer: I did receive an advance copy for Youtube coverage and assembling a guide for the game.

This is the sequel to 2014's Boot Hill Heroes, which is a wild-west themed JRPG with an old school art design reminiscent of Earthbound, and loads of charm. The first game itself was a very good Indie RPG in general with the one downfall of being rather short. This one remedies that problem and loads it up with even more content. Most of the downfalls of the first game have been addressed and the outcome is a stellar experience all around.

To explain, this does pick up where the first game ended, and you may be a little in the dark about the various characters if you are coming in fresh. This game does feature data carry over where you can import your items and levels, to encourage you to come in after playing the first game. To summarize what happened there, the Saints-Little Gang framed the Chepakwik Indian Tribe for destroying the town of Ashwood in an attempt to incite a war between the tribe and the settlers. Their exact motive was unknown, and the first game ended with you defeating one member of the Gang, and then hearing the story of how their leader was arrested 10 years prior to the start of the game. Your objective here is to round up the gang members who are up to no good and find evidence to clear the Chepakwik before a war breaks out.

So one of the big changes you get right out from the gate is the non-linear gameplay. Once you return to the hub town, you are free to go after any of the members of the gang, provided you can find them. This will affect your equipment, what side quests you can take, what recipes you can learn, and other sorts of minutia that are important to the world building experience. In doing so, you learn about past events related to the characters themselves and the world they live in, and also allowing you to see first hand what kind of chaos this gang has unleashed. Additionally, the way hats in the game has also changed. The first game featured them as a tool for learning moves for combat, but now they function more along the lines of a job system, sometimes teaching you new moves for the hat itself, giving you abilities to be used with other hats, and also exceeding the 4 move limit from the first game. Beyond just this, there are many new moves that open up different strategies for fighting your opponents, meaning that you don't necessary have to grind to win, provided you look at what hats are available and adjust your strategy for whatever obstacle is in your way.

As for graphics, everything has been touched up from the first game, with portraits being added for many of the important characters, allowing you to see the smaller details of their characters. The playable characters themselves both change on map as well in portrait as you change their hats around. Cities have been re-designed to be more stream-lined and everything is just better. You will re-visit some of the locations from the first game, but there are also many other places to go, many of them having something unique to set them apart from the other areas. Seeing as you're playing as a farmer, it is nice to actually be able to use your farm to generate materials for some of the new systems in the game.

In terms of gameplay, there is both good news and bad news. The first is that the battle system itself still carries over a lot of the weaknesses it possessed from the first game, with an all-or-nothing aspect where you either dodge a move in its entirety or you take the hit in its entirety. This is bad when the shot is going to kill you from full health, which is a threat periodically throughout the game. However, the good news is that there are new systems in place that can make your life a little easier. Should you go down, Doc Valentine can now treat your wounds, meaning you don't have to go to town and shell out a fortune. If you need money, Rosy can use the food you collect to make dishes to sell, or just to eat to obtain some buffs for a few fights. And finally, when it comes to combat, Moon Dancer can augment your equipment with numerous effects to inflict statuses, boost your damage, or help you hit evasive enemies. Additionally, with the new hats in the game come new abilities to help speed up battles by allowing you to break enemy stances, turn normal moves into AOE, or other effects. Most of the things from the first game are still intact, but everything is bigger. And should you find the game too easy or tough, you can change the difficulty at any time to better suit your experience.

Overall, I have been waiting for this game to come out since I finished the first one, and I am impressed with what I've found so far. It occupies a niche of its own, and I recommend it to anyone interested in wild west themed gaming environments or those just looking for a fun JRPG to sink some time into. It truly is a unique experience and I am looking forward to whatever Experimental Gamer puts out next.

In short, Boot Hill Bounties is a Western (as in "Wild West")-themed JRPG with a unique combat system that makes it ideal for local co-op, 20+ hours of playtime, and amazing music. It's a direct sequel to Boot Hill Heroes by the same developer, so I'd strongly recommend playing that first.

The Good:

* The music. Simply amazing (and guaranteed to get stuck in your head, but not to an ear worm extent)
* The combat system is a unique style, with each character slowly gaining energy over time, which they can spend on abilities (called "Vantages") once they have enough. It also includes a system of "Stances" which are persistent effects on the characters, for instance allowing them to dodge attacks, plus abilities which are designed to counter stances, giving battle a certain rock-paper-scissors strategy to it. Also, since each character gains and spends energy independently, it's easy to split up the duties in local co-op.
* Aside from following the story, there's plenty to do in the game - you can develop your own farm, participate in cooking contests, solve problems that citizens post in the newspaper, solve riddles made by clever schoolkids or the local master, or just talk to everyone and take in the local flavour. None of it is required to beat the game, so if you don't care for part of it you can skip it (though you might have to decrease the battle difficulty if you skip too much).
* There's plenty of playtime for the pricepoint, making it a great value for your money
* The story opens up shortly into the game, allowing you to pick which path you want to pursue next (and it appears the developer has done some sleight-of-hand behind the scenes to keep the difficulty appropriate whichever path you take, but I can't say for sure)

The Bad:

* There were a few moments in the game where it's a bit obtuse about what you need to do next, requiring a bit of "try everything possible in town" to get through
* The story ends right after you complete the final of the four paths in the game, which means it might not end on the most satisfying storybeat. My recommendation: Go to the Chepahkwik village last for the best ending.
* Although the story reaches a good ending point, it doesn't fully resolve everything. Hopefully a final part to the trilogy will be released, though that depends on how much interest there is. But every person that buys this increases the chance of that happening *nudgenudge*

The Ugly:

* Even after a couple bugfix patches, the game still has some lingering bugs in it. Most of these are minor annoyances (symbols improperly positioned within text boxes at a couple points, some objects your character will walk over instead of behind, etc.), but a few do impact gameplay (enemies that are asleep and have a stance active are immune to all vantages, the general store doesn't seem to restock properly every two days like it says it will, etc.)
* In my ~30 hours of gameplay, I ran into four crashes. One of these types of crashes might have been fixed with the most recent patch, but the other is apparently proving much more difficult for the developer to track down. At least with the autosave system, you won't lose much progress to a crash.

In summary: Even despite the occasional bugs and crashes, this is well worth playing. I do recommend playing the original Boot Hill Heroes first though, but this does provide a recap of the plot from that if you want to skip it.

I'm a bit late in reviewing this game, but I have to say that Boot Hill Bounties is a worthwhile little indie title to play. It's a continuation of the developer's first game Boot Hill Heroes, and I have to say that this game is a significant improvement over the original. The majority of my complaints from the original were alleviated and I was able to play through this just fine, besides a little hiccup here or there.

One important thing to note is that the developer is responsive even to this day about any potential issues with the game, so they're clearly devoted to their work. That's a rare sight nowadays.

Essentially, you're following bounties to hunt down the remaining members of the Saints-Little Gang in the Wild West. The game is split up into parallel sections that focus on the different bounties, and you can choose which ones to tackle. The maps are done in Earthbound-style, and while I had some issues in the first game with navigation, it seemed to be done better here in most places.

The art style is much better in this sequel, as is the music. Simply put, the developer had more practice and experience, and it turned out to be a better piece of work. Just comparing the trailers and screenshots between the two games will showcase this quickly, but I will confirm that this sequel maintains the better qualities throughout.

You wander around various towns and areas on foot or by horse, and you can fast travel using trains. You do some of the usual RPG aspects of finding missions, buying things from shops, crafting items or upgrades, fighting in turn-based combat, etc. There are newspaper articles to read up on, some of which will have recipes for cooking or crafting, and will also point to side missions or even hints when you look at them.

As far as the combat goes, each character has a time-gauge before they can act, and you can pre-load their actions. I had some issues with "Vantages" in the first game, which are essentially the game's version of specialized skills, but it seems more balanced and interestingly done here. You have a stamina bar as well, and different attacks or skills will use it up. Since you have to recover stamina at times, you need to plan out your attacks. That said, once the characters get a bit leveled up, you'll usually figure out what everyone is best at and you can get into a good cycle for most combat, then unlock stronger skills over time.

The pacing of the game is much better as well, stemming from the bounty-based setup, so I was much more interested in hunting these criminals down. There's much more interesting set-pieces as well, such as getting lost in a haunted, maze-like desert.

Overall, I'm glad that this game turned out better. It shows its improvements in just about every area. And I wish the developer luck in the future.

Following where Boot Hill Heroes leaves off, Boot Hill Bounties brings back the exceptional soundtrack and storytelling that makes this series one worth getting into. It introduces many new features like cooking and camping as well as several sidequests. I was reminded of the good old Bioware days with the character development and freedom to chose the route that the story unfolds on. I can tell that a lot of passion went into the development of this series and I'm dying to see what will happen in the next installment!

What can I say that I haven't already covered. This game is a role playing, nostalgia filled RPG and it's a western. All combined to give me one of the most satisfying games I've played this year. The developer aloud me an early code to play through the game, he was very responsive to any and all questions and concerns, and just was a pleasure to speak to and play his game. I have always wanted a western RPG that captured the sense of the west but in a RPG sense and this does it more so then any game prior. Funny dialog, good combat, tons of variation in locations and enemy types. Highly reccomended this game to RPG fans through and through.

At the time of me writing this review, I would not suggest this game. I'm a bit over 4 hours into the game, only to have deal with multiple bugs that have soft locked me.

Now, I got this game right when it came out due to being excited for the sequel to Boot Hill Heroes, and after sinking dozens of hours into that game, I was really happy to dive into Bounties. While I ended up getting soft locked in the first 30-ish minutes of the game, with another 30+ minutes to figure out something screwed up in the files and I had to verify them, I reported it on the forums but couldn't reproduce the bug.

My second time? I've gotten further in the game to the Mines, and shortly after fighting the first boss enemy there and picking up what I can only assume was a key item, the game soft locked when I moved over towards the elevator by the camp at the mines. I had to alt + tab out of the game to manually close it due to the game becoming softlocked.

Keep in mind that steam says I have 4.3 hours into the game. But easily an hour, or even longer of it, is due to me trying to deal with bugs that happened. I know that players are supposed to report bugs they come across, which I have, but when you keep getting ones that soft lock the game and prevent you from moving forward, it's hard to want to continue to play the game.

In the current state I would not recommend playing Boot Hill Bounties, due to it feeling like more testing was needed before going public for the game. I paid for the game the moment it came out, partally due to it being on sale the moment it came out due to being a new release, but I am second guessing myself at this point.

Maybe after this game has recieved numerous updates after others have played further into it and helped report bugs and the like I'll give it another chance, but at its current state I can not play a game that keeps giving me this many issues.

[Review copy was provided by the developer before release.]

Earthbound is a game with a legacy that has enriched ‘90s kids and inspired classics such as Undertale, LISA and Citizens of the Earth as well as Pony Island and OneShot. While seemingly unrelated, subversion, of gameplay and of storytelling, combined with deadpan comedy of modern tropes of RPGs has always made these titles special to make up for their simplicity. Along with different themes, tones and comedy, each interpretation never feels like a copy; instead, each game feels like a game based around what aspects resonated with each creator who had played Earthbound.

Boot Hill Bounties is another Earthbound-inspired title that challenges what you might expect by taking a more straight-faced approach. As someone who had not heard of the original, it was not confusing to start with the sequel, yet the gameplay is largely the same except with more time with a full-party. Gameplay largely borrows from Chrono-Trigger’s turn-based combat with its own ideas how to make standard JRPG battles more diverse. Linearity is replaced with branching paths; and instead of a story relying on spectacle and lore, there is a surprising richness behind every character, friend or foe, involving a pulpy adventure in a loosely historically accurate Wild West. While BHB may not be revolutionary, it is a game that will leave you with fond memories as it rides off into the sunset.


Saying that the gameplay is largely uninspired would be unfair, but it’s easy to see why when you compare it to Undertale’s non-combat system and LISA’s status-heavy combat. The gameplay borrows various elements from Chrono-Trigger’s battle-system; Earthbound’s pre-battle, status-effects and anti-grinding elements; and Harvest Moon’s progression system for skills like farming. On top of these features, BHB also creates its own unique battles that feel more like puzzles such as a sniper shootout with destructible cover or a security door that must be disarmed in a fight. Moments like these, though sparse and sometimes frustrating, are the best gameplay elements BHB has to offer.

The problem with the rest of BHB’s gameplay is how simple it is. Combat doesn’t suffer as much because you can always ramp up the challenge by switching to Hard where tactics are a requirement. Synergy between companions’ skills (Vantages) makes up the gameplay where party members rely on buffs, status effects, etc. to get through as a team. Every encounter, even if it’s standard JRPG combat, always feels impactful as different hats reward players with new strategies to accumulate on top of standard leveling up. These progression systems benefit the game because it rewards variety.

Outside of combat, however, is where the gameplay’s shallowness begins to show. Map design and side-quests are actually the highlights as every area offers activities to break up combat like riddles or mini-games such as a food contest. However, skills (farming, weapon buffing, cooking, etc.) are simply meters increasing the number of options to do the same thing. Guessing with reagents to find weapon-buff combinations is more often a crapshoot unless you know the recipes from NPCs. Doctoring is simply a stat-removal skill to sap away money unless you invest into it at campfires. Lastly, if you were expecting BHB to be a JRPG mixed with Stardew Valley/Harvest Moon, then farming will disappoint you the most; it’s simply farming for extra resources to sell. Items also seem oddly placed where you may get the best gear early on, making money a commodity with no usage except for increasing these progression ranks.

None of these elements ruins the gameplay, but they feel like features simply there for the sake of variety without thinking of how to best integrate them. At worst, it can showcase a lack of extra polish that could have improved sections like Little Creed’s apparatus, yet none of these features are mandatory. (The game itself is highly polished with relatively few technical issues, which all have been addressed.) It seems odd to add extra things when the game is not lacking on content; it took me twenty-one hours to complete 66% of the game—most of it was completionist rewards for an end-game reward, which you can complete post-game, but there were a fair number of side-quests incomplete. The only reason these extra features bother me is that it takes away the real star of Boot Hill Bounties, the storytelling.


Storytelling has never been a large focus in Earthbound-inspired games much like the original. The comedy, the weirdness of its spectacles, and in some games like LISA and Undertale, the lore, have all supplemented what threadbare narratives they have had. (The one exception being Mother 3.) None of these statements are to say games with lore have bad stories; it’s simply a different way to tell them. In contrast to other titles, Boot Hill Bounties has not only the pulpiest of stories inspired by Spaghetti Westerns but it also has the strongest sense of storytelling because of its emphasis on plot.

This effect is largely the result of how much BHB emphasizes character development for every main character as vignettes behind every branching path. To tie everything together, the set-up is simple: Hunt down the remaining members of a gang during an impending war between the Indians and Settlers. Similar to games like Shadowrun Dragonfall, the plot begins on a set-path before allowing players to choose different junctions to focus on both the protagonists and antagonists. (Choices, however, seem superficial as they don’t appear to impact the outcome.) Each path tells its own story to completion which allows all of them to have a nice sense of pace and purpose. It also not only ties the plot together with relevant details but also give motives behind the antagonists that flesh them out to be real characters than simple bad guys. This is BHB’s greatest strength, characters.

Fans of Mother 3 will truly enjoy this game because of how character driven it is. The adultness of the world is handled surprisingly well with the kiddie visuals and perspectives as the game explores themes of war, racism, violence, religious institutions, and other matters that fit the Western times. It always borders the line of tasteful portrayals mixed in with creative fictions like the Mexican nationalists waging a war in the U.S. and Mexico because they are abandoned, “We are men without country, unbound by laws or customs.” These result in some well-executed gut punches later on that truly surprise you because the narrative builds up to them striking at the right moment. Even without playing the original, the sense of growth of every character feels like a complete story-arc that only suffers from the fact that the game goes out with a taste of what’s to come as its final act.


Unlike the original which was marred by the fact that the game ended as soon as you rounded the whole posy, the sequel does a better job ending to set-up the third game. Some may not like cliffhangers but if a game can resolve its plot to let another game take up the reigns, then the role of that story fulfilled its purpose. Boot Hill Bounties manages to end at the right time, though it may feel anticlimactic depending on what order you took as it doesn’t have a final boss or an ultimate challenge. That is obviously the purpose of the third game, but it is a hard truth when it may take years to see it.

The people that I believe will truly appreciate BHB are not only fans of Earthbound but also their families. While some aspects may be questionable for younger audiences, the fact that you can play this game with others lets the legend live on beyond the hearts of Earthbound fans such as their children who can share that memory with the same passion.

I grew up playing Gun.Smoke and Dragon Warrior on the NES, and gazing at the picture of the first Mother game that appeared in Nintendo Power (before anyone had even heard of Earthbound). Decades later, and my love for cowboy games and JRPGs hasn't died at all. The Boot Hill series blends the wild west with a fantastic SNES JRPG vibe in a way that feels incredibly fresh and makes me feel like a kid again.

Since I was a huge fan of Boot Hill Heroes, I offered to help with the testing for Bounties. I received the game for free in order to test it. My only regret is that I never got a chance to buy it for myself, because I've had more fun with this game than any RPG I've played in years. I would gladly pay full price for it. You'll love it, especially if you played the first game in the series. (This game is MUCH better than the first one, though.)

The jump in quality from Boot Hill Heroes to Bounties is surprisingly staggering, from the much-more-detailed 2D graphics, to the neat little twists in everything from the battles to the optional sidequests and the dialogue. There were many times when I thought to myself, "I've never seen an RPG do that before." I was also extremely happy to see that Kid, the formerly silent protagonist, now talks! You can really connect with him more this way,

The battle system, although rather unconventional, was easy for me to pick up since I played the first game twice. If you've played Boot Hill Heroes, you know the drill. Knowing when to launch an attack, when to cancel, and when to trigger the proper "vantage." If it's your first experience with the Boot Hill series, the game does a fine job of explaining the battle system, and it does this (for the most part) without breaking character.

And with farming, weapon-modding, cooking, riddles... Even outside of battle, there's still a ton to do.

The story proceeds in a quasi-linear fashion. Unlike the first game, all of the bounties are available for pursuit in any order, but each bounty's arc must be resolved before moving on to another, with side quests unlocked each step of the way. Even after the credits roll, there's a completionist challenge (that I still have yet to complete) with the promise of something BIG if you finish the full list of stuff to do. I can't say what that is, but what I can say for sure is that you'll get your money's worth here. See if you've got what it takes to complete the checklist... Good luck!