The western genre is one that can trace its inspirations back through countless iterations. Lead And Gold is no different. The myth of the Wild West is one that has enamored people for generations, from the radio dramas of the Lone Ranger to the gritty spaghetti westerns starring Clint Eastwood. This means that Lead and Gold has both a literary history and a gameplay history. Naturally, it's time to discover both and just where they lead. After all, a game's influences are incredibly important to the end product.

The first, and most obvious, influence upon the world of Lead And Gold is Outlaws. Often considered one of the best western games ever made, it was one of the last good original LucasArts games before they shifted mostly to Star Wars for licensing. Outlaws follows the quest of a US Marshal to get his child back after a railroad baron hires outlaws to terrorize people into leaving land that he wants. As the palyer goes through the game, more and more behind the marshal is revealed, culimating in the final moments of the game. It's cheesy, sure, but it's still excellent, and those with a love for westerns can't go wrong. The gameplay is fairly standard shooter fare, but the relative weakness of characters and western weaponry really caught the attention of players at the time. After all, most enemies can only take a few shots, and that includes bosses!

The westerns starring Clint Eastwood are another obvious influence upon the world of Lead And Gold. Of special note is the film "A Fistful of Dollars," which depicted two warring families fighting over control of a town. This faction-styled conflict definitely carries over to Lead And Gold, thanks to the team-based play, and the specialization of each character mimics several characters in the film, such as The Man With No Name (who is an excellent gunman). The dramatic, anti-hero, gritty feel of the movies also carries over to lead and Gold, making it less of an epic game and more of a stylized one. This isn't a setting involving dramatic confrontations. It's one about killing or being killed.

Westerns in general also play a major role in defining the classes and environments of Lead And Gold. Each class is based on a Western archetype: the gunslinger, who is great with revolvers, but not much else; the foreman, who is burly, tough, and ready to kick ass; the deputy, who upholds the law by marking criminals and taking them down; and the trapper, who is great with a rifle and at luring enemies into her sights. Each of those is almost directly correlated to a Western character archetype, but we don't mind. The same goes for the towns, which range from the Civil War ghost towns to old derelict mining towns with plenty of gold hiding out.

The gameplay of Lead And Gold looks to be somewhere between classic team-based games (such as Battlefield) and the games developed by GRIN. This is intentional, as the engine is the same one used in GRIN games such as Bionic Commando and Terminator Salvation. The ability to revive teammates, spawning on friends instead of at specific spawn points, and the custom abilities of each class mimic the specialization seen in games such as Battlefield or Team Fortress 2. However, the core of the game, shooting, is one thing that has never changed, and probably never will. If you're used to games like Gears of War, you'll be kicking butt in Lead And Gold in no time.

Some other, more obscure, influences include the synergy buffs and the level system. Most games have you level outside of the game in a persistent environment, but Lead And Gold follows the Enemy Territory model. You only level within a game, and as soon as you leave, your level resets. This does mean that you get a lot of levels really fast, but removes a lot of the fun persistence behind the game. The synergy effects are more obscure, and as far as we know haven't really been used in any other games. However, similar incentives to participate with teammates are included in games like Team Fortress 2, so it's not entirely out of the blue.