The game tells the story of Billy 'Candle', a young ranch hand and fortune-seeker, and Ray McCall, a former gunslinger turned preacher.

For the subsequent Xbox 360 release, numerous graphical improvements were made, and some gameplay elements were changed, reducing the amount of stealth in Billy's levels.

On the other hand, many critics were impressed with how the game recreated an authentic Western tone, and Marc Alaimo's voice acting as Ray was generally lauded.

Call of Juarez is a first-person shooter in which the player controls alternating protagonists - Billy 'Candle' and Ray McCall, each of whom has a different style of gameplay.

[10] The main difference between the two characters is that Ray is stronger and slower, and although he cannot jump as high as Billy, he can kick heavy obstacles out of his way and take considerably more damage from enemy fire, due to wearing a cuirass.

[15] The whip is very weak as a weapon, and is mainly used to aid Billy in climbing or jumping over large gaps, by lassoing nearby trees.

[10] During combat, when he draws either handgun, concentration mode is automatically activated, and the game goes into slow motion, with two targeting reticles appearing on either side of the screen, each moving towards the centre.

To draw Ray's gun, the player must move the mouse/analog stick downwards and then snap it upwards, at which point a reticule appears on screen which can be controlled as normal.

[26] Billy stows away on a train heading to San Jose, home of Molly Ferguson, a young woman with whom he had a relationship a year prior.

He is nursed back to health by an Apache Native American named Calm Water, who advises him to accept who he is and embrace his destiny.

He reveals he is Billy's father, explaining that about seventeen years prior, the pregnant Marisa stole the medallion and left him for Thomas.

Using his memory of the shape of the medallion and a story Marisa told him as a child, Billy locates the gold, but Mendoza follows and attempts to kill him.

Their younger brother, William, a priest, attempted to intervene, but Ray killed him in a panic over the assumption that he was reaching for a gun, but it was a Bible.

As his last act, Ray kills Mendoza before thanking God for the opportunity to redeem himself, reciting the words "though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil".

Following the gang to a farmhouse, he sees them set the house on fire but is able to douse the flames, rescuing the woman and child locked inside.

[30] Upon arriving, he finds a letter from the mayor telling him that Vasquez, the notoriously violent leader of a gang of thieves and rustlers, is staying in town with his men.

With Vasquez in custody, County Commissioner Grizzwald sends a four-man team to escort him to El Paso to stand trial.

We treat the project with the highest priority and we want the game to be seen as a serious player in the FPP shooter market, despite the Wild West themed action.

[32]Techland were especially keen to make a specifically Western-themed first-person shooter, as they felt the FPS genre had become overly dominated by World War II and science fiction games.

[16] They revealed that a major part of the gameplay would involve duelling, with players needing quick reflexes to win, just like the real-life gunslingers of the time.

This leads to new types of outstanding gameplay, such as the possibility to control the spreading of fire once you know the direction of wind, or even scaring enemies out of their hideaways with well-directed smoke.

[16] The engine also facilitated wind effects, alterations to object properties when interacting with liquids, Shader Model 3.0-based simulation and animation of vegetation, fumes, and smoke, and changes in daytime and the position of global lighting.

[16] The game also included ChromeEd; an "effective and easy to use authoring tool for creating not only user's own maps but even completely new mods.

Selinger came up with the basic plot outline and characters, and Orkin wrote the dialogue and story specifics, staying in contact with Techland from Los Angeles.

Call of Juarez, with its "full akimbo" mode, also seemed ideal for consoles because of the two triggers that give you a true idea of what it's like wielding dual six-shooters.

[45] Eurogamer's Kieron Gillen scored the PC version 8 out 10, praising the alternating level structure, and calling the game "as good a cowboy shooter as I've played".

Although he was critical of the use of Billy's whip, which he found to be "needlessly fiddly", he wrote that the game "has given new life to an area of the FPS genre where tons of developers have given up".

Although he praised the tone and voice acting, he was critical of the controls and the overly linear levels, concluding, "the basic first-person shooter concepts are in place, but the essentials aren't."

He praised the voice acting and Ray's levels but was critical of Billy's, especially the implementation of the whip and the platforming sections (which he called "horrific").

He praised the shooting mechanics but was critical of the whip, writing that the game "feels [like] a next-gen version of the lackluster Dead Man's Hand.