South Park: The Stick of Truth Review

The Quest to be Cool

I have to admit, I was hesitant to buy this game. South Park: The Stick of Truth faced numerous delays and I feared that it would be a buggy piece of crap. The sixty dollar price tag online was a bit much, too. Thankfully, they were selling it much cheaper in retail here at a little over thirty-five dollars. I am pleased to say that it was a lot better than I expected and that I thoroughly enjoyed this game.

Remember the awful South Park games for the PlayStation? Of course you don't. Forget all of that because South Park: The Stick of Truth is, without a doubt, THE South Park game fans have been waiting for. This game has foul language, scenes of extreme violence and gore, nudity, sexual situations, sodomy and what could be the first interactive abortion mini-game in video game history. In other words, it's the South Park that lives up to its franchise and the game the world needs!

You play as "The New Kid" who just moved into South Park. The player character is essentially a character in a typical episode of South Park. You get to interact with the main cast of: Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Kenny and a whole lot of supporting characters fans are familiar with. The story is about the quest for the "Stick of Truth", a magical "relic" so powerful that whoever wields it, controls the universe.

Gameplay

The game is an RPG where you get to customize your character's appearance and skills. You can choose between four classes: Fighter, Mage, Thief or JEW. Each class has its own hilarious set of skills and skill trees. For example. as a Fighter, you get to practice "Roshambo", the art of kicking people in the balls and stomping them while they're down. As a Jew, you can cut your opponents down to size with the dreaded "Circum-sythe" ability!

 Combat is turn based and simplified. The player controls himself and a buddy, your buddies being the main characters of the show. Each character may perform two actions per turn but attacking or using an class ability will end all actions for that character. It is efficient to use an item as your first move, then attack for your second move instead of attacking immediately.

When the player uses abilities, certain key prompts will appear on the screen. For example, when performing even a basic attack, the weapon will "flash" at a certain moment. The player must press either the left mouse button for a series of attacks, or the right mouse button for a power attack. Whenever the enemy attacks, a white circle will appear under the player character to prompt the player to press the right mouse button in order to block the attack. This greatly mitigates the damage done to the player.

Enemies have tricks up their sleeves too. Enemies in the front column protect the ones in the back. Some enemies are ARMORED, which reduces the damage received from each attack according to the armor value. Therefore, against armored opponents, the player should use abilities to reduce the armor and attack using a single powerful strike instead of a series of small attacks. On the flip side, some enemies are SHIELDED, which means that they will completely negate all attacks received per shield value; even special abilities, Against shielded targets, a series of attacks is best to wear the shield down to nothing instead of wasting single, powerful attacks. Some enemies also go into stances. RIPOSTING means that they counter all melee attacks while REFLECTING counters all ranged attacks.

There's also status effects in this game. "Gross out" is a damage-over-time debuff that blocks healing. There's also your usual, "stunned", "sleeping", "on fire" and "screwed", which is certain death after a few turns. Inflicting these status conditions on enemies is the key to victory.

Thoughts

I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, the constant key prompts help keep the player engaged with the things happening on the screen. It helps things from getting too boring.

The mechanics are solid. There's great potential here to make the combat deeper in terms of strategy. Unfortunately, the game doesn't go all the way with it. While the game isn't too easy, it doesn't provide a real challenge either. I think the problem lies in that items are just too plentiful and money to buy stuff like equipment is just too easy to get.

Story

I cannot say much about the story because that would ruin it. I don't want to spoil the fun. What I can say however is that South Park: The Stick of Truth is one of those games that's all about its story. It survives on its narrative which is kind of a problem in a way.

If you're a South Park fan, you will love the hell out of this game. The South Park brand of humor is definitely here in all its outrageous and offensive glory. The bigger a fan you are, the more enjoyment you'll get out of this game with all the references to past episodes and the chance to play in an actual episode of the show.

However, if you don't like South Park or don't "get" the show at all, you probably won't like this game. Needless to say, the squeamish and easily offended types should just skip this game.

Conclusion

If you're a true fan of the show, this game is a must-have. It has everything a fan could want. If you're concerned with the game mechanics, it's passable enough. If you like the show and video games, well it's just perfect.

If you don't like the show or don't care for it, the gameplay alone probably won't hook you into it.

A warning though; if you decide to buy this game, make sure to check what version you're getting. The Australian version for example, has scenes and certain parts of the game censored. My version is the Australian one. It's annoying but I guess it wouldn't be South Park without some bullshit censorship. I play on PC anyway so I'm sure some mod is out there to remove the censorship screens. Please check your version before buying.

Even the censorship is hilarious too.

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