Zero Punctuation: Painkiller

[Dysmachia]

Endless forum blathering and noise aside, this game sounds awesome. The reasons for your praise resound well with me, especially since I'm playing a game that fits the criteria just nicely, albeit on a much smaller scale. The game I'm being all gushy over is Contra III, the pinnacle of "Blow Shit Up Or Die Trying" shooters of the old generation. Contra III is precisely what every game should be like:

A) "Here asshole, here's an objective, go accomplish it."
B) "Oh, while you're at it, here's a metric fuck-ton of challenge in the way."
C) "Don't worry man, you can do crazy awesome shit like this."

Games forget that I'm not here to prance around enjoying a carefully crafted story presentation whilst pressing buttons. I'm here to kick ass, solve puzzles, do something, and I want it to be interesting in the process, ya know? It seems the basic meat and potatoes of games, the objective, the challenge, and the cool stuff, are lost amidst 'innovation', 'thrilling next-gen graphics' and whatever other PR dribble comes out of developers' frothing mouths.

And here you describe a game that is exactly what a game should be. An objective that isn't solvable by a retarded monkey and is solvable by means that are totally awesome and entertaining. Every game should have a gun that shoots lightning bolts and shurikens or the equivalent thereof.

 

[SaneIntolerant]

I'm a fan of games that allow you to kill enemies in fun ways, yes, but I find something wrong with myself when I start thinking "Oh geez, now I need to go through all this runny-gunny-shoot-'em-up crap just to get to the story stuff?" during a session of Half-Life 2.

Nevertheless, good review. A little optimism is nice every now and then.

 

[Hedberger]

What happened to the old reviews? Will they be re-added to the site later on?

Hoping for a Fallout 3 and S.T.A.L.K.E.R Clear sky review this autumn.

 

[Crooked Knight]

Hooray for Painkiller, "kill everyone in the universe" FPSes are far too rare these days. Yeah, it wants to be Serious Sam, but it's not like we're drowning in the genre.

 

[Geo Da Sponge]

If it's criticism Yahtzee wants, it's criticism he'll get.

I feel that this weeks review isn't as good as some of the others; as Yahtzee says himself, he's not as funny when he's giving out praise. Jokes seemed a bit sub-par, which might have been all right if this was a constructive review of a game anyone's ever heard of*. Of course, I wouldn't want zero-punctuation to lose all concept of being a source of proper reviews, but let's face it, Yahtzee didn't become popular because of a deep level of game analysis.

Ah well, still better than 95% of the internet.


*Though it's nice to think of people buying the game just because of this review.

 

[Hypersapien]

I CANNOT, for the life of me, get the video to run. Using Opera 9.50 beta, build 10005.

Also, why was the Escapist dying every so often?

Let's see. Wednesday, round about noon. Yep. A tidal wave of traffic pouring in to see Yahtzee vent himself over a new game.

I'd like to say that's the only time that The Escapist has problems, but this is the only time of the week I even come here.

Seriously. Does anyone else ever look at The Escapist any other time of the week?

I mean besides to watch ZP reruns.

 

[Lupie]

Haven't played it, but I hear it's got a serious case of "I Wish I was Serious Sam."

Btw, new site = For the Lose.

If I have to unblock all your adsites on my Noscript, you're doing it wrong.

I have NoScript, and it runs only allowing escapistmagazine.com, warcry.com and quantserve.com through. I might try taking quantserve.com off and see what happens.

 

[illegalusername]

Nothing can beat the bee-hands of Bioshock.
And i never get anywhere in this game because i overuse the weedwhacker gun and laugh maniacally

 

[Kryopsis]

Huh. I missed the game the first time around. I recall it was released right before my switch from PC to Mac. Now that I switched from Mac to PC, I guess I'll give the game another try, especially since the Gold Pack's 9.99$ on Steam.

 

[Frapple]

Go back to the old player please, first it was audio lagging behind and now it's sound switching between stereo and left ear only.

 

[Neo Kojiro]

I feel slightly dissapointed that there wasn't any references to all-county cocksucking championships, or tropheys there abouts.

 

[Entharion]

I CANNOT, for the life of me, get the video to run. Using Opera 9.50 beta, build 10005.

Also, why was the Escapist dying every so often?

Ctrl+f5 worked for me on firefox... movie didnt load before, hope this helps

 

[Imper1um]

Dude, that was sweet. But, yeah, you have to get the latest player to run before you can see this. It seems the installer wasn't bundled with the runnable.

Here's the steps:

[FlowPlayer is a flash player. You do not need to download or install it]

 

[Squarewave]

It's on steam for 10$, the video trailer makes it looks like a serious sam clone, a game I loved. So for 10 bucks even if its not as good as Yahtzee says its not a huge loss

 

[theprinceofcamden]

I loved the comment at the end about not reviewing Mariokart for the Wii. Yartzee, I completly agree with you!
Amazing review this week, as evey

 

[cutekittenkyti]

nuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu

ok i better stop now before i get banned

Yahtzee has dropped the C-bomb Crikey.

British accent = cool sophisticated cynical
Australian = freaky references to the crocidile hunter and kangaroo jack

great now I'm going to have nighmares

 

[Bombader]

Awesome retro, makes me want to play the game again.

I really liked the gun that fired bullets and rockets though.

 

[leverus]

Another wednesday made funnier!

Agreed on the shuriken/lightning gun - that was the badassest-est weapon ever..

The story was tolerable, though you had to be sleep-deprived or worse for it to make sense.

 

[GokoWildheart]

Painkiller is one for the phew FPS i enjoy and still play every now and then. I just miss the old days were it was just get from a to b through Massive group of monsters Z using what ever weapons you want. If they left the story line at that and the cut sences out i would love this game so much.

Thanks Yahtzee for taking the time to route around for a game in the dry period of gaming caladers for a lovely if not small gem.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

As one of the first few to post in this thread, I would like to establish some "implied yet unwritten" rules/guidelines, because I'm not a mod and I don't expect everyone to follow these, but for the greater good of this thread, PLEASE follow them as best as you can! -and Remember, I am condemning out of love, not hate (sort of)

[li]NO ASS KISSING! Yahtzee hates it when people call flawed work flawless, so give the guy some criticism, it's the best thing an artist can get.
[/li]


[li]No flaming either! If you disagree with Yahtzee, say why, and then criticize him, preferably constructively.
[/li]

[li] NO ONE POST WONDERS! IF YOU ARE GOING TO REGISTER JUST TO SAY 'LOL YOU HIT THE NAIL ON THE HEAD, GOOD JOB! BEST ONE YET! LOLOLOOLLOLOLOLOL OR ANYTHING OF THAT NATURE....DON'T! If you register, make your post worthwhile, because one post wonders have an opinion that is worth practically NOTHING, if you make an account, browse the other forums, or just do something other than kiss Yahtzee's ass![/li]

[li]SERIOUSLY! NO ASS KISSING![/li] The Ass kissers are worse than the flamers, the flamers still actually contribute by giving (whether it be good or bad) criticism, ass kissers just make the thread grow until it bursts with bile! DON'T DO IT!


Thanks for listening! Chances are this will be completely ignored anyway! Happy posting!

Yeah, because a non-mod posting "What not to do or you'll piss off Yahtzee" isn't kissing any ass at all.

Touche. By the way he forgot to add 'Stop trying to use the smartest sounding vocab you can in an attempt to be like Yahtzee'