Imagine the worst characteristics that a game could have today: a simple concept of playable mechanics, an inferior and poorly optimized technical section, a banal plot as a simple excuse to do “nonsense” and humor or situations in such bad taste that they could offend even the rudest of individuals. Alas, so is Postal 4 No Regerts.
There is so much to talk about that I don’t know where to start. Normally, that would seem like a good thing in a game since it makes us think that it has so many features and points in favor that it is difficult to choose a starting point… but that argument is easily reversed. Describing Postal 4 No Regerts is such a task. tedious How has it been playing it? Running with Scissors continues to insist on developing the only IP it has ever worked on, but paradoxically -or perhaps as a cruel mockery- they continue to offer a flat gamebadly programmed, with a non-existent innovation and a humor that I can only describe as tastelessness despite the fact that, according to the developers, it seeks to be a satire. For the fourth installment in the adventures of “Postal Dude” and his dog “Champ”, they try to recover their caravan that was stolen from them at the beginning of the game. Already in this presentation scene I see that the game tries too hard to be funny but fails to do so by overusing the eschatological or chabacano.
From this peculiar premise and introduction I have begun my journey through the game that has the dubious honor of disputing the position -according to the words of the developers from Arizona- to the “worst game ever created”, and without having played the previous one, if it does not manage to snatch it away it will be for very little. Aside from the glitches, which seem to be a never-ending story based on the updates they put out on Steam, the game is a accumulation of nonsense playable and technical. Starting with the terrain in which I play, I find myself with a mapping that seeks to imitate the chaotic style of other cell shading type productions but totally empty of life. The city in which the plot takes place feels dead, there are only passers-by -which I will talk about later-, a single breed of dogs and cats, and a kind of motorcycles that help me to go through the soporific places that it boasts. the game. But the worst in this aspect is the false premise that we are in a open world.
Every time I get to a different section of the neighborhood I’m in, the game loads the next area, forcing me to wait for control to be returned to me… and that’s if it doesn’t crash and return me to the desktop. Texture glitches also abound. To be fair, there are times when the game doesn’t look too bad in terms of the use of lighting or the color palette. But even in that part it fails since as there is a minimum focus of direct light focused on the player it will seem to you that you are watching a series in which JJ Abrahms got too excited with the “lens flare” effects.
The game is a cluster of playable and technical nonsenseAs I have been touring the city I have come across versions of the classic “hicks” of the American Midwest. And frankly, I’m sure that their counterparts in the real world are more pleasant and above all functional than the ones in Postal 4. Apart from being designed in a way that is quite unpleasant to look at – even for what the game is looking for, which is to ironize or lampoon – have the AI of a zombie. All the NPCs behave as such, hanging around in the same area with nothing to do or spouting a generic phrase from time to time; they are even hindered in their travels. Enemies are just as poorly programmed. The programming routines that dictate its behavior can be summed up as “I see it = I go straight at it and/or shoot where it is without looking for cover.” If only the weapons I have at my disposal behaved in a real way or presented a challenge when facing them, but neither. A pistol, shotgun, or rifle essentially differs in its rate of fire, but they all work like a laser beam; there’s no recoil to control, no damage reduction for distance, and aiming is rough.
The violence that the game boasts is very basic. In the 80s and early 90s it might have been shocking, but someone bleeding when you shoot them is a logical thing to do and one that any FPS has. The most ridiculous thing is that if you hit them sometimes they remain blocked, still, and even turn their back on you and don’t move. No comment.
An affront to “easter eggs” in video games
Well, “what about missions?” you will ask Mundane, banal, boring tasks that show an almost nonexistent effort in your design. I have had to give tickets to badly parked cars (yes, there are cars but they are decorated), attract cats and dogs for a veterinary company, return mexican immigrants on your side of the border using a catapult -in Running with Scissors they must think that racism is a humorous genre-, or take “catnip” to a pet store that was a cover to manufacture psychotropic substances. Another detail that does not help at this point is that the interface works when it feels like it, making it even more difficult to use objects and weapons or directly get to where the mission will take place. To say here that there are not a few that try to reference scenarios or situations from great games like Doom or series like Game of Thrones (with a wink in bad taste included at the expense of people who suffer from the same affliction as actor Peter Dinklage).
A detail of error in the textures
The interface works when you feel like itThe game doesn’t even make an effort to present these missions in an interesting way: it only knows how to resort to easy jokes, xenophobic, intolerant, scatological and always presented by the most recalcitrant stereotypes of the topics of deep America. From time to time he drops a joke or reference to popular culture, but it is so obvious and forced that it is inevitable to feel some embarrassment, especially the revelation of the final boss that I will not reveal here, not to make spoilers, but out of respect for a of the most mythical lines of cinema. Where if it stands out a little is in the dubbing, since everyone who has lent their voice for this project shows that they at least know how to interpret and try to imprint grace on their characters, including Jon St.John, the voice of Duke Nukem, who we can choose for our character. However, you can’t save a game with good dubbing alone.
Finally, concluding that I have beaten the game in a few 7 hours. A ridiculous duration for a game that presumes to be an open world, with what supposedly should have lasted at least three times as long. Perhaps it does have something of value for fans of this peculiar cult saga, but for the rest of us it is a title to avoid and an example of how not to make an action game.
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