South Park: The Stick of Truth its one of the most satisfyingly source-loyal and appropriate gaming adaptations of a series from another form of media I’ve ever played. Obsidian has juggled their RPG-making chops with gameplay machinations that fit the universe of the South Park TV series well.
If you don’t like South Park, or you get offended by farts, talking poop, performing abortions, monster fetuses, excessive use of the F word and ballsacks (lots of ‘em) then don’t bother playing this game!
Developers Obsidian Entertainment and publishers Ubisoft have now took it upon themselves to deliver a sixth South Park game promising to be true to the show whilst being original calling it South Park: The Stick of Truth.
It puts the player in control of the “New Kid” who, after being instructed to make new friends by your parents, soon become enthralled into fighting for the Wizard King (or Cartman dressed as a wizard) against the despicable elves in a war for control of The Stick of Truth.
South Park isn’t exactly the prettiest of TV shows, but that’s always been by design. There’s artistry to how crappy it looks. The strange bouncing walking animation, the four-or-five frames of mouth movement for talking – it’s all here, accurately recreated in gameplay. It looks simple, though if considered properly it becomes obvious that there’s an awful lot going on under the hood to keep the game looking like the show.
Of course it’s just as with most of the shows themes, the kids imaginations brought to life as every character is dressed up in homemade outfits fighting with wooden swords, plungers, toys, anything they can get their hands on. The story is fantastic as the fight over a stick soon turns into battling aliens and hobos. The humour is constant throughout keeping players laughing and chuckling at all of the pop culture reference parodies, sordid themes, juvenile jokes and awesomely put together cut scenes.
South Park: The Stick of Truth has taken on the form of a role playing game set in the entire town of South Park. Once you create your kid, you are given the choice of four roles, Fighter, Mage, Thief and Jew all of which haven’t got much difference between them performance and story wise sadly except for the clothing you are given. After choosing your role, you are soon left to your own devices and are free to roam the whole town, rooting through iconic households and buildings featured on the show. There are so many things to see in this game as exploration is encouraged by having tonnes of things to find and collect such as armour sets, weapons and buffing stickers for weapons as well as collectables like Chinpokemon and friends on a socialnetwork. South Park: The Stick of Truth is a deep game with plenty to see and do with loads to unlock.
Battles are different to the exploration as it switches to a turn based fight similar to early Final Fantasy games. You choose what action you want to perform which could be a swipe with your weapon or a special ability or item use or even to use your magic which is a blatant reference to the mighty Skyrim. When you have chosen your attack, you are required to perform another button press action keeping players immersed in the fights.
It sounds simple and it is but it’s also incredibly fun.
Completing side tasks for certain characters can unlock them for use in battles as summons. These act just as they did in Final Fantasy games by having the character appear and do a special attack that wipes out the enemy. Obsidian have kept it fair however only allowing players to use these once a day and not against bosses. If you have watched South Park, then you will know what the visuals are going to be like as Obsidian have done away with flashy 3D effects, which in the past has ruined it, leaving South Park as it is known for. Everything in the TV show visual wise is here in all its glory but that doesn’t mean you can’t explore freely as it is in a 3D space so you can literally go anywhere.
