7.3.2014

Usually, the term ‘licensed game' held a negative connotation, but fortunately, South Park: The Stick of Truth is one of the new breed of licensed games that is actually fun to play. It also doesn't hurt that South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone were so involved in the game's design and creation after this kick-ass announcement during E3 2012. While fans of the show will be the ones to enjoy it most, newcomers to the franchise will find it accessible enough to get a kick out of it as well.The very first time I stumbled into a fight with a homeless guy who, apropos of nothing at the time, was speaking in Adolf Hitler samples,it cemented what I already knew about South Park: The Stick of Truth; this was going to be one for a very specific audience.Two stock phrases: “fans of the genre” and “fans of the license.” This pair of tired old chestnuts are often trotted out during reviews as a lazy man's way of saying that while Joe Average may find a particular product quite mediocre, rabid devotees will probably forgive its glaring flaws when viewed through the lenses of their fanboy goggles. Now while it may sound like I'm leading with this as a way of softening the blow that Stick of Truth is only average at best, I'm actually doing so for a totally different reason. Stick with me here.South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone are known for their raunchy, foul humor and it shines through as the most entertaining aspect of the game. Within the first five minutes of South Park: The Stick of Truth I picked up a hunk of poop that I could use in combat to gross-out other kids. Later on, during a boss fight with The Bard, he used one of his special abilities that literally made me crap my pants. Throughout the entire game there are callbacks to details from over 200 episodes of the South Park show. Everything from collecting all the Chinpokomon, to Al Gore's hunt for ManBearPig, to Butter's transformation to Professor Chaos. It's pretty impressive how many references are crammed into a game that only lasts about 10-12 hours. Parker and Stone make sure to take shots at all the gaming tropes that we've all become accustomed to such as: audio logs, QTEs, and turn-based battles. There's one section about 3 hours into the game in particular that mercilessly screws with you.I'm surprised at just how much South Park: The Stick of Truth is able to get away with. Complete enough side-missions and you'll be able to summon special South Park characters to assist you in battle; the most disturbing of which is Mr. Slave forcing a kid completely into his ass. Anal probes look like futuristic dildos (and obviously the black ones are larger). Pretty much every hot-button issue is addressed in some way, including, but not limited to: homosexuality, racism, religion, abortion, and pedophilia. South Park has been mocking these issues for years, but it's a little strange to see them in a video game; strange but not unwelcome.In the years since its 1997 debut, South Park has metamorphosed from a crude (for its time), but relatively nonthreatening animated comedy about the surreal adventures of four kids in a quiet little mountain town into a scathing satire of current events where no topic, no matter how seemingly taboo, is off-limits. As the show shed the relative innocence of its early days, the material grew increasingly transgressive and socially aware, doubtlessly alienating a portion of its former audience in the process. Foul-mouthed children, abundant scatological humor, nudity and graphic sexual activity, racially and culturally insensitive stereotypes; jokes about religion, abortion and pedophilia (just to name a few); it's all par for the course here. This content is the divide that is most likely to determine if somebody is going to enjoy South Park: The Stick of Truth or not, because the mechanical side is, for the most part, pretty solid.Instead of putting one of the familiar foursome of Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Kenny in the leading role, Stick of Truth casts the player as the nondescript New Kid in town. Players get to design his appearance from a fairly robust palate of options, while still keeping South Park's trademark simplicity intact. This blank slate of a character also brings about the first instance of Stick of Truth's lampooning of classic gaming tropes; in this case, the silent JRPG protagonist with a mysterious past and an epic destiny. The New Kid (dubbed “Douchebag” by Cartman) never speaks aloud and his companions take nearly every opportunity to lampshade this with uncomfortably pregnant pauses and sideways glances, waiting for the answers that they know are never coming. And despite the amusingly Bakshi/Rankin-Bass-esque intro sequence and early gameplay setting the scene for what seems to be a standard fantasy RPG, before long things go off the rails and players end up waist deep in a genre stew of aliens, zombies and more. But as fans of South Park can attest, these sorts of chaotic train wrecks are a near-weekly occurrence and more often than not, they just find a way to work.The game mechanics are not nearly as confusing or complicated. After picking his class from Fighter, Mage, Thief or (the quite surprisingly inoffensive) Jew, the New Kid sets off with a traveling companion, who can be swapped out on the fly as more members are recruited. Combat is fairly standard turn-based RPG fare with a couple of real-time action RPG mechanics thrown in, like timed button pressed to inflict more damage or to block incoming attacks. Since the player's party of two is quite often outnumbered in fights, the designers also decided to free up the annoyance of needing a dedicated heal-bot character by giving each kid two actions per turn. One of the two can only be used for consumables, which restore health, special ability power or fart-based mana (Chipotle burritos, anyone?). The other turn is used to make basic or special attacks. This was a smart move, as battles can (sometimes quite rapidly) turn deadly if the player isn't properly prepared and since the PC party is so small, having them run double-duty as their own support team keeps things from getting too crowded on-screen.While the New Kid typically gains experience via combat, his abilities can be further tweaked by attaching modifier-adding stickers and patches into slots on his weapons and armor. He also earns a choice of perks after surpassing milestones of earning various numbers of Facebook friends. In fact, the whole system of backend menus is meant to represent his Facebook profile, complete with humorous feed updates (with replies, likes and all) from his newly acquired social network.These sorts of things are where South Park: The Stick of Truth really shines. The game was scripted by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, as is blatantly obvious to anyone familiar with the show from the moment the game gets underway. The writing is tight and has the right balance of laugh-out-loud funny and cringe-inducingly gross. Boilerplate hyperbole like “it feels like you're really inside the show!” may be weak and groan-worthy, but it's also the only really appropriate way to describe the feeling of immersion in South Park's universe that the game projects. Indeed, the crude simplicity of the show's now-trademark construction paper design origins and jerky animation style is part of what serves the game's ability to so accurately replicate this world. The insertion effect is near-seamless and fans will likely spend the first couple of hours grinning from ear to ear as they bounce along the town's snowy streets, collecting loot that references close to two decades worth of episodes.

29.4.2014

No doubt anyone thinking of buying this will already suspect that you need to admire South Park humour and the series to fully (and some might say even partially) appreciate this game, and that is entirely true; the humour is not a by product of the plot but essentially is the plot. If you hate the humour then this is definitely not the game for you because there aren't a couple of gags spread sporadically through the game; it absolutely depends on the gags and, as most people say, it should basically be considered as a long episode of the game.If you do like South Park then this is a fantastic game. It doesn't pretend to be a fantastic RPG or to stand alone as genre defining game; I'm sure even Parker and Stone will admit to that.However, it does achieve a hell of a lot and I'll mention the good and bad points....starting with the good as these far outweigh the bad.1. TIME. Other reviews state that the game can be completed in around 10-12 hours, if you rush this you can easily complete it in a couple of long sittings or a weekend. So if you really want to enjoy this game it should be savoured; it takes place over 3 days and 2 nights so each stage can be used as a good yardstick to know how far you are from the end. It is highly addictive so it's difficult not to apply the "just five more minutes" tactic, but patience is a virtue to aid the enjoyment. There are plenty of quests and side quests and a lot can be missed by not exploring everything properly and several times. With proper exploring and patience you can eke this out to 15 hours or longer, because there are different outcomes and classes along the way you can also try multiple classes and actions. Considering it is around £30 now I think that is good value for money alone, it's not something I will be storing away and never play again.2. CUSTOMISATION/COLLECTIBLES. I see a lot of the gameplay as a nod to Final Fantasy and the ilk, you can customise, level up and try various items, combinations, outfits and weaponry. It's worth getting a lot of practice and exploring the different combinations rather than using the same method for each fight. You customise your own character along the way and there are plenty of items to purchase, find, steal or earn. There are plenty of collectibles to find too, some in areas you may not think to look.3. GUIDES. I strongly recommend not reading any guides unless you are absolutely stuck, I suspect people that finished this game quickly and got all the collectibles used online guides and there are areas where you only have one chance to get items. I think it spoils the game to use guides to save time and the sense of achievement is worth it. I did use the guides when I was stuck with a certain fighting technique and to get some of the collectibles and I wish I hadn't as a bit of patience and strategy would have worked much better.4. CHARACTERS. Being a sad South Park fan I have to admit that it was great when a favourite character appears, sadly there are some noticeable omissions and some tiny bit parts are accounted for as well. This game, unlike the others in the SP series, is really true to the show and it's great to interact and have commentary from the characters; a lot of them were probably after thoughts to weave into the game but were superbly done.5. CONTROLS. The game handles really well, the controls are easy to master (bar a particular fight technique which I won't go into) and you can skip cut scenes you've seen before and fast travel to areas to avoid endless walking. Like FF the fight controls are turn based, which gives plenty of time for planning and enables you to strategically plan ahead. It's very user friendly to navigate and learn. There is one magic fighting technique which should have been worked on but on the whole it's fine. Like good RPGS you get summons, magic, combat and various specialities to master and experiment with.The bad points?1. CENSORSHIP. Yes, the European version is censored, however I don't think this detracts too much from the game. Being European we also suffered this on the DVD release of Season 14 and when you find out what is missed it isn't actually that big a deal. The people who whine and moan about it do so purely on principle, I agree with that but it isn't so heavily censored that you miss anything of great significance.2. FIGHTING. As I said earlier, there is one fighting technique that was incredibly ridiculous to master. I still don't think I truly understood how it worked but got through on luck. There were a couple of moments that edged scarily close to the classic gamer frustration of "why do I bother!!" but suddenly it clicks. It felt like a bug to me as I wasn't doing anything different for it to suddenly succeed but it was really annoying, and you can't get progress until you master it. Although it was terrible, and the biggest downside for me, it doesn't impede the overall enjoyment to a great extent.3. CANADA. I love the Canadians in SP, so was really looking forward to going there in the game, however, a good joke was overplayed a little upon going there and it wasn't what I expected. It was a funny gag but I was looking forward to exploring Canada properly.If you are a South Park fan you are bound to love this game, or at least most of it. The biggest bad point is basically if you don't love South Park or that kind of humour then you will hate this game. Yes, it is one for the fans but even if you know little of South Park but find it quite funny it should still be enjoyable. Think of the bad points as tax you pay for the parts you do enjoy.You will notice the bad reviews on here are short and tell you absolutely nothing (to date). This seems to be people who dwell on the censorship or expected a genre defining game rather than South Park spinoff. One in particular offers absolutely no justification for hating it other than his own word, which is crazy. All you need to know is whether you like SP or not. If you don't love it then avoid this at all costs as you are likely easily offended too.If there are future updates and mini games that makes the purchase even more essential but what is most essential is that if you are worried about the time length remember the stages of the game (3 days and 2 nights) and try short bursts and lots of experimenting and exploration. The game will easily last quite a while that way.

8.2.2015

Released after years of developments and rewrites, a suspended release, Activision's legal issues, Ubisoft's release, and a Black Friday trilogy promoting the human-elf war in an awesome three-parter, here is the video game South Park fans have been waiting.South Park The Stick of Truth. Entirely developed, conceived, written, and performed by the show's creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, their show's production team, and Obsidian Entertainment.Set over a course of three days, you play a new kid who has moved into South Park under strange circumstances his parents wanted to escape and preserve their son from. Powers that end up in the hands of the South Park fourth graders who are busy playing their Elf and Wizard game,started after the Black Friday debacle and its heretic resolution.At the game's beginning, four classes are offered to you: Warrior, Mage, Rogue, and Jew. Each presenting specific abilities and attributes one can obtain through experience or by making friends with the South Park community, either through sub-quests, discussions, or main quests you complete for them, situations as crazy as the town itself; but also clever social commentary on the video game medium (ex:Bioshock audiophones, DLC, reused ideas, etc.) and on our world's injustices (ex: germanophobia, phony media statements even in the face of truth, cultural barriers within Canada, etc).Of the gameplay, everything occurs in a two-dimensional environment similar to the TV show, which mixes both cut scenes the South Park studio animated, and a game environment where the character fights against his enemies in a traditional RPG battleground. While loading screens serve as transitions from certain environments (houses, sewers, country, etc.) and also to pass from the free-walking environment to the battleground you and your guest character get to play against enemies. Though the walking environment can offer you props that allow you to bypass enemy fights in clever ways and gain experience points. An awesome idea from the show's creators as it makes the game more alive and real.Through the entire game, Parker and Stone succeeded in recreating the town's major buildings and made multiple references and jokes to popular characters in the show; Past show elements like the Chinpokomons, Crab People, Lemmiwinks, Mr. Hankey and his dysfunctional family, Critter Christmas, and Jesus. Some you get to summon as Espers, and others you meet only once like the Aliens, but whose interaction with brings forth a serious impact to the storyline. Storyline in which the creators will not release any DLC extra levels, though they have offered in the game enough achievements to encourage players to replay twice or thrice or anytime you'd want to for the game really offers much to play and laugh with.As for the Grand Wizard set, the game comes with a hand drawn map of South Park by Cartman, a large plastic figurine of him, and DLC costumes for your character. Indeed, Ubisoft has developed a nice collection set for any video game and/or South Park fan, though I'd wish they could have offered more choices of large figurines. Either Butters or Princess Kenny, whose popularity grew enormously due to the Black Friday Trilogy.In conclusion, although this game's loading screens can sometimes load more longer than necessary, this game is the first South Park video game I have adored in its entirety and I encourage anyone to buy it. Not only that it is also an awesome love letter and tribute to the Earthbound video game, which Trey Parker and Matt Stone have admitted being enormous fans of, especially of its surreal and unique gameplay with children that fight against something adults have no control on.

14.3.2014

Right so here goes my 1st proper review, by this I mean actually going into detail:South Park: Stick of Truth, I bought it for PS3 (not from Amazon) and was playing it all last weekend, it's a very well made game with lots of South Park references along with iconic RPG references too. However there haven't been much detail on the actual gameplay in reviews I've read so I'm going to focus more on that rather than tell people how much it looks like the show.So we begin the game as our own designed 'new kid' as with many games getting to create your own character, most stuff can be changed; skin tone, hair, makeup, clothes etc. You remain as 'new kid' until you meet with one of the game/shows main characters where you obtain a title.Your appearance is fully customizable throughout the game (with exception of skin tone)After this you can pick one of 4 classes Fighter, Mage, Thief or Jew. All have different special abilities, and do obtain unique equipment, I personally selected Thief which does have some cool status inflicting abilities, also I quite liked the hooded top which comes with the class.Once you've sorted all this it's time to learn about combat, I thought it was a pretty good combat system with the timed attacks keeping you switched on either allowing you to deal more damage or receive less damage. Also you're able to use an item and either attack, use an ability or summon once per turn - this means you don't have to rely on one support/healer character. Battles completely depend on upgrading your characters equipment throughout a new weapon or piece of armour makes all the difference.Now you've learnt about combat you get your first proper quest and get to start exploring South Park, which is pretty cool as they've managed to fit loads of the show into the game. During exploring you get to search characters houses along with other key locations for equipment, loot and other collectables. In addition to this you get to speak with characters and complete side quests for extra loot, friends, summons and EXP.The games friend system is quite simple, basically make friends with the residents some by simply talking to them, some by doing quests. Achieve a certain number of friends and receive a 'perk point' to spend on a perk that will assist you in battle. Each time you level up you also get an ability point to upgrade your in battle abilities.Throughout the game you also get to pair up with one of 6 'buddies' to fight alongside with, all have very unique abilities inside & out of battle.That is pretty much the game, I don't want to give away any details of the story as it is most definitely an experience that any South Park fan should have. Listed a few pros & cons below.Pro'sGreat graphics, hilarious story, tongue in cheek references, 'celebrity' cameos, good amount of character customisation (could be better however) good battle & 3 different difficulty settingsCon'sShort game, all classes can equip the same equipment (excluding the unique items) low level cap, character strength increases too quickly (making some of the later on bosses really easy) limited number of abilities and upgrades to them.I've given the review a 4 star, but it's more like a 4.5 really. If you're a fan of the show at all it's a must play, for those of you bothered about the 'censor' screens on the EU version, don't worry about it as it doesn't affect gameplay at all. Hope this is useful, happy gaming.

28.3.2014

Having enjoyed South Park since the very first episode and owning every season of it on DVD, I suppose I could consider myself somewhat of a large fan; I have seen the show evolve from somewhat juvenile plots (aliens probing Eric Cartman, Mecha Streisand et al) to what it is today, which is a very satirical view on life and the culture we live in. Also, I had not played a South Park game since the Nintendo 64 game (has there been any since???!)Maybe because of the fact I have seen all the episodes is one of the main reasons I have such high praise for this game- The game is literally littered with references from the series, many of which I had forgotten about, from the Chinpokomon collectables,

10.5.2014

The Stick of Truth is so good in many ways, but is ultimately bogged down by very repetitive gameplay and longs spells between excitement. I hate to complain about a game so imaginative and cute, but it did become an issue with me the more and more I played through it.You play as a new kid in town, customizable to your discretion, who makes friends with the South Park gang and becomes involved in their fantasy role-playing games when the precious Stick of Truth is stolen from Cartman. A terrifying plot involving aliens, anal probes, zombie Nazis, abortion clinics, and ManBearPig himself, plus many side-quests make up the lengthy adventure which is a hilarious parody of fantasy RPGs,

16.4.2014

Ordered on a sunday night quite kate and the postage was supposed to be 2nd class 3-5 days imagine my surprise when it arrived tuesday morning. Really fast delivery. Now to the game, I loved it, never was a massive fan of South Park only seen a few seasons but i understood the references from the episodes i've seen. What the game does is use the storylines from past episodes to create a story and i thoroughy enjoyed it. You play as a new kid which you create the look of (as you play through the game you unlock more attire and hair/beards) the objective set at the start of the game is to make friends to make your parents happy and as you play through the quest for the stick of truth you make friends by interacting with people and completing quests.

14.4.2014

This is a role playing game based on the South Park series which loosely continues the concept of the "Black Friday" trilogy of episodes in S17 i.e. the kids are playing an elaborate role playing game. You play the role of a new kid in town following a series of quests which allow you explore the town and talk to pretty much all the characters from the show.The game is fairly straightforward: the combat system took a bit of getting used to but once I got the hang of it I had no problems, and the puzzle solutions are never too difficult to find. You can explore the town and go on side quests as well as continue with the main story.

11.9.2014

I bought this game when it first came out but this is the first chance I've had to sit down and write a review.Firstly, let me say this. If you are not a South Park fan don't even bother with this game. It's kinda like an inside joke, you can be involved in it and have a laugh but really you won't understand the references and why everyone else is having such a ruckus.I enjoyed this game. It's everything I wanted the game to be and more. You'll have read online that there are parts censored and there are, quite a few to be honest, but that doesn't take away from the fun.I was never into the toilet humour side of South Park so granted there are some bits that make me cringe whilst others have me in stitches laughing.

19.5.2014

I bought this game with a little bit of reluctance, despite the positive reviews. I didn't know what it could offer me in terms of 'serious' gaming and I was worried that the humour would be trying to be like the TV show to the point of being a bit tired and cringe-worthy. How wrong I was!It is of course a parody of the RPG genre, but it actually executes it pretty well in terms of quests, character upgrading and combat. The storyline is very good (outrageous and out of hand, just like one of mini-series of South Park episodes. Think Imagination Land!). The side quests are suitably varied and amusing. Despite what a few people have said, I thought the amount of playing time was fine - completed the game in about 11.5 hours.

12.7.2014

I was expecting a great game as it is one of the few that is actually made by the original creators (Matt Stone and Trey Parker) rather than the name sold and destroyed by other gaming developers like they originally with the awful N64 and PS1 South Park game if anyone remembers that!But this game gives the South Park series justice, graphics as if you're playing through an actual episode, this captures the humour of South Park we all know, love and find hilarious!Of course it's 18 for a reason, it's not for the faint hearted or easily offended,from fart spells to nazi zombie aborted babies this has really gone out of it's way to shock players! (I have never laughed so much at a game)From beginning to end,

28.5.2014

this is a great game. pure and simple. the battle mechanics are so much fun, and never at any point do you feel like this game will screw you over.even though you wil lose the odd fight, you always have the resources and powers to get you through.the fan service of the game is incredible, everywhere you look and search is choc full of easter eggs. every south park character you can think of appears in the game or atleast makes refference to them. you can even pick up junk of things that have appeared in episodes, such as poop and tonnes of other things i cant mention.the set pieces that the game throws at you are Hilarious, this game has laugh out loud moments, but also soo many cringe moments that are funny too.

2.2.2016

yes its censored in region 2, can you play the region 1 version ? anyways I have been a fan since this first showed on English TV, this is a really long time to be a fan of anything, we have watched this show become more outrageous over the years so I think the fact that its censored really hurts the story, just like episode 201 !! but those of you who can't watch region 1 DVD's wont have seen this episode as its removed from the DVD's along with episode 200, I have the region 1 DVD's ... its better than having the set with those episodes missing but 201 is pretty damn censored !!I was having a blast playing this until I saw the message SORRY REGION 2 you can't view this content, the game is rated 18,

8.4.2014

This game is not for the faint hearted. As as player you will be subject to being probed in a spaceship, crawling up a rectum and many other situations which you wouldn't expect from a main stream video game. The graphics are smooth and reflect the show perfectly and the game play (though may seem frustrating at first) in this situation is the best system to use. Matt and Trey were heavily involved in the game which shows, as the comedy is still very much satire and scatological (typical Southpark) and leaves the player wondering what events and obscene sequences lie around the corner.The only issues there are with the game is the fact that some side quests can only be done during the campaign

31.5.2014

I stopped watching South Park a long time ago so I haven't kept up with the TV show. Playing this game though makes me want to go back to the series and see what I've been missing.As a game it's one of Obsidians best I can now almost forgive them for Fallout New Vegas. The RPG elements are solid and as a game without the South Park aesthetic it's a very good and enjoyable experience. Then they added the South Park spin to it and it went to a different level. It's got childish elements, it's got the fart and anal probing jokes and if your easily offended then "why are you considering buying this game?" It's South Park and you are playing a character in that universe and you really do feel like you are one of the kid in that world.

South Park: The Stick of Truth - Reviews

Info

Analysis

Detail