South Park: The Stick of Truth

This should be relatively spoiler free, but a few plot points kind of have to be discussed.

No, it’s not an indie. But I sort of have to write this review and eat a plate full of crow. From the moment Trey Parker and Matt Stone took the stage of E3 a while back, I said there was no chance in hell that South Park: The Stick of Truth would be a decent, worthwhile title. I was just going off the property’s track record. South Park on Nintendo 64 and especially the PlayStation? Horrible. South Park Rally? Possibly the worst kart-racer ever. Chef’s Luv Shack? Possibly the worst quiz and/or minigame collection ever. The Tower Defense game? Well, I never really got around to it, but it mostly got a bunch of 7s out of 10s, which as we all know, is critic speak for “Worst thing since Hitler.” (By the way, I’m pretty sure that joke will get me banned in Germany) Hell, there was a fairly hyped Scott Tenorman based game that ultimately was a mediocre platformer. I think my doubts about how Stick of Truth would turn out were completely justified. If all you’ve ever shit out are turds, only someone delusional would expect the next turd to be a solid gold nugget.

I was wrong. South Park: The Stick of Truth is incredible. In fact, dare I say, it sets a new standard for licensed video games. In other news, crow has never been so delicious. Now, there are about a quagillion reviews of this out there, so I’m not going to waste time talking about the fun (though sometimes too button-mashy) combat mechanics, or how the fart mechanics are the only thing I really disliked about the game. Well, besides a laundry list of glitches and game hangs. That kind of stuff was to be expected anyway. The game is made by Obsidian Entertainment. That’s like putting a big banner on the box art saying “this shit will not work right for at least the first six to twelve months, not that it matters because you sheep will buy it anyway!” Hey, guilty as charged. And also, baaaaaaaaaaa.

You’ll notice that the main character is a guy in all the pictures. That’s because there is no option to select a girl. Do you know why there is no option? Because it didn’t fit into the story the creators wanted to tell. I’m just pointing that out because a few weeks ago, the Big Bullshit Fake Outrage of the Day© was people whining because some upcoming free-to-play Capcom MMO would not include the option to play as a girl. Butthurt was felt across the land. I guess people thought that as a vagina-owner, I should be outraged as well. I wasn’t. I pointed out that not every game has a story that a female lead-character can fit comfortably into. I guess this proved that I’m a self-hating anti-feminist that should voluntarily disenfranchise myself because obviously not being able to play as a girl in a free-to-play MMO will lead to women being walled up in the tower and fed through a slit in the wall. That’s another reason why I loved Stick of Truth: because the same people whining about that game were delighted by how this one turned out. The hypocrisy was too delicious to not point out, which just made them madder. “Um, weren’t you one of those guys (and it is almost always guys) who was whining about that Capcom MMO not having girls in it just a couple weeks ago?” “Well that’s different. This is South Park. Girls can’t fit into the story as easily!” “Weird, that’s the same argument I used for why not every game can have a girl character and you told me I was wrong. How come it’s okay for South Park but not okay for a company whom their every move you whine about?” “HOW DARE YOU POINT OUT MY DOUBLE STANDARDS! BAD FORM! BOOOOO!” By the way, tongue firmly in cheek the whole time. I just found humor in the whole situation. I guess getting outraged over the lack of mandatory, uninspired female characters in games is serious business.

Stick of Truth feels like it could be an episode of South Park. Hell, if you cut out all the exploration and battles, what’s left would probably be an episode long. Two-parter tops. That’s fine. There’s enough gags between the main narrative to keep you laughing your ass off from start to finish. It’s unquestionably a fan service, but it never feels condescending about it, like some of the more well-liked television or movies turned into games do. Some of the bits feel like they’re shoe-horned at first, like a section involving Al Gore and ManBearPig. It felt tacked on and kind of hokey at first. Then the joke paid off in such a satisfying and unconventional way that I wanted to high-five the developers through the television screen.

I also owe a big thank you Trey Parker, Matt Stone, and all the guys who worked on this game (including former XBLIG developer Roby Atadero, creator of Spoids. Ha, there, I tied this to Xbox Live Indie Games. I’m still an indie Goddess). Because of them, I realized I’m nowhere near as desensitized as I thought I was. A section based around Planned Parenthood squashed any lingering doubts about that. I played that part with my mouth gaping open, eyes blank in stunned awe, with a knowing awareness that I’m officially going to Hell now. After digesting it………. probably the wrong word considering that I think I threw up three times in between fits of laughter………. I put down the controller and spent the next hour actively wondering how on Earth this game skated by with only an M rating.

Oh, and in the “wow, this is awkward” department, my staunch Catholic mother walked in during a scene in which I was performing an abortion. Granted, there was no scene she could have walked in on that wouldn’t have resulted in a priceless look. But I’m still grateful she walked in there. Because it was so glorious. That “every suspicion I’ve had about my daughter is true” look. Sadly, I’m not as quick-witted as people think I am. If I had been, I would have said “if you think this is bad, you should see it when you’re using Kinect!”

The only part of Stick of Truth I truly loathed was the cut-scenes where you learn to fart. Because if you screw them up, you have to listen to the long, dull, repetitive, dialog all over again. It blows.

By the way, for my European and Australian readers, I guess we are supposed to pretend that abortions aren’t a thing and that if you find any humor in them at all, your countries will fall into anarchy or something like that. So if you laughed at the above story, for God’s sake, don’t tell anyone. I will not be held responsible for your respective collapses into moral bankruptcy.

South Park isn’t a perfect game, but I dare say, it’s a perfect use of an IP. Some of the stuff ran a bit too long. The Canadian section was funny for about five seconds. Then it kept going and refused to fucking end. You know, sort of like every single unfunny episode based around Canada on the show. And South Park also does that thing that nobody likes where there are collectables in a game, but some of them you only have one shot at, and if you miss them, you can’t get them later. South Park isn’t the only game guilty of this, but it stings a little more here because such TLC was put into it. This felt like something made by people who love games for people who love games. Whenever that’s the case, those awful, always bitched-about problems always seem more damning.

And yea, I have to go back on my word and bring up all the fucking glitches. They really start to pop up over the last hour of the game. I had a few game-killing hangs, where it would enter a load screen and never leave it. There is a practical fix to this, in that you can get past it just by switching which secondary character you’re using. But it seems fairly common, in that most of the people I’ve talked with have encountered it. I also had a hang while in a, ahem, “cave” in the final level of the game. Then one immediately following that. Then in the final boss battle, some of the secondary character abilities caused the animation to lag, which made correctly using those abilities a bit fickle.

By the way, this is your fault. Yes, you. And you too. All of you. If you guys wouldn’t whine like babies whenever a hyped game gets delayed (which is typically done to make sure shit like this doesn’t happen), games wouldn’t come out like this. I saw it with Grand Theft Auto V too. “Waaaaaa! They delayed GTA V! It won’t be out when I thought it would be out and I will have nothing better to do for months! A pox on your studio!” Then it did come out, but GTA Online wasn’t ready yet, and a lot of people absolutely shit a brick over it. South Park had a few delays, then was set to come out in December. It got delayed again, and everyone farted. It could have probably stood a few more months of play-testing, but given how you guys farted over the last delay, I can’t really blame them for putting it out like this. It’s basically what you asked for.

Pictured: an average gamer upon learning of a small delay in a game’s release date.

But, South Park: The Stick of Truth is still an awesome video game. The best adaption of a television show I’ve seen. Possibly just the best adaption, period. I’ve heard arguments that it’s actually Escape From Butcher Bay (yea, but the movie sucked), Spider-Man 2 (ugh, try playing it today), or one of the Arkham games (okay, yeah, those were pretty good. Well, at least the first two were). Nah. South Park is the best because it feels like you’re playing the show. There’s no seams or stitches to be seen. The plot, writing, and voice acting all feel like it fits into the South Park universe, as opposed to being a video game built around it. Those Arkham games feel like video games based around Batman. The Stick of Truth simply is the South Park we all know and love. And it is so very, very wrong. You guys are sick fucks, you know that?

South Park: The Stick of Truth was developed by Obsidian Entertainment

$59.99 said an episode of the show where the boys fight over making and indie game is a no-brainer in the making of this review.

South Park: The Stick of Truth is Chick-Approved.