This game has me torn. On the one hand I commend the creators for making a game that stands out from the rest of the pack. On the other hand, it doesn’t deliver enough of what it promises, and too much on things that it shouldn’t. Confused? Yeah, I still am a bit as well.
In DeathSpank, you play as the titular character. He is a hero to the downtrodden and an enemy to all things evil. Your main quest is to uncover “The Artifact” thus finally fulfilling his life long goal, to be the hero he always knew he would be. However once he actually obtains said artifact, it is taken from him by henchmen of Lord Von Prong. The rest of the game is spent with DeathSpank trying to make his way into Von Prongs castle stronghold to recover “The Artifact” once again.
DeathSpank is a sort of dumbed down, Diablo-style, loot grab, hack and slash type mash up. You will find many many different sorts of weapons, armor and magical items along your journey. Some of which are pretty helpful and some of which I personally NEVER used. The main quest is what obviously drives the game towards completion, however the majority of your time will be spent doing nonsensical side quests. This was the first sticking point for me.
The game was touted as being “from the creator of Monkey Island Ron Gilbert” in pretty much every press release and preview. This was good news. I loved that series, and still do. It’s humor, as well as clever puzzles, always tickled my funny bone as well as sometimes making my brain hurt. However this game is severely lacking in the puzzles, and the humor is, well… sophomoric at best. Seriously, I am a kid at heart but having said that, poop jokes in video games are just not funny anymore. There is a quest that will have you hitting demons with a hammer in order to literally “beat the poop” out of them. If that wasn’t enough, later you will have to coat turnips in a special jelly in order to collect the poop of unicorns. Come on, aren’t we past this yet?
What DeathSpank does have, is style. I love the way the world looks. Everything from the flat and almost cardboard cut out style of certain environmental elements such as trees and houses. Also the subtle way that the world kind of curves off at the horizon line is done with great effect. Just about everything in the game looks very unique and well thought out.
Seeing as how this game really is a hack and slash at heart it suffers from the same issue that has plagued that genre since it’s creation; tedium. After about five or six hours of working my way around the world it becomes so repetitive that I had to really work to finish the game. In the higher levels of your character development it’s almost unbearable because you know that there is nothing left to discover. Working towards the level cap meant a grind that would make most Final Fantasy fans cringe. I guess what I am saying is that the pacing seemed a bit off by the end and the quests became boring.
It was announced last month that the sequel for DeathSpank is not only done but would be available for download in September. “DeathSpank; Thongs of Virtue” will be available to XBLA and PSN on September 21st. This is one of those rare occasions of “too much too soon”. Most people just shelled out $15 for the first game a little over a month ago and now you want them to drop another $15 on the sequel. I just don’t know that I care enough at the moment to pony up for more poop jokes and quests for tacos (yes tacos) right now. This is definitely a game that if it were on PC (which it may still be at some point) and Steam had it on sale, I could say it’s worth it. However I just don’t know. Play the demo over and over and see if you still enjoy it. If so then you may want to pick it up.
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