Following up the elegant Star Wars: Darkish Forces Remaster was all the time going to be robust. Reasonably than deal with one other well-known franchise, Nightdive Studios has correctly chosen to revisit one of many weirdest forgotten gems of the ‘90s with PO’ed: Definitive Version. Utilising the identical rules as Darkish Forces, Nightdive’s newest challenge breathes contemporary air into the Any Channel-developed FPS which debuted on 3DO, modernising it in all the best methods whereas sustaining a good degree of authenticity.
We should always stress proper from the beginning, although: this can be a bizarre sport, and it received’t be for everyone. The Darkish Forces Remaster was primarily based on an already well-known title, and even when you hadn’t performed the unique, it was crammed stuffed with recognisable imagery from the Star Wars franchise to assist ease you into the old-school expertise.
PO’ed: Definitive Version has none of that. Its setting, enemy design, construction, and extra are very a lot ‘exterior the field’ — if that appears like your factor, then you definately’re in for a beautiful time. We suspect, nonetheless, that in case your FPS expertise is proscribed to extra trendy examples of the style, you may need to attempt one thing a bit, nicely, much less bizarre earlier than getting into the world of PO’ed.
You play as a chef who occurs to be caught in a hostile, alien world and should use every part from frying pans to rocket launchers to outlive. See? We informed you it was bizarre. The story admittedly takes considerably of a backseat to the motion right here, with separate ranges propelling you thru the expertise with no added fluff in between. We appreciated this quite a bit; the sport locations a number of emphasis on enjoyable and freedom above all else, so not having to take a seat by cutscenes or textual content bins is a giant win in our eyes.
As for the degrees themselves, they’re typically huge. Actually huge. Early within the sport, you achieve a jetpack that may traverse wherever inside any open house. With this in thoughts, you’ll typically discover ranges made up of huge areas with brief corridors sprinkled in between. Breaking out the jetpack in smaller areas can show a bit fiddly, however zooming round in an enormous room is nice enjoyable, and it’s probably the most well-realised makes use of of a jetpack we’ve seen in any online game.
Regardless of this, most of the ranges in PO’ed are, fairly frankly, a nightmare to navigate at instances. Typically, the required pathway is extremely nicely hidden; as in, you need to go by what appears to be like to be a totally stable wall however is definitely an phantasm – that form of factor. It is undoubtedly irritating, and now we have to confess to resorting to a YouTube walkthrough of the unique on one event so we may work out the place the heck we have been speculated to go.
The fight, in the meantime, may be hit-and-miss. There are a lot of enemies all through PO’ed, and the sport tallies what number of you managed to wipe out after every degree, so there’s a superb incentive to hunt all of them down. That mentioned, your weapons aren’t essentially the most correct at the most effective of instances, and even once we enabled the crosshair function, we have been spraying bullets in every single place; virtually like we’d simply accomplished primary Stormtrooper coaching. Enemies are sometimes extremely correct, so even when you strafe forwards and backwards, most main encounters will depart you lacking a hefty chunk of well being.
Not all weapons are created equal although, so whereas the throwing knives and the essential pistol require extra focus in order to not miss your shot, others such because the Uzi, drill, and rocket launcher are a bit extra forgiving; you may comfortably waltz right into a room all weapons blazing and be assured that you just’ll eviscerate a number of enemies in a single fell swoop. What helps drastically is the inclusion of gyro aiming — a staple of Nightdive’s ports at this level — and you’ll tweak the sensitivity to fit your wants. By default, aiming is executed with the analogue sticks whereas gyro is there as a form of ‘fine-tuner’, however you may improve the sensitivity and have it’s your main technique of management, if you want.
By way of its visible and audio design, we’ve already talked about that PO’ed is a bizarre sport, and that is solely strengthened right here. The enemies embrace what appears to be like like a pair of purple lips with sharp enamel jutting out, a pair of muscular legs with a bizarre mouth, uh, there, and a lot extra. It’s odd, we inform you. The audio is analogous, and whereas there’s no music to talk of, which is unlucky, among the sounds you’ll hear could have you creased with laughter. One among our favourites must be the kung-fu-esque “Hwaaaah” the primary character emits when performing a backflip. Oh sure, you may carry out backflips at will on this sport. It’s fairly nice.
As common for Nightdive’s ports, PO’ed: Definitive Version ran flawlessly on Change at 60fps with not a single noticeable drop. The visuals are crisp, and a number of other enhancements resembling view bobbing, HUD messages, and extra have been included right here. In the event you’re after a purer interpretation of the unique, nonetheless, you may disable any or the entire enhancements throughout the choices menu. So whereas we wrestle to supply up a blanket advice for the sport itself, there’s no denying Nightdive’s efforts and talent in modernising the expertise.
Conclusion
PO’ed Definitive Version is one more high-quality instance of Nightdive Studio’s glorious work in preserving distinctive, oddball video games of yore whereas including some welcome mod cons. With this one, nonetheless, the core expertise is slightly bit too bizarre to advocate to only any FPS fan. The overall premise is odd, the enemy design is unsettling, and the structure of the degrees can show irritating, particularly for newcomers unaccustomed to its old-school methods. Regardless of this, the jetpack is actually probably the most enjoyable mechanics we have sampled in gaming, and the weird audio design had us in matches of laughter at a number of factors. In the event you’ve performed the unique or fancy trying out probably the most distinctive FPS video games from the ’90s, it is nicely price a punt.
