Painkiller

The Good
Seems Serious Sam really made a dent out there, as we are officially seeing the first clone of it right here in DreamCatcher's Painkiller, an FPS that's heavy on the action and light on the brains.

Just like "Serious", Painkiller is nothing but a shooting gallery on steroids. A throwback to the more simplified early days of FPS gaming where you'd walk into a seemingly empty hall with a big weapon or power-up floating in the air and as soon as you grab it all exists close and a gazillion enemies spawn instantly coming for you from all sides. Forget tactics, forget realism, it's all about killing the bad guys in a frenzy of bullets before they get you. And like Serious Sam proved, that concept is more entertaining than you would first believe. You can't say it's groundbreaking but it sure is entertaining... for a while anyway.

This mold of simple yet entertaining gameplay is the one Painkiller takes and coats with a dark theme much like Quake's as you are not a cartoony hero defending earth from alien invaders, but instead take the role of a "Hitman from Heaven". A wandering soul that's tasked with cleaning out the Armies of Satan from the purgatory as exchange for him getting into heaven and rejoining with his long dead wife, taking the souls of his enemies as he dispatches them... The game thus plays in the purgatory, which as imagined by the developers looks pretty much like a distorted and dark version of earth (think Silent Hill). As another reviewer noted while the level design itself is completely straightforward, the layout and art direction is not so, and manages to be a standout feature in the game, with some pretty impressive locations like the sanitarium and the opera house deserving some serious praise.

I don't know what engine the developers used but the results are pretty impressive. Not only on the levels themselves, but also on the enemies (which also have localized damage and rag-doll physics) and special effects such as when you trigger your "god mode" (acquired by collecting a determined number of souls) and which blurs and distorts your vision and surrounds all the enemies with an eerie glow (and also allows you to kill them just by looking at them!)

As for the enemies and weapons, they are all your standard "darkie" stuff you know from games like Quake or Blood, with the inclusion of some rather impressive asian-themed enemies and the hyper-gigantic bosses that steal the show and prove to be the most exciting opponents in the single-player game. As an original touch the game throws mini-objectives for you to complete in each level, usually dealing with a certain number you must reach in some of the game's many stats (killing X amount of enemies, recovering X amount of souls, etc.), should you complete those, the game rewards you with tarot cards that can be equiped before you go into the next level, and which have all sorts of different effects that you can call forth at anytime to aid you in the fights (such as stopping time, dealing cuadruple damage, etc.) a nice idea that has proved itself in other games and works like a charm here also.

Finally, the multiplayer component (the real deal-maker here) is superbly designed with enough options and quality gameplay to satisfy the most jaded frag-addict.

Oh, and the cutscenes are reeaaally good, and the goth heavy metal soundtrack Kicks ASS.

The Bad
Well, it IS a clone of Serious Sam... With everything bad that entails...: A braindead action game with braindead enemies and braindead gameplay. Continued playing either takes you to a zen-like nirvana state or makes your brain explode, as it's the same retarded shoot-everything-that-moves thing over and over and over again....

It also has some rare bugs that get you stuck in a pixel and crash the entire thing... but I'm sure that's going to be solved eventually.

The Bottom Line
It's simple enough: Liked Serious Sam? How about some Quake flavor on top of it? That's Painkiller. If you liked Serious Sam then "more of the same" doesn't exactly pose a problem to you, so you are sure to enjoy every action-soaked moment of it. However the rest of us with somewhat more diverse interests might consider the novelty but quickly forget about it as soon as anything barely more interesting comes along.

The Good
Daniel Garner is in Purgatory since his car accident. He's been separated from his wife Catherine, who is waiting for him in Heaven. Something about being not pure. One day, Sammael, an angel, gives him a mission: kill four guys. Four generals of the hellish army. Daniel accepts. If he succeeds, he'll join Catherine. He's standing in a Cemetery, weapon in hand, waiting for his first serious battle with a demon. He's the Painkiller. He's you.

Nice introduction, no? I could have done better, well, I did but in my native language, French. But we're not here to discuss about my creative skills. No, we're here for one of the most enjoyable FPS I've played: Painkiller. And well, it brings some good ideas, aside from the fact that Painkiller is an old-school FPS, you don't need brains for playing it. Just follow the successive areas, kill some demons and enjoy the gameplay.

First good point is the Black Tarot. How to obtain the cards? Play on Insomnia or Nightmare difficulty and you'll have the card... if you pass the unique challenge in each level. Let me explain the difference between silver and gold cards. Silver ones are useful during the level, even if you can only carry two at the same time. Be wise when you're choosing them, remember that for a boss fight, you can't use a card like Soul Catcher but if you have Forgiveness (gold cards use per level is two times instead of one), don't hesitate to pick it. Gold cards are limited in time and use, so, it's up to you to trigger their effects at the right moment because, unless you've chosen Mercy (3 uses) or Forgiveness (see above) as silver card, you can only make one use per level.

Second thing, difficulty makes harder the quest of the cards. Daydream is the easiest difficulty setting - I'm always playing in the easiest mode first - but Tarot isn't available. Add to this that you can't play 3 levels. That means that if you want to really enjoy the game, you must play in Insomnia where Tarot card is available, as one of the 3 blocked levels (Abandoned Factory in chapter 3 and its waves of Skeleton Soldiers). Then Nightmare is harder than the two previous ones: cheats codes don't work anymore - aaargh, I wish I could play with the god mode for some passages - . But you can play another level who was forbidden to access: Prison in chapter 2. I'll make a confidence: I don't know how I survived it but I did. And then Trauma, only available after beating Nightmare, will give access to the last level you couldn't play before - Forest in chapter 4. But you can't play chapter 5 because of a different ending and enemies don't let green souls, useful for morphing into a demon. And you've understood that your usual Black Tarot deck must change for surviving in this cruel world... in the cruel Purgatory.

Third positive point is the fact that every level has specific enemies s to it, even if it's an advance version of another one: Templars in Babel for example shoot three arrows when the Templars in the Palace are only shooting one. Enemies have a great design, I love the Samourais or the Arabian Warrior. Rare are the games with this particularity.

Fourth good point is the originality of the weapons. Don"t be sad about the fact that you have only 5 available. But each one has two (or three - discovered by the players) ways to kill the demons: for example, stakegun is also a grenade launcher. So, you have choice between the Painkiller (the unlimited ammo weapon), the Stakegun, the Freezer Shotgun, the Rocket Gatling and the Electroshuriken (or Electrodriver). Stakegun is probably the most original weapon and Electroshuriken the most beautiful.

Fifth point is the quality of the graphics, even with 4 years of age. Levels are beautiful and I can't only applause for the variety of them: from an old Asylum (scary and shocking - don't let children play with PK) to a Castle without forgetting an Old Monastery or Docks, you're traveling between insane places to religious buildings or to modern places. The game is divided in 5 chapters with a boss at the end, generally a general or for the last level, Hell, Lucifer himself.

And last but not least, the soundtrack is marvelous: vocals, hard rock, everything is just at the right place. My favorite are the ambient from Atrium, Cathedral, Old Monastery, Military Base, the Palace and Castle. Oh yeah, when you're hearing the beginning of an hard rock track, be prepared to fight against demons!

The Bad
If Painkiller was perfection, I would have erected a statue to the first game to ever gain a 20/20 on me since I'm 13/14. Before, I was too young to really see the defaults of a game. But back to Painkiller. It's not perfection. And here are the reasons:

Repetitive fights are getting on your nerves, especially with the Skeleton Soldiers in chapter 3: you never know when it will end. And you're even wondering if it will effectively end.

Difficulty can also be a negative point. Even if the way of presenting it is original (well, it's not the usual "more enemies in highest difficulty"), Nightmare and Trauma are really challenges. In Nightmare, I've never passed the Swamp Thing for example - I've played the last blocked level because one player solved the problem of accessibility, it's perhaps cheating but it was first for making Chapter 5 available in Trauma.

Another one negative point is the useless cards like Divine Intervention (effect: placing cards in the board doesn't cost a thing) who is totally useless for players.

The fact that you have only 5 weapons can be a disappointment for some players (but remember, it's a two in one). It's not an arsenal like Half-Life or Rainbow Six but originality is the keyword here.

And some moves are difficult to master: Lead Jump (well, the fact that you can direct your jump with moving your mouse) and PK Jump (use your painkiller on an object when jumping and you'll jump higher) for example.

The Bottom Line
Painkiller is a victorious return of the FPS old-school like Doom or Serious Sam, where Will Rock, released in 2003, failed. Lock, load and shoot is your motto. 2004 was also the year of Doom 3 release. What a year for the old-school FPS! Last thing before concluding the review: I played with the demo on my 5-years-old laptop (in 2008), with some slowing times. But the complete game, I couldn't install it on my laptop (normal) and on my previous computer. Luckily, I've got a new one on 2006, so, I could enjoy the magnificent graphics. I just wanted to point that if you've bought a computer before 2003/04, Painkiller will not work - my previous one was from 2001/02.

Painkiller is a good game, you'll have a lot of fun with its famous stakegun and I must warn you, Painkiller can cause addictiveness. And even if I'm writing in 2008, Painkiller didn't lose of its charm. I strongly recommend it. With its add-on, released later in 2004, Battle out of Hell and perhaps Overdose, the free mod which became a costing stand-alone, Painkiller is one of these games with a coherent universe.

The Good
The candy. Ohhh the eye- candy. Absolutely stunning graphics, great level design (extremely straightforward, but graphically impressive), amazing textures. And artistic choice of coloring. The physics (Havok 2) are also impressive- one can spend hours experimenting with the rag doll effects, the angle of impalement, the effect on each leg, member, head and so forth.

Another attempt for "depth" is the Tarot Card system. Each level carries an objective- kill all monsters, collect all gold, destroy all objects, complete level only with a certain weapon. If the objective is completed, the player is awarded with a Tarot card. These are used in game, costing a given sum of gold coins, they give away 2X damage, speed, etc.

The multiplayer aspect is of great importance- the expected modes are all there, and some new ideas are brought to flesh correctly (namely, the People Can Fly mode). The community of Pro-Gamers have been expecting this game, and major tournaments have incorporated it in their schedules.

Other cool stuff: the mini-bosses, the big-bosses, the dark mood. The demon mode: a time-limited god-mode called forth when 65 souls (dropped from perished enemies) are collected. The story (if you like silly scenarios while blasting away at the legions of doom).

The Bad
This is an extremely straightforward and simple game- Daniel dies, gets stuck in the Purgatory and must banish 4 great generals of evil... and the zillions of demons before them. All exits close when the player enters a new area- the monsters come rushing in and head straight for the bored Daniel. No tactics are involved- just speed and quick turns. Once all are dead, on to the next area. The weapons- yes, they are very perty... but the shotgun is too powerful at times. Each level presents a maximum of four different monsters- there is no variety in terms of monster models within a level. AI is completely absent.

I do not like comparisons, but many have used Serious Sam when describing Painkiller. Well, Painkiller is in fact, even more straightforward and simplistic at its core. No weird levels, no reverse gravity, no round, revolving stages: its the same "all exits close/monsters appear/monsters are slain/exits open" again and again. Its level design, in terms of architect, visualization and imaginitive use of tools, seems to suffer greatly at this point.

Other uncool stuff: The cut scenes: they seem to be missing something- i think it's called "persuasiveness". The story (if you want profound stories wrapping your gaming experience).

The Bottom Line
Somehow, it +feels+ like a Quake-game, simple and straightforward. At times, TOO simple- not even a duck command is included.

As one, a flood of mods is expected (the first mod is up as you read these lines...). My point is: Painkiller is a decent enough game. It will get a lot better.