Painkiller: Gold Edition

The Good
Do you like old school first person shooters, like Doom? Don't be silly... of course you do! Have you played Painkiller? No? Well, you should. Painkiller is a delightfully old school shooter, so if you liked any of the old school shooters or more recent Arcade style shooters like Serious Sam you are bound to squeeze some enjoyment from Painkiller.

The game doesn't bullshit around with things like a story (There are cinematics, but thank god for the skip button) or complex level designs. Some could say the games style is even simpler than Doom considering it throws the dreaded key card hunt out of the window. All you need to know is this: Satan and his generals are about to attack heaven, and that isn't good so you need to go out there and shove a boot up his ass.

The gameplay is fast paced and very fun, its simple yet cathartic and fun. Levels breeze by and you'll rarely ever have to back track unless you are looking for secrets or trying to collect all the gold and whatnot. There are no confusing mazes or switch/key card hunts and a compass will show you the way to the next battle so you'll never get lost and this keeps the flow of the action going at a fast pace.

The graphics were pretty cool for the time. Considering the premise, obviously there is a lot of dark scenery and satanic imagery as well as plenty of Gothic architecture. A lot of the environments definitely recall the castles and churches of Quake thankfully a little less brown. The game does have plenty of varied environments though, and each episode has a different look. Enemies look cool, like something out of a cheesy 80s horror movie or a Heavy Metal album. There are lots of great special effects and the animations are nice.

There's a lot of content here. There are tons of levels between the two "games" ('Painkiller' and 'The Battle out of Hell.' I've heard that Battle out of Hell was originally an expansion pack, but the copy I own has both on the same disc) and the games various 'episodes.' There are also plenty of enemies and the weapons kick ass. The arsenal might seem small at first, (5 in the base game, 7 in Battle out of Hell) but in truth that number is doubled because each gun is a two-in-one deal. There's the eponymous Painkiller, a spinning blade of death that can also be used as whip, a shotgun that can also freeze enemies, a stake gun that pins enemies to walls and can also shoot grenades, a minigun that doubles as a rocket launcher, and of course the infamous gun that shoots lightning and shurikens! In Battle out of Hell, you will also get a flamethrower with an assault rifle and a sniper like gun that shoots cluster bombs and standard sniping rounds. Many of the guns also have a combo move, meaning there's a lot of death to deal.

The bosses are awesome. They are absolutely massive and they get larger and meaner each episode. Some of them can even make the Cyberdemon look like a puny pansy.

If you are a fan of horror movies, there are a lot of nods to classic horror movies, especially in the 'Battle out of Hell' levels. In fact the first level in Battle out of Hell is set in a ghostly orphanage, and when you enter the Foyer a ball comes bopping down the staircase in a nod to one of my favourite 80's horror flicks, "The Changeling." Noting these references is always fun.

The physics are over the top and hilarious. Watching enemies fly 50 feet into a wall after blasting them with your shotgun or pinning an enemy to the wall with a stake gun by his pinkie finger is satisfying and cathartic and often funny if you have a penchant for black humour.

The Bad
Load times. UGH. The load times in this game are some of the worst ever encountered. Some times the game will load fairly quickly, but other times it won't, and sometimes the load times can span up to 3 minutes and more often then not the Boss levels take a full 10 minutes to load. Even on newer PCs, this is an issue.

The AI is poor. To be fair, these kinds of games aren't exactly noted for great AI, all the AI really needs to do is run up to your guy and hurt them. You will forget about this issue thanks to the fast paced gameplay, although there are occasions where the AI will get stuck in the scenery and sometimes they even fall out of the scenery.

The music is "meh." Most of the time there's this cheesy metal playing, and other times there's some surprisingly good ambience, but the ambience doesn't really set in since it only plays inbetween battles.

The Black Tarot and Soul sucking gameplay elements are a snooze. While I suppose completionists will eat these elements up, and some black tarot cards are a joy to put into play and alter the gameplay in a fun way, earning them is a chore. It breaks the flow of the game to have to sit there forever waiting to pick up each soul or backtrack the level to break every stupid barrel just to get a card.

Although Battle out of Hell is still a ton of fun, it isn't as good as the first portion of the game. Since I played them back to back not knowing it was an expansion pack at first, I kinda felt like the game was slowly fizzling out.

The Bottom Line
Painkiller is a balls to the wall old school shooter, and if that's your thing, you will absolutely love it. It's an addictive game and blasting apart enemies with the creative weapons is a joy. It won't wow you if you prefer modern shooters and don't like the old school ones, but if you've been dying to play something like Doom with more modern technical details then Painkiller is for you. You can do what I did and buy this version of the game on Steam, and right now it's only 15 bucks and there is plenty of bang for that buck.

The Good
When I first purchased this game, it actually came on 6 CDs. So I installed it and discovered that it was updated to 1.62. I took a moment to update it to 1.64, which provided a bloom effect.

This game is fun! There is rampant carnage to be fully engaged. You watch as the Havok engine tosses baddies left and right, occasionally exploding or tossing like a rag doll. The developers were very clever in designing both levels and designs. Each level managed to spook and challenge unlike most FPS as of late.

Some levels, like the Oil Rig level were enormous by game standards, and left you breathless as you faced a very long fall from towering cranes. The Roller Coaster level was a blast if not one of the hardest levels in the game.

Sound was worked so ambient noises were there to fool you. Each monster had its own unique sound, so you could anticipate attacks. The ambient music between fights was pleasant enough.

Special Kudos to the Designers for the final Hell map. It was the most ingenious use of the Havok engine I've ever seen.

The checkpoint save worked to avoid redundancy by autotracking your progress through game. Ammo is everywhere, so explore and you'll find it.

The Bad
Story, What Story? The FMVs were ok, but hardly the same quality as the exemplary work done by Blizzard. It was as if it was slapped together by Poser software. The voice actors did an ok job as well.

A lot of music is industrial metal and very repetitious, excessively noisy with a couple exceptions. Clipping was a minor problem. Crashing wasn't such a minor problem. The game would crash on certain levels, forcing you to start over from the last saved point.

The Bottom Line
Rough but a lot of fun!! You can pick up in the bargain bin and you should if your system has the hard ware to support it.