Postal²

The Good
This game is FUN. Its not fun as in I have to complete this next mission to see where the story goes, its not fun as in I have to show off these graphics to my friends, its fun because you can run around and cause havoc in this town. There is a huge variety of weapons to use, and the unreal engine provides adequate environments to use them. Everything can be blown up, and cars especially go flying up into the air and land with a gratifying crash after a good explosion. Some missions can be tackled from a number of different perspectives. Example: In one mission you must infiltrate the police headquarters to obtain something, I can't recall what. One way is to use a police outfit to fit in with the other officers and just waltz right up and take it. Another is to go in guns blazing. Another way is to take some "catnip" that slows down time, thus allowing you to run by all the officers, grab it, and run out. Or there is another way, I sat on the roof of the police station, found a skylight window, and lobbed grenades, molotov cocktails, and gasoline into the headquarters until there was no one left to stop me!
The game has a...distinct...sense of humor as well. Gary Coleman makes an appearance if that gives you any idea as to the basic scope of the game.

The Bad
The AI is this game is legally retarded. Basically the people in the game just stand and shoot at you until they are dead. Occaisionally they will run for cover, but most often not. The graphics are also quite lame, weak textures with low poly models most of the time.
The biggest detractor from this game is the load times. LOOOOOONG. Moving from one section of the city to the next can take forever as the level has to load ala Half-Life and Half-Life 2. Also if you don't appreciate this kind of humor, you may be very offended by the game.

The Bottom Line
Postal 2 gets a lot of bad press because of its content and tongue in cheek attitude. You play the Postal Dude, you live in a trailer, and throughout the game you are trying to go about your business (ie picking up a pay check, getting grocceries, etc.). Eventually you get into some pretty hairy situations that require the use of bazookas and flamethrowers...must've been a pretty bad week eh? Its a first person shooter based on the Unreal engine, although it is not optimized very well. It is fairly open ended, you have a whole town to walk around in and cause mayhem, although bits of it are locked and must be opened up at later levels. Its a very politcally incorrect game. You can pee on people and yourself, douse people in gasoline, use a cat as a silencer, at smoke a "magic pipe" that somehow heals you temporarily. You can kill a whole marching band and shoot up a circus. But it's fun!