South Park: The Stick of Truth Review

South Park: The Stick of Truth is hilarious in its writing just like the show, but even those who don't watch the show can play this game and enjoy it. Theres a great balance between humor and gameplay, with a fun RPG mechanic and fun boss fights.

The story is a typical South Park related one, with you being the new kid and needing to help defend The Stick of Truth from the Elves. Not only does your character create hilariously awkward situations, but the jokes made about him never speaking are fitting. Its set in modern day but the kids pretending it's medieval time, with a shop in Cartman's backyard (known as the kingdom of Cupa Keep) to buy weapons. The joke that the stables owner has diabetes is funny as hell, and Cartman is just as angry and stupid as before.

When fighting, its a turn based RPG. You can use special moves to fart on enemies, and launch projectiles via fart power. You use PP (Power Points) to use special attacks such as backstabbing for the thief class. Speaking of classes, you have pretty standard stuff, such as Warrior, Mage, Thief and... Jew. HAHAHAHAHA! The Jew class, despite the iconic idea, isn't much different from the other classes. Whilst you can stick to playing as the class is supposed to be used, there's no stopping a Jew from becoming a Mage or a Mage becoming a warrior, despite special attacks. You gotta either love it or hate it for that.

Boss fights are a neat addition. However, the first boss which is a Ginger Hall Monitor, is too easy. He does some easily blocked special attacks and usually his minions are fighting for him. When he does do some damage, its a decent amount, but as long as you have some health potions handy its nothing.

The world is small, but doesn't feel it. Whilst you are restricted to only the small town of South Park there is plenty to do, such as hunt down Manbearpig or use an Alien Probe to teleport onto a roof of a store. The side-quests feel fun, but not as fun as the main missions. Random battles are fun, and the higher the level the more useful they are to get loot. Shops for weaponry, health and armor cover the town and the references are never ending. If you get bored, there's always the option of hunting for the collectible Chipokimon. When you collect all of them, you get a prize. Not gonna spoil it for you though, go and see yourself.

You can have 2 characters together at a time, each great. Princess Kenny, Paladin Butters and so on are great characters with great attacks, and can be controlled by you in combat. Only downside to this is they can't use the special fart attacks you can, but are always useful when your character runs out of potions and they have some instead. Potions are plentiful though, the looting system is great and rarely unfair. But its forgivable since the combat is fun even if you die.

Cutscenes are packed with humor. Even though Europe (Where I'm from) got a censored version, the censored slides are pretty neat in explaining why its censored in a comedic fashion. Comedy is the same rude and great humor as you see in the show, with fart, butt, swearing and more jokes, such as parodying goths. NPCs are funny in their dialogue and match up to their character in the show brilliantly, saying lines that have pretty good voice acting for them.

Weapons are plentiful, but the only real changes (if you choose to use only the ones for your class) are damage and look. If they gave you more special attacks it would be a good feature, but as long as you have a high damage weapon you're fine. What equippable is really great is armor and bows. They have different abilities and upsides, making it possible to play the game in any way that suits you.

The Stick of Truth is an amazing game for the first one by South Park, with hilarious writing and fun gameplay. Don't expect to be dissapointed with immature humor and nothing more, the immature humor is executed great and is a full length game with many surprises. Feel free to buy this game, its definatley worth your money.

CONCLUSION
Fun - 8 The game is fun in combat and just watching cutscenes or listening to jokes can be entertaining. Not to mention that Chipokimon hunting is a fun time-killer.
Graphics - 8 Its just the same as the show, but with better animation whilst staying relevant to the cartoon style seen previously.
Writing - 9 South Park: The Stick of Truth is fall off of the chair funny. Butt jokes to references, there's something for everyone.
Story - 6.5 Whilst it is a typical South Park story you would expect, and its executed well, there's nothing spectacular about it.
Control - 8.5 The control is simple and fun, even non-gamers can get used to it.

OVERALL RATING: 8/10, or 4 stars.