

6 people found this review funny 0 107 people found this review helpful6 people found this review funny

Recommended 30.9 hrs on record

I only recently decided to get this game while it was on sale, and I binged the whole thing in a week and a half. Honestly, it was great, and despite what the overall rating will show, this game IS a huge improvement on the original South Park game. While the first game felt more like a funny story to be experienced rather than played, The Fractured but Whole does truly attempt to become a game with depth and strategy that the Stick of Truth lacked. In some ways it succeeded in that. In other ways, it is held back from what it truly wants to become.



First of all, let me say this: the reason the first game was so well received was primarily due to its sheer novelty, charm, and hilarity. For a sequel of such a game to be successful, the first two aspects, novelty and charm, wouldn't be able to carry its flaws anymore. Both from a strategy perspective and balance-wise, the Stick of Truth's gameplay was a joke. TFBW fixes this all by introducing a compelling tile-based combat system, making enemies' movesets and behavior far more diverse, turning each boss fight into a unique strategical experience, and rebalancing summons and ultimates to be useful but not game-breaking. "But," some of you who have played the game may say, "The game still is broken. ultimates are overpowered, and fights are the easiest thing in the world with no strategy whatsoever!" This is both true and false, and one of my main gripes with the game: the offered difficulties.



Let's be real. Anything except the hardest difficulty in this game is a joke. And what's sadder, the hardest difficulty, diabolic, was only introduced with a DLC update later on. This is game-ruining for many players who don't know what they're getting themselves into. Clearly, because the publishers wanted TFBW to appeal to a wide audience, and not only fans of strategy games, they decided to transform a game so well balanced and thoughtful into a walk through the kiddie park. I imagine they did this in part because the first game was so successful, and they attributed part of that success to how easy it was. But i will repeat, if you play this game on Diabolic, it will actually be fun. That's right, the hardest difficulty, which is normally meant for people looking to subject themselves to torment and misery, is actually how I believe this game was meant to be played. Despite this, though, there are still countless non-combat elements that will never scale up depending on the difficulty, which is sad. The DDR toilet sequences will always be ridiculously easy no matter the star-rating, the puzzles are simplistic and mindless, and surprise encounters are incredibly easy to avoid. I wish this could have been different, but you have to live with what you got.



Now that I've gone over that, some other improvements over the first game are first and formost regarding the visuals and UI. So sleek. So satisfying. So responsive. And the effects! So explosive. So gosh darn POWERFUL. By the way, play this game with a controller. The rumble responses you get from the actions in this game are orgasmically satisfying. I can't say enough about the visual feedback this game has to offer.



Also, sidequests are more or less necessary now, and they go hand in hand with the main story. To achieve the power you need for the end, you're kind of meant to do all the non-collecting oriented sidequests. And that's so nice. I like the feeling of truly accomplishing the entirety of a game when I'm done with it, and I also hate the feeling of doing every side quest and becoming to powerful for the finale to be any fun.



Oh, and the game is funny. Did I mention that it's funny?

The jokes and characters are unarguably what carries both South Park games more than anything, and man, did they nail it with this one. There is no semblance of a cop-out when it comes to writing in this sequel. If you love the humor of South Park, you will love love love this game's story.



Now for a few more cons. Minor ones, to wrap things up.

I wish the buddy actions were a little faster. I wish fast travel was a little faster, too. Sometimes I just wish I could get through an area and on to the next fight without watching the all the little cutscenes every time. I don't care how cool they are the first couple times, it gets a tad stale.

I wish this game wasn't so expensive. This is the reason I didn't buy it right off the bat when it was released. I picked TFBW up for 9 bucks on sale. I'd say the game is worth 25 dollars, so don't buy it for more than that. Don't get me wrong, there's tons of story and playtime, I just don't think this is one of those justifiably 60 dollar price tag Triple-A sellout games.

And lastly the DLC. Really, DLC? South Park games aren't Bethesda games, Ubisoft. Stop trying to turn this fun franchise into a cash cow. The Ubisoft club exclusive items are stupid as hell too, and unbalanced to boot. And why do I even have to sign into Ubisoft to play the dang game? Can I not play a single-player game offline? I hate this kind of stuff. But that's Ubisoft and EA for you. Holding back works of art for more than a decade.



My final say is get the game. Use a controller. Play on diabolic. And watch the hours disappear. It's fun. Way more fun than Stick of Truth. And it is, despite its few flaws, deserving of a 5-star rating from me. I hope you get a chance to pick this one up.

