There is a game called Postal 2 for ps2. Is it any good and should i get it for my kids

Postal 2
REVIEWER/Chris Hudak
PUBLISHER/ Whiptail Interactive
DEVELOPER/Running with Scissors

http://www.gamesdomain.co...tal_2.html

Reprising his role from the 1997 top-down killfest Postal, the disturbed, trenchcoated, wisecracking Paradise, Arizona-based protagonist known only as "The Postal Dude" has settled down - at least, relatively speaking. Apparently having completed his parole (and/or extensive psychiatric counseling), The Postal Dude now has a girlfriend, a dog, a car and a home, and he even has a job - with game developer Running With Scissors, no less.



But all is not well in Paradise, come this fine Monday morning: Postal Dude's house is a rubbishy trailer, his car won't start, his dog just piddled on him, Running With Scissors just fired his ass, and his woman is a weapons-grade nutter who already has his day all planned out with a lot of mundane errands. It's enough to make a guy a tad... antisocial.

Postal 2 is a first-person game that has players walk a week in the Postal Dude's boots. The absolute, minimal conditions for "victory" each day of the week are straightforward to the point of somnambulism: show up for work; cash your paycheck; pick up some milk; procure signatures for a petition. But life is never that easy, especially in a town full of borderline psychopaths, most of whom -- just like the real-life Arizona -- seem to be heavily armed. In a world where you have to show up for work even if it's just to go get FIRED, it's tempting to take a few detours from your chore-route to shoot up the local populace a bit.



And you're free to. Problem is, so is everybody else in town, and seemingly normal situations can go drastically south in an instant. There you are, waiting in line to cash your paycheck at the bank (listening to piped-in, calculatedly-awful Muzak), when a group of thugs try to rob the place, and all hell breaks loose. Or maybe you'll just tire of waiting in line and start the festivities yourself by opening fire on the six slow-pokes ahead of you in line. Either way, the ensuing chaos is a perfect time to choose sides... or maybe hop the counter and pilfer the vault for some much-needed cash!

Oh, that wasn't smart - now the local police will be after you, along with any armed, collateral damage bystanders you happened to clip with a few stray rounds. Have fun getting out of the bank alive, buddy.

Or this: You're in the local mini-mart, trying to buy a quart of goat's milk, when you suddenly realize you don't have any cash. Becoming a shoplifter on the spot, you decide to dash out the front door... at which point shop-owner seven wives come out from behind every door and obstruction, wailing their warbling war-cries and coming after you with automatic rifles. Won't do THAT again, will you?



Or maybe -- just maybe -- you'll want to be as nice a guy as you can, and simply make your way from errand to errand without ever firing a single offensive shot. It's certainly possible -- but tough, and not recommended -- to play the pacifist as you clamber about Paradise Arizona's free-roaming environs. Paradise is a fully realized township with lots of variety, details and sub-locales for the curious to explore. These include the Paradise police station (where the player can actually wind up imprisoned, necessitating escape), an establishment that is obviously a gay dance club (with a great name, which we won't spoil), a shopping mall (where you can attend a book-signing for a chance to meet, or shoot, in-game guest star Gary Coleman), the aforementioned bank, a church, a depot with lots of platform-style ledges, and a host of others.

Postal 2 is probably the least politically correct and most equal-opportunity game of all time. If it moves in the game, you can attack it - and probably should, before it comes after you. Nearly every broad group of people imaginable is here in the game's 150+ non-player-character permutations... and if you want to, you can kill every last one of them, often in some inventive, funny/disturbing way.



For sheer entertainment value, some of the best targets in the game are videogame-protester crazies (who rail for non-violent games... and suddenly storm the in-game RWS offices with an arsenal weapons), game-geeks of questionable hygiene, at least three distinct types of Taliban... and last but never least, recognizable employees of Running With Scissors themselves, easily spotted by their distinctive T-shirts! Many who protested Postal 2's content before the game's release made a point of asking Running With Scissors president Vince Desi how HE would like being shot; not only are you able to do it in Postal 2, but you may actively want to, after he sacks you and laughs. Unzipping your pants with a keyboard command and urinating on him is also an acceptable alternate.

We probably forgot to mention the tactical applications of urination: There may be persons or things burning that you don't wish to burn, and... well, you gotta do what you gotta do.

While each day's handful of "chores" are required to move forward, the bulk of the game is about freely exploring all of Paradise's gags, secrets and idiosyncrasies. Once you put yourself into the mindset of explorer, there all kinds of incidental events to witness and participate in. Firefights and clashes amongst the populace can break out spontaneously. Dogs can be your enemy or, with a little work, can become your best friend. It's all about getting into the world, the cartoon-violent rag-doll physics and the sick-minded results when the two meet. It would have been great if all the individual objects throughout the levels (televisions, computers) were as interactive as the overall scheme of the game, but it's all geared toward how you react to the characters' actions... and they to yours. Some of those videogame protesters screamed when we peed on one of their soccer-moms, and a couple pulled out guns and shot us up pretty bad... but it was worth it! We'd do it again!



There is a downside to all this merry ugliness, and one extremely aggravating and inescapable issue is the load-zones. Paradise is broken up into numerous free-roaming zones, decently sized but often separated by tunnels. Passage through these tunnels activates the load for the next area, and depending upon how much side-questing you choose to partake in, it's possible to hit two or three such loads en route to your objective. Expect some abnormally long wait times.

It should be obvious, but Postal 2 is deliberately engineered to offend while entertain, and on that score it is very good at its job. If you're playing around others, expect to have passersby freeze in amusement (or horror, or both) over your shoulder, asking if you in fact did/killed/befouled what they think you just did. Unfortunately, all the violently fun physics and gross, inventive application of weapons and other items is a single-player experience only, which is limiting in the long run. It just cries out for multiplayer, particularly when you can lay down a snaking path of gasoline for half a block and light it up; what a way to trap and kill your local or online friends! Alas, it's not there. Yet, anyway.

CtheUncanny said:

No.

Firsly - Postal 2 is a shit game. Truly dreadful. It's a PC game, not a PS2 game IIRC.

Secondly - it is rated "18" by ELSPA in the UK. I imagine a similar rating applies in the US. That means it is suitable for adults only.

Although it does feature Gary Coleman