That is an IGN opinion piece from Ryan McCaffrey, who labored at Official Xbox Journal from 2002-2012 through the unique Xbox and Xbox 360 period earlier than becoming a member of IGN, the place he stays “the Xbox man.” Within the run-up to Xbox’s twenty fifth anniversary, he’ll be sharing his recollections from the platform’s first quarter-century.
I pushed my method to the entrance of the road of IGN editors to evaluation South Park: The Stick of Reality in 2014. I’ve seen each episode of South Park earlier than and since. I’m of the opinion that present creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone are the 2 premier satirists of our era. In my opinion, the puppet-led Group America: World Police is a comedic masterpiece. Heck, I even love the box-office bust the blokes starred in again in 1998, BaseKetball. So yeah, I’m an enormous fan of those guys, and once I discovered they had been making a role-playing recreation with Obsidian Leisure, of all builders (at Parker and Stone’s request!), I couldn’t wait to see the outcomes of this match made in heaven. At the least on paper. As a result of in contrast to earlier notorious South Park video video games like South Park Rally, Parker and Stone could be straight concerned this time.
However then the enterprise facet of the video games business received in the best way. At the least for some time. You could or could not do not forget that THQ – the unique incarnation of it – was funding and publishing The Stick of Reality. However a humorous factor (sadly, not the great sort of humorous) occurred through the course of growth: THQ filed for chapter. Uh-oh. Whereas the undertaking fortunately wasn’t canceled, the publishing rights to it had been put up for public sale as a part of the chapter, and the South Park people weren’t precisely blissful about it.
Mercifully, avid gamers weren’t robbed of the possibility to play The Stick of Reality, as Ubisoft purchased the rights, enabling Parker, Stone, and the Obsidian crew to complete the RPG. Regardless of its mammoth 850-page first script draft, the ultimate recreation didn’t find yourself being a very lengthy RPG at round 12 hours lengthy. However boy oh boy did it make each minute rely. I ceaselessly laughed in a very doubled-over approach I’d by no means laughed at a online game earlier than, and matched with its basic (if easy) turn-based RPG gameplay, I fortunately gave The Stick of Reality a 9 out of 10, and to this present day, if somebody asks me what the funniest recreation I’ve ever performed is, that is my clear-cut reply.
When you haven’t performed The Stick of Reality, it’s completely not too late. The graphics look precisely just like the present, in order that they haven’t actually aged in any respect. In reality, as a 12-hour RPG, The Stick of Reality is like taking part in an extended season of the present. Parker and Stone’s fingerprints are throughout this factor, with Obsidian’s game-building and style experience underpinning the entire thing. I dare you to not snigger hysterically on the Underpants Gnome boss struggle, the scene with Mr. Slave, the Canada part, and so many extra.
I’ve performed loads of genuinely humorous video games through the years. The basic LucasArts point-and-click journey video games of the ‘90s had been formative for me (the Monkey Island video games, Sam & Max Hit the Street, Full Throttle, and many others.). Saints Row: The Third was stuffed with humorous stuff. Portal 2 is basic. Excessive on Life is a good latest instance. However for me, none of them come even near the masterclass that Parker and Stone taught the gaming world with The Stick of Reality. Heck, even its sequel, South Park: The Fractured However Complete – which Park and Stone had been additionally concerned in – didn’t fairly land the identical approach. So I’m extremely fortunately that The Stick of Reality survived THQ’s chapter and have become a basic. It’s one among my favourite Xbox recollections from the primary 25 years of this model (although, by all means play it on any platform you possibly can!).
Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s govt editor of previews and host of IGN’s weekly Xbox present, Podcast Unlocked, and a co-host of Subsequent-Gen Console Watch. He is a North Jersey man, so it is “Taylor ham,” not “pork roll.” Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.