It's not often that I'll buy a game based solely on the pedigree of its lead designer, but when Ron Gilbert comes out of hiding to make a game, I have to admit that I'm usually the first in line. It's well known that his Monkey Island series is among the funniest in Videogamedom, and as far as I'm concerned, if his latest creation, DeathSpank, ended up being just a fraction of the quality of some of his previous work, it'd still be worth more than most other games out there.
So now that I've played through the game, the inevitable question that comes up is, "how does it stack up?" Well, the bad news is that DeathSpank isn't quite as inspired as the best of the revered Monkey Island series. But on the other hand, it's still better than most other games out there -- assuming of course that you have a high tolerance for underwear jokes.
DeathSpank is set in a cell-shaded, pseudo-high fantasy world populated by such broad yet somehow appropriate creatures like a hippy, rock 'n' roll loving tree, taco craving knights, and murderous chickens. You take on the role of DeathSpank, whose not-quite smirk-inducing name is indicative of the rather one sided nature of his character; which you can think of as an ultra-hammy mashup of Don Quixote and Captain Qwark. He's amusing enough I guess, but when stretched out over the course of an entire game it's more than likely that the schtick will become a bit grating. Still, the game's wit doesn't end with DeathSpank, and thankfully, the various characters you'll encounter, as well as the myriad in-jokes and pop-culture/gaming references sprinkled throughout counterbalance the rather one-note tone of the game's protagonist.
What you can take away from this is that, without a doubt, Gilbert's trademark sense of humor is well accounted for -- a fact that alone makes DeathSpank a game worth checking out.
But if Gilbert games are known for their humor, they're just as known for their genre, the much beloved point-and-click, graphic adventure. However, if you're expecting a Lucasarts type experience, guess again.To use Gilbert's own words, DeathSpank can be described as "Monkey Island meets Diablo." This basically means that DeathSpank incorporates the loot system of Blizzard's Diablo with the puzzle elements of his own series. When I first heard this, I was genuinely excited. It's a unique idea to be sure, but it turns out that the elements of the former end up working a bit better than those of the latter.
The vast majority of your time with the game will be spent traveling to different areas of the map, hacking and slashing your foes, all the while grabbing the weapons, ammo, and armor that their dispatched bodies drop. The balanced nature of ranged, melee and element-based weapons keeps the action interesting as well as pretty challenging. And if games like this have a tendency to become rather tedious, DeathSpank does a good job keeping itself fresh by frequently introducing new enemies and environments. Let me put it this way, when the enemies included crazed unicorns that drop rainbow-colored, er... waste, from a design standpoint, half your work is done.
Yet, considering how engaging the game's action and scenario is, the puzzle solving aspects of the game -- what should be Gilbert's forte -- seem an afterthought by comparison. Not only are the puzzles rarely challenging or inspired, but really, they're hardly there at all. For every one hour or so of hack and slash, you can expect one puzzle -- which more often than not is only a "puzzle" insofar as "go fetch me an 'X' for my 'Z'" can be considered a puzzle. Moreover, those challenges that aren't fetch quests typically involve using an item in your inventory with a piece of the environment, or another item in a way that is hardly ever intuitive. This inconsistency has the effect of leaving the player confused as to when he needs to progress by adding one item in his inventory with another, or by heading out for some enemies in hopes that they'll drop the specific item you need.
DeathSpank is three parts prime Diablo, and one part second-rate Monkey Island. But like I said earlier, less-than-stellar Ron Gilbert is still great by most other standards, and DeathSpank isn't bad by any means. So the puzzle elements aren't that great -- big deal. This game is fast-paced, funny, deep, challenging, fun, and certainly lives up to his venerable pedigree. Just not in the way most of us may have been expecting.
Share this article
