At a glance...

The Baconing review

When Matt gave me this review code, I must admit I wasn't entirely sure what kind of game I'd be playing. I am, of course, familiar with the DeathSpank games, of which this is the third, but I'm ashamed to say that actually playing either of the previous games was something I have yet to have the pleasure of. So, armed only with my first-hand knowledge of Hothead's Penny Arcade games, I typed in my XBLA code...and left my Xbox to download the game whilst I went and did something else.

My first play of the game left me wondering whether I'd be able to progress at all far enough to write a review. Death was a far too regular occurrence. Even after the game had informed me that the difficulty could be changed, and I had taken the hint, I frequently found myself reappearing at the local outhouse (the DeathSpank equivalent of save points/teleporters). I'm not sure whether The Baconing's producers were assuming most people would have played the previous games, or whether they just wanted to throw the player in early on (...or whether I just wasn't all that good), but thankfully I managed to get to grips with the controls with some perseverance. This isn't to say that the tutorial's bad, in fact it seemed to cover everything (including the hint system) in a way that didn't feel like a tutorial, but rather there seemed to be a few too many enemies to start with.

Once I'd stopped dying all the time, I had some time to take in what The Baconing's actually about. You are DeathSpank, the hero (or, at least, titular character) from the previous games, who has unfortunately managed to summon a giant evil robot by the name of the Anti-Spank by wearing all of the Thongs of Virtue at the same time. To rectify the damage caused by the Anti-Spank, your task is to seek out bacon fires in five locations and to burn the thongs, killing enemies and completing side-missions along the way, before finally defeating the giant robot himself in combat. I would say that I'm sure that the storyline makes far more sense if you've played the previous games, but I'm not so certain...

Earlier I mentioned that I'd previously played the Penny Arcade games from Hothead, which I quite enjoyed when they came out a couple of years ago. Setting aside the point that combat is completely different (the PA games had turn-based conflicts, whilst The Baconing is real-time), there are a number of similarities in the two series. Firstly and most obviously, the presentation of the game has a very distinctive Hothead style; it's hard to describe, but instantly recognisable. Secondly, it's somewhat of a hybrid between an old-style adventure game and an RPG - there's a lot of fighting, levelling up, and choosing of armour and weapons, but then there are also some puzzle elements where you have to think about what you need to do to progress. Oh, and it also most certainly doesn't take itself seriously, with humour being a strong point of the game.

Now, contrary to my initial impressions, The Baconing isn't a never-ending stream of death. Once you get used to the controls, which aren't that bad once familiarized, encountering enemies becomes a far less dreaded prospect, and it wasn't long before I found myself getting into the flow of things (well, until I got lost for a bit). There's something satisfying about breaking up a pack of enemies, bashing the ones who follow you with your shield whilst reflecting ranged attacks back towards their source. It's especially satisfying using some of the Weapons of Justice - weapons that either deal a large amount of damage, or which have some other special effect such as immobilizing enemies. And who can resist using the orphan gun, a weapon that propels orphans towards enemies at great speed? Well, there do seem to be a number of them about in Spanktopia... or did, at least. Unfortunately, the novelty does wear off when you're facing large groups of enemies, or in one of the boss battles; the fighting comes down to a fairly monotonous stream of blocks, attacks, and potions. Thankfully most of the enemies go away for good when you slay them the first time round, with only a few respawning when you come back to an area.

There are also a number of safe zones (well, areas which are safe to DeathSpank at least), such as a city and, erm, a retirement village for gods, and these locations replace fighting with side missions. These are occasionally combat-based (there's a string of challenges in the city which involve beating progressively harder enemies), but they usually take the form of a puzzle. Unfortunately this is where I found The Baconing to be a bit lacking - I only had to get a hint once, and that was because the mission was "use a fortune cookie", where fortune cookies are the currency for the hint system. In one case I'd even found the required information and written it down before I knew what the task was. There also aren't very many of these missions, and the ones that are there are very short-lived. Perhaps the audience The Baconing is aimed towards prefers a more action-packed game, but I feel that it could have done with less fighting and more (and tougher) puzzles.

The aspect I have yet to touch on is the writing; The Baconing is filled with well-written and genuinely funny dialogue. From DeathSpank cheerfully agreeing to contaminate well water with parasitic spores, to asking a meaty mascot for bits of his flesh, there's a lot of enjoyment to be had. It's not just the dialogue, either - there are little touches everywhere, such as the eclectic sets of armour (ranging from Elvis to steampunk to leprechaun to "Ender of Games"), the enemies (I now fear gummy bears, and worry that trees are going to shoot at me), and the weapons (including one which calls in a dragon to attack from above). Cut-scenes are rare, but when they appear, they are actually engaging and amusing, which I find to be uncommon.

I said I'd never played either of the previous DeathSpank games, but The Baconing has left me wanting to give them a go. Knowing that Ron Gilbert, a veteran of the adventure gaming industry, had worked on them makes me hopeful that the issues I found with The Baconing, namely too much monotonous fighting and not enough side-missions and puzzles, might have been better balanced. That's an unfortunate thing to take away from a game, that its predecessors may not have the niggles that you found with it, but this is what I'm wondering after finishing it. This isn't to say that The Baconing is a terrible game - it kept me playing it without feeling like a chore, and it was honestly fun in many points. It just could have done with that little bit more excitement in combat situations and some more well-developed missions.

Ratings

Copyright Information

Website design and content (c) 1999-2012 allaboutgames.co.uk.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License, except where otherwise noted.

Smileys taken from Crack's Smilies.