Postal 2
Postal² is a 2003 computer game by Running With Scissors. It is a sequel to the 1997 Postal. Both are highly and intentionally controversial due to high levels of graphic violence, particularly aimed at unarmed civilians. Unlike its predecessor, Postal² is a first-person shooter based on the Unreal Graphics Engine.
Story
In Postal², the player takes on the role of 'The Postal Dude', a tall thin man with a goatee, sunglasses, a blue alien t-shirt and a big black leather coat. 'The Postal Dude' lives in a trailer park with his nagging wife (only identified in the credits as 'Postal Dude's Bitch'.) in the fictional Arizona mining town of 'Paradise'. The game levels are split into days of the week starting monday and finishing friday. At the start of each day the player is given several tasks to accomplish, such as 'Get milk', 'Confess sins', etc. The rest is, supposedly, up to the player. The purpose of the game is to get through as much of the game as possible without going berzerk and gunning people down, or, failing that, to avoid getting caught and being thrown in jail. This proves to be exceedingly difficult, as the citizens of Paradise seem absolutely determined to make life hell for one another. The player must put up with being flipped the bird, being mugged, being attacked by protestors, being put upon by an obnoxious convenience store owner/Taliban terrorist and his patrons who cut before you the "money-line", a hideously annoying marching band and Gary Coleman, among many many other things..
Chores
Monday
- Get paycheck from Vince at Running With Scissors
- Get goat's milk from Lucky Ganesh convenience store
- Cash pay check at Fee of America bank
Tuesday
- Confess your sins at the church
- Get signatures on "Petition to make whiney congressmen play violent video games"
- Return book to the library
- Get Gary Coleman's autograph at the mall
Gameplay
One of the major concepts of Postal 2 is that it is meant to be a "living world", a simulation of a town where the inhabitants are all somewhat crazed. Game characters live out their lives completely separate from the actions of the player; walking around town, buying and selling merchandise, and even engaging in random shootouts with each other and the police.
Like the Grand Theft Auto series, the game aims to be non-linear by allowing the player to explore the town of Paradise. At first, the Postal Dude can only enter the neighborhood areas directly adjacent to his own neighborhood, but new areas are unlocked as each day of the week passes. However, the local inhabitants also become progressively more violent and heavily armed as the week goes on, and on the final two days of the week, SWAT teams and National Guard squads patrol Paradise who wear heavy body armor and are well-armed. According to the storyline, they are there for a convention and in response to a request for assistance hunting down a mass-murderer, respectively (it is implied that the mass murderer is Postal Dude, regardless of whether or not you have been killing people during the course of the game).
Unlike Grand Theft Auto, the game world is not one single large continuous map, but rather several different neighborhood maps broken up by loading zones (which are marked by road-signs saying 'Load Zone'). One of the main gameplay complaints about the game was that the loading time for each new map was too long due to the strong engine, seriously interrupting the flow of gameplay and reducing the motivation for exploring new areas. A vendor-released patch managed to significantly reduce load times.
The game also features a cameo by Gary Coleman, acting as himself, who appears early on as the objective of one of the game's tasks (get Gary's autograph). If the player chooses, he can fight and kill Coleman as one of the game's two boss characters or simply get the book signed peacefuly. Regardless of the player's action police try to arrest Gary Coleman.
The town features many cars but they are all "useless exploding props", according to your character, and cannot be driven, although they can be blown up and sent flying into the air. In addition to cats and dogs, other animals presented are elephants, which can be shot or set on fire which causes them to trumpet with rage and attack anyone within stomping distance.
Controversy
The developers of the game counteracted criticism of the violence by claiming that the amount of violence is up to the players — they may go about their tasks without causing trouble, or they can create mayhem. Critics state that the game clearly urges people playing the game to indulge in homicidal behaviour, given that the player is often attacked by ludicrous hate groups, who despise everything from books to Christians. Additionally, there are long queues when the player goes to the bank or shop, the people of 'Paradise' are exceptionally rude and spit insults at the player if he or she dare bumps into them, and furthermore weapons ranging from machine guns to rocket-launchers are left lying about for the player to pick up.
Going on the rampage (or going postal, the phrase which the game is named after) is clearly encouraged, but never necessary. However, some missions put the player into extremely hostile environments, where the player is practically forced to kill the people attacking him/her in order to survive, such as book protesters who set the local library on fire and then attempt to murder everyone trapped inside (this includes the Postal Dude, of course.) Several ambient features like advertisement signs and shop names and interiors are loaded with some dark humor, thus exposing the decadent nature of 'Paradise' and letting the player more inclined to resort to violence.
The game also involves some obvious inside jokes. The player's character actually works for Running With Scissors — the game's developers — with its offices being the scene of a protest by a group opposed to violent computer games. Some of the company employees show up in other areas too, such as Mike Jaret, who appears as the cross-dresser in the gay bar.
Some game critics regarded Postal² as being a single-joke affair which clearly sets out to shock and has limited play-value, but it also has quite a cult following. Although it may have been the game developer's intent to rival the notoriety of Grand Theft Auto, Postal² did not achieve moral panic in the sense that the GTA series did. While violence and sexuality were part of both games, it was overexcessive enough in Postal² that it was considered tasteless and senseless; whereas in the GTA games such controversial content is used with discretion and it fits in with the theme of organized crime. Violence aside, reviewers gave low ratings to Postal² for its cheesey production values and occasional technical flaws, whereas the polished production and innovations of the GTA series won it critical acclaim and blockbuster status. Unlike the GTA games, Postal²'s content was sufficiently over the edge to preclude widespread distribution and many North American retailers would not stock it.
Some of the more controversial aspects of the game are:
- Al Qaeda terrorists who carry out a suicide bombing of a church and a marching band (these characters all resemble Osama bin Laden).
- The ability to urinate on people to make them vomit in disgust.
- Anthrax-filled cow's heads as weapons.
- The use of cats as silencers for shotguns and machine guns, involving pushing the barrel of the gun into the feline's rectum (this was commented on in an episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit).
- When the Postal Dude wears the police outfit and brutalizes innocent people, the other police officers openly admit that they are corrupt.
- Crack cocaine "health" pipes that can be smoked in order to regain health.
- Decapitating people with shovels and kicking the heads about.
- Playing "fetch" with dogs using people's heads.
- A scene that bears resemblance to the Waco Siege of 1993, with a cult group being surrounded by ATF agents at 'the compound'
Postal² became the second computer game to be banned by the Office of Film and Literature Classification (New Zealand) (Manhunt was the first). As is the case with Manhunt, it is a punishable criminal offence to be in possession of the game in New Zealand. This title was also banned in Australia by the OFLC due to the absence of an 18+ rating for software. As of January 11th, 2006 RWS made a deal with softwrap to legally allow the purchase of Postal 2 globally, if not legally, even in Australia and New Zealand.
Regardless of the critical commentary received by Postal², the video game has earned success and has a stable fanbase. While some psychologists have denounced the game, other psychologists believe that the violence in the game is actually a good way release pressure, and as long as the gamer is mature and sensible enough, there are no dangers in playing the video game [citation needed].
Game add-ons
The 1.337 patch for Postal² reduced the long level loading times but also added a new level, The Tora Bora cave system, where the player came across Osama Bin Laden look-alikes in his search for the weapon of mass destruction. The patch was released around the beginning of the 2003 Invasion of Iraq.
An add-on called Postal²: Share The Pain extended the game with a multiplayer mode. The Macintosh version of Postal 2 shipped with the inclusion of Share The Pain.
Another add-on called Postal²: Apocalypse Weekend (named such because the end of Postal² marks the beginning of the apocalypse in Paradise) was released by Running With Scissors on May 12, 2005 for Windows, and September 28th, 2005 for the Mac and Linux versions. Apocalypse Weekend expands the reaches of Paradise with new maps and missions, adds new weapons and foes, and raises Postal²'s gore and violence to an even greater level. Both Postal 2: Share The Pain and Postal 2: Apocalypse Weekend were ported to Linux and Macintosh by developer Ryan Gordon.
Independent developer Kamek Magikoopa is one of the most prolific volunteer community contributors known for creating customizations for the Postal. His works include mutators, weapons, and single and multiplayer extensions, such as Airmail, Postal Arena, and Apocalypse Weekend 7.
The forthcoming add-on, Eternal Damnation, is a modification for Postal² which adds new weapons, enemies, maps, a new storyline, and a whole host of other features. This addon has been independantly developed by Resurrection Studios, which was formed by fans of the Postal series. Eternal Damnation will be free for download once it is finished.
Trivia
- Postal² appears briefly in the hip-hop music group The Black Eyed Peas music video "Where is the Love?", showing young children playing the game. Children are not supposed to play this game at all, as it is rated as 18+ in most areas and they wouldn't be able even to buy it. Yet, in the absence of an outright government ban, it is not illegal for a minor to own or play such a software title.
- Alexander Koptsev, a 20-year-old Russian, attacked a Moscow synagogue on January 12, 2006 and stabbed 8 people in the back or the neck, shouting "Heil Hitler" and "I'll kill Jews". According to his father, he had been playing Postal² for many hours most days, including the day of the attack. [1]
- Postal² was the first game to recieve 0 out of 5 stars from Computer Gaming World. This was not only for its content, but for its lack of game design.
See also
External links
- Official Postal² Website
- Postal Network: Postal² mods, files, forums and news.
- Resurrection Studios: Eternal Damnation - a mod for Postal 2.
- Pure Postal: Postal community site.
- The Dude Magazin: German Postal site.
- Postal World - German Fansite
- Open Directory Project: Postal² category
- Postal² Review at The Adrenaline Vault
- Postal² review at Gamespot
- Postal² at MobyGames
- Postal 2: STP Detailed review at Macologist
- Review at FreeInfoSociety.com