Friday 25 March 2016

Shank 2: A Game review



As you guys probably already know, I am an avid gamer. Or was and well..trying to be again. Don't hold me against it. I kept on writing my novel and with moving to another country, something had to give (not to mention the dearth of good gaming devices - yeah, I'm back to being a broke student for the time being).

Anywho, I was inspired to game again by my good friend, Devospaz, who runs a gaming channel of his own - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCL-TMpShNQIuAMnguXQwFAw. Subscribe to it fellows. Sure is worth it. Especially check out his Assassin's Creed India videos - his commentary is way beyond hilarious and best, an Indian guy gives you his perspective on what the game developers got right and what they muffed up.

So he put up videos of a hack-slash comic book appearing (you say whaaa....yeah I said it too) game from EA called Shank and I loved the not-so-mindless innumerable hacking and slashing it offered. So, I decided I would try it for myself. Guess what, when I searched for it, I realised a sequel to the incredibly popular 1st part had already been released. So, I got SHANK 2! I can play Shank - the originaaal vicariously through Devo's videos, while I play the future of the chain-saw wielding, pistol-firing, shotgun-shooting, shark-teeth grabbing (yes, that happens) sequel.


As rightly captioned in the video, this is the most epic gaming scene ever in the history of every game ever created ever. If you started counting my evers, you will forever be counting evers. Anyever, the game has a cool storyline, well a semblance of a storyline (actually I have not finished the game - only about halfway through it).

Shank is a homely ex-hit mobman who goes back to his loving homeland only to horrifyingly find it under the atrocious flames of war and his mentor leading the rebellion against General Magnus' militia. His mentor - a lady (see it is a progressive game already) is captured and Shank must rescue her through wild west saloons, docks and ships, flaming infernos, and tribal pygmies who bite your face-off - literally. Still not sold on it?

Well, the gameplay will make you drool then. You have three main weapons you use at any time - knives, pistols and grenades. You gain more weapons as you go along - the trusty chainsaw comes in soon enough and you can execute a million different ways to kill bad guys. Stabbing them is easy, as is squashing them under huge crates. You can also fly in the air for a long while by firing your pistols continuously (seriously my superpower list just got rearranged - you can kill while flying at the effing same time - Superman can kryptonite himself).

Of course, the fights are not mindless hack and slash. The bosses specially require a lot of strategy and every boss is different and just tough enough to make you work for the bloody kill. The good part is even if you die, you start the game with full health pretty much just before the short segment you died in (applicable to boss fights as well), so the frustration levels never creep in too much.

There is one tiny downside. You will have to sit through an entire chapter, which takes about half an hour to get through, to save, otherwise you lose the entire progress. A small price to pay for such exhilaration.

So go play both Shank and Shank 2 or at least watch Devospaz's journey through the bloodthirsty lands of one of the ever best games ever.

Signing ever...err...off,

Utsav


1 comment:

  1. bruhhhhhh, devozpaz here, this review is the shizzz! It truly portrays the series as it is. I was skeptical about the 2nd part but now I know it's as good!
    This game really is a gem and the biggest of thumbs up for trying to be a gamer again! That's the only thing that keeps the kid is us alive, well, at least for me! :D

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