Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

South Park: The Fractured But Whole - South Park RPG sequel from Ubisoft

lukaszek

the determinator
Patron
Joined
Jan 15, 2015
Messages
12,621
deterministic system > RNG
 
Last edited:

Deleted member 7219

Guest
On steam page it got nice yellow boxes combo of
- denuvo
- origin
- eula

quick skimming of eula showed a bunch of stuff about advertising and selling your data. Will it be 60$ game with ads or is it a standard eula?

I don't know, but don't get it on Steam. You'll still need Uplay.

If you buy directly on Uplay (or Greenmangaming) you've lost one layer of DRM.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Oh boy: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...s-south-park-fractured-but-wholes-season-pass

Ubisoft details South Park: Fractured But Whole's season pass

Ubisoft has detailed its previously announced season pass for upcoming South Park sequel The Fractured But Whole.

The season pass will include three main dollops of post-release DLC, starting in December and running through to an unspecified point in 2018. December's DLC, known as Danger Deck is described as "the ultimate combat challenge against Doctor Timothy's Danger Deck", and will include exclusive unlockable costumes and artefacts.

Next up, and currently scheduled for a vague "2018" release, is From Dusk till Casa Bonita. This is the first of two planned DLC story episodes, and sees players "team up with The Coon and Mysterion to defeat a demonic presence at Casa Bonita".

jpg

This is a visual metaphor.

Rounding off Ubisoft's three-pronged season pass DLC is the second bit of story content, Bring the Crunch. There's not much in the way of information on this one just yet, but it will, says Ubisoft, introduce an all-new superhero class.

That's not quite everything, however; the season pass also includes two minor bits of Day One DLC - one of which, rather confusingly, isn't actually out on launch day. The Relics of Zaron costume and perks pack will be available on release day, October 17th, while the Towelie in-game tip buddy is out the week after on October 24th.

The season pass will be available to purchase from October 17th, the day that South Park: The Fractured But Whole launches on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. There's no detail on pricing just yet, but it's already included if you opt for the game's Gold Edition.

In other South Park news, a full-length episode setting up the events of The Fractured But Whole ran in the US earlier this week as part of the TV show's 21st and newest season. The episode will air tonight in the UK at 10pm on Comedy Central.
 

Lurker47

Savant
Joined
Jul 30, 2017
Messages
721
Location
Texas
Oh boy: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...s-south-park-fractured-but-wholes-season-pass

Ubisoft details South Park: Fractured But Whole's season pass

Ubisoft has detailed its previously announced season pass for upcoming South Park sequel The Fractured But Whole.

The season pass will include three main dollops of post-release DLC, starting in December and running through to an unspecified point in 2018. December's DLC, known as Danger Deck is described as "the ultimate combat challenge against Doctor Timothy's Danger Deck", and will include exclusive unlockable costumes and artefacts.

Next up, and currently scheduled for a vague "2018" release, is From Dusk till Casa Bonita. This is the first of two planned DLC story episodes, and sees players "team up with The Coon and Mysterion to defeat a demonic presence at Casa Bonita".

jpg

This is a visual metaphor.

Rounding off Ubisoft's three-pronged season pass DLC is the second bit of story content, Bring the Crunch. There's not much in the way of information on this one just yet, but it will, says Ubisoft, introduce an all-new superhero class.

That's not quite everything, however; the season pass also includes two minor bits of Day One DLC - one of which, rather confusingly, isn't actually out on launch day. The Relics of Zaron costume and perks pack will be available on release day, October 17th, while the Towelie in-game tip buddy is out the week after on October 24th.

The season pass will be available to purchase from October 17th, the day that South Park: The Fractured But Whole launches on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. There's no detail on pricing just yet, but it's already included if you opt for the game's Gold Edition.

In other South Park news, a full-length episode setting up the events of The Fractured But Whole ran in the US earlier this week as part of the TV show's 21st and newest season. The episode will air tonight in the UK at 10pm on Comedy Central.
Lol, "planning dlc" like this is clearly just "we made a game, pay extra for parts of it"
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-10-16-south-park-the-fractured-but-whole-review

South Park: The Fractured But Whole review
Are games fart?

jpg

Ubisoft tightens up the systems but can't quite replicate the sparkle for this fun but flawed RPG sequel.


For nearly two decades, South Park's creators have been working to a weekly production schedule. It's an inconceivable cadence that must raise stress and caffeine levels well beyond what medical professionals would endorse, but crucially it allows the show the agility to satirise events as they're happening in a way that most television can't. By contrast, South Park: The Fractured But Whole has been in development at Ubisoft San Francisco for over two years. Perhaps it's this fact, above all else, that best explains why it falls just faintly but consistently flat.

It's not simply that the game isn't topical. The well-recieved Stick of Truth spent five years in gestation, after all, and didn't feel at all lacking relevance or bite back in 2014. But The Stick of Truth had the advantage of going first. It was the vessel for every observational gag about gaming that had ever occurred to Matt Stone and Trey Parker up to that point, and on those terms it was a real pleasure. Familiar RPG design met naturally in the middle with the series' humour and made a cohesive whole. But with the jokes about gaming already made once before, and South Park's defining current affairs-based humour kept out of reach by game development's longer timespan, The Fractured But Whole can't help but miss the mark. It's a game that listlessly re-tells the same 'gaming be like' jokes as its predecessor, changing tack only to give 2015's hot button issues like gentrification a real roasting. Like the TV show did. In 2015.

What's all the more frustrating is that limp writing is the only real problem with The Fractured But Whole (other than that name, obviously). Elsewhere, Ubisoft San Francisco has done a commendable job expanding the turn-based combat system to incorporate multi-class character builds and place more emphasis on positioning party members effectively, broadly similar to Divinity: Original Sin 2's battle grids and even Disgaea's esoteric boxiness. It's a system that serves the new superhero theme well: you're once again the New Kid in town, only this time it's the town that's changed. On a whim Eric Cartman ditches the role-playing world the neighborhood kids have been playing in for his own comic franchise universe, Coon and Friends. Thus, the town of South Park changes from a nine-year-old's vision of Middle-Earth to a nine-year-old's vision of a crime-ridden metropolis, and the Archmage's Wands and Axes of Stopping are replaced by endearingly rubbish superhero abilities from the likes of Toolshed, Mosquito, Captain Diabetes, and The Amazing Butthole.

Superheroes having abilities innate to their beings and all that, equipment upgrades now take a backseat. Outfit customisation is a purely aesthetic endeavour - and before you ask: no, they're not unlocked via loot boxes. Outfit items, along with the obligatory collectible detritus, are scattered throughout the world map, often dangled tantalisingly at the end of a navigational puzzle that might require farting yourself back through time to navigate a hazard, or combining that same flatulence with The Human Kite's airborne prowess to reach the town's rooftops. The human body's tendency to produce methane during the process of digestion has seldom escaped South Park's attention, and in this case it's your essential power; a means of time manipulation, navigation, and inflicting a grossed out status effect on enemies.

It's not entirely without upgrade trees, however. In the place of traditional RPG gear slots or skill points are DNA strands and Artifacts which modify your character's stats and offer bonuses to things like critical hit chances and health recovery. New slots for these are unlocked every time you level up, and new artifacts can be crafted, bought, or found, lending a pleasing and uncomplicated sense of progression to your character. Things get fiddlier when periodically selecting a new class to add to any existing ones. Basically it's a chance to swap old abilities out for new ones, although since you're forced to select your new class without having examined the abilities it offers, you're essentially stabbing in the dark. I suspect there are much more effective builds than the Cyborg Speedster Gadgeteer Thingamy I've created, but it's an enjoyable hybrid all the same. It's still an RPG, then, under all the masks and capes, but a less conventional one than Obsidian crafted in 2014.

In that sense, at least. Because for all the hoods and staffs in The Stick of Truth, it had plenty to counterbalance that trad stuff with in its many excitable left-turns, both narrative and in its design. Moments like the journey through Canada, which was not only one of the game's best jokes but a welcome bundle of fresh gameplay opportunities you didn't see coming. There are leftfield game-changing moments here too, but they're kept exclusively in the back third behind 15 or so hours of routine superhero-ing. Wake up, pop over to Cartman's, run an errand for him, then go to your parents' house and pretend to sleep before sneaking out for the night's big boss fight. This isn't in itself a bad thing: the Persona series thrives on a strict daily routine structure and The Fractured But Whole has some of that same perverse thrill of mixing the mundane and the extraordinary. The problem, as you'll remember, is that the writing isn't very good. If it were, the pacing would feel just right because you'd be flung from one memorable caper to the next, with just enough time to appreciate a passing item description joke. But it isn't, so instead you have the feeling of trotting between greatly enjoyable battles interspersed by toothless sketches.

jpg

New Kid's home life is a long way short of idyllic.

It has its moments, though. At its best, The Fractured But Whole wields familiar game design elements as a tool for satire, and that satire's at its sharpest when presenting to you a skin colour-based difficulty slider, and consequently giving less money to black player characters and altering attitudes from certain characters towards you. But at its lowest points, you're listening to kids tell you "Well, nothing left to do but go home and play Star Trek: Bridge Crew" without a shred of irony. Oh, and here's another kid five minutes later, telling you: "When I go home, I'm gonna play Star Trek VR, and it's gonna be awesome." It's a bit like watching someone give an insightful TED talk, and then having them come up to you and try to flog you a fidget spinner.

Most of the time the humour falls somewhere in the middle, neither inspired nor completely inane. Coonstagram, the social media network by which South Park's youth define their standing and trade that standing like currency, is a riff on The Stick of Truth's quasi-Facebook network. Your repeated talks with school counsellor Mr Mackey on gender and sexuality feel as though they're heading towards a payoff but never do, resulting in little more than some later confusion as to which bathroom to meet in and a possible fight with some rednecks who don't take kindly to cisgender folks. Cartman's business-minded franchise building offers some of the most consistent laughs, but the shtick doesn't have the same glee to it that the previous fantasy setting offered. There are only so many times you can sit around and discuss who's getting their own Netflix series, after all.

South Park: The Fractured But Whole is an RPG with tangible qualities and enjoyable passages, but without the bite or imagination you'd expect of the name. For anyone who grew up with the TV show, there's still some thrill to be had in simply walking around that familiar town, rubbing shoulders with its famous denizens and savouring the feeling of having an episode play out around you. But these were qualities of the last game too, and they have that bit less impact the second time around. Ubisoft San Francisco's rebuilt combat system goes some way to push back the sense of deja vu, but it entirely can't shake off the suspicion that this is a sequel which exists because its predecessor was so popular, not because its creators were brimming with more ideas.
 
Last edited:

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
https://www.pcgamesn.com/south-park.../south-park-the-fractured-but-whole-pc-review

South Park: The Fractured But Whole PC review

Before the first bottom burp had even been recorded, Ubisoft had their work cut out with any sequel to the well-received South Park: The Stick of Truth. First, they were without developers Obsidian - a bad start in any RPG player's spellbook. Second - and just like the TV show - they would be confined to the same setting. It is a South Park game; how could it be set anywhere else? Last, and, most importantly, they could no longer use the nostalgia built up over 17 seasons of the show quite like they had the freedom to in the series' first foray into videogames. That currency was spent.

They might attempt to make up for this by delivering enough fart jokes to make the game a veritable dutch oven from start to finish - trying to outdo the toilet humour to its detriment. But loyalists should not fear: South Park: The Fractured But Whole leaves its predecessor far behind.

The sequel sees our favourite potty-mouthed fourth-graders bin wizards, wargs, and powerful artefacts (that look suspiciously like your normal everyday twig) in favour of a new superhero playground pursuit. So, to start out, as with any superhero, you are going to need a backstory.

Despite your heroic exploits in The Stick of Truth, you remain the mute 'New Kid', but your hard-earned status has been swiftly forgotten. In this brave new world of capes and crusaders, Lord Douchebag is nothing. Now you must work your way up the hierarchy of new superhero franchise, 'Coon and friends', who share a mutual hatred with rival franchise 'The Freedom Pals'. At the centre of this inter-hero civil war is your mission: find a missing cat, Scrambles.

anticipated%20games%20south%20park%20the%20fractured%20but%20whole.png


It is this most quotidian of MacGuffins that, predictably, engulfs the entirety of South Park in a cloud of oddly egg-flavoured intrigue. South Park is as sordidly recognisable as ever as you explore its crime-ridden underbelly, but enough is done to expand the setting in all the right places to make it feel distinct. But it is on the battlefield where things have really changed.

Combat is the strongest tool in The Fractured But Whole's utility belt. Gone are the staid, repetitive combat encounters and unreliable rhythm systems of The Stick of Truth. Instead, The Fractured But Whole features much deeper, grid-based theatres of war inspired by XCOM and Fire Emblem. Movement adds another layer of strategy to a rich menu of new RPG systems to transform The Fractured But Whole from a good game into a great one. With myriad classes, turn types, and areas of effect, it is like Tetris meets the JRPG, and it is brilliant.

Each new system is effectively drip-fed so as to feel manageable despite their innate complexity. Artifacts, for instance, are special, craftable items that grant upgrades to increase the potency of the classes within your team and impact stats like ultimate move recovery and damage. They also increase your collective Might that allows you to gauge the missions and enemies you can conceivably handle.

South%20Park%20The%20Fractured%20But%20Whole%20combat.jpg


Allies and enemies come in many shapes and sizes, fashioned in typical South Park style: prepare to do your worst against fearsome, snot spewing sixth-graders, nimble Ninjas that summon more of their ilk to overwhelm you, and, er... crab people. One of these enemy types you must choose as your Kryptonite, your Superman-inspired weakness to force you to adapt. All enemy types have their strengths and weaknesses that significantly affect how you will approach your fight strategy. That is where the game’s 13 classes come in.

Each class is satisfyingly distinct: the Speedster calls upon his pace to move around the grid with ease, buzzing around foes to deal light damage or heal allies. The Blaster, on the other hand, keeps their distance as they whittle down enemy health bars, with the Brutalist preferring to get up close and personal. Each has their own lovingly designed ultimate to tip the balance of a fight in your favour but, as thrilling as any class can be, they will get repetitive after 20 or so hours.

Thankfully, then, you are not just able to dual class, but you can mix and match three classes at once to keep things fresh throughout. Triple-classing means you can choose ultimates and standard powers from three classes at any time - perfect for exploiting enemy weaknesses in a testing fight. By the end, my humble Blaster got to mess around with massive turrets and music so grating it induced an enemy’s rage. Your allies are each variations on these classes, and all unlocked allies and powers can be changed in the much more streamlined, smartphone-style menus. Feeling bored? Change everything in a, well, Flash.

South%20Park%20%20The%20Fractured%20But%20Whole%20ultimate.jpg


The new grid-based system brings with it the freedom for Ubisoft to experiment with ‘Special Objectives’. Simply defeating your assailants forms the bulk of battle types, admittedly, but, in some cases, you need to escape from an invincible boss or group of cantankerous old people. Or you might be forced to ‘unground’ your companions before they can join the scrap if they have fallen foul of their parents. You are kept on your toes at all times, making the tiresome, stationary left-to-right tradeoffs of The Stick of Truth’s battles feel all kinds of archaic.

It is during combat that South Park: The Fractured But Whole showcases Ubisoft’s astonishing attention to detail - with Matt Stone and Trey Parker’s help, of course. When buffing my allies, the almost-defeated grimaces of my ‘fourthie’ colleagues turn to relieved smiles as I hover my cursor over them. Tupperware - Token’s superhero alias who was run over and put back together with bits of Tupperware - in a ‘Grossed Out’ debuff state, throws up within his plastic-encased head. It’s these unique animated quirks that truly bring South Park’s characters to life, encouraging you to try them all.

Recurring jokes from recently-completed side missions regularly return mid-fight, some being too good to spoil. Whilst rewarding, it is also a treat to see your impact on the world integrated dynamically into combat. However, some jests are strung out a little too long.

The game is at its funniest in these kinds of situations. In ‘Raisins’ - a parody of Hooters - you rescue fellow Coon friend Clyde, masquerading as his parasitic hero alias. “Not even citronella can stop me!” is his cry as he swarms over enemies. While South Park might be known for its outrageous, headline-grabbing sense of humour, it tends to be the subtle, missable jokes and references that elicit the chuckles.

Of course, whether you get on with the jokes in South Park: The Fractured But Whole depends on your taste and offence threshold. Unsurprisingly, if you are a long-serving fan of the show you will feel right at home. If you are on the fence or don’t get on with a level of humour that saunters confidently across lines others dare not cross, things get tricky.

south%20park%20fractured%20but%20whole%20poo.jpg


Jokes are thrown at you in a dizzying barrage, so it is bound to be a hit-and-miss deal to some degree. For me, the majority of jokes did not land. Briefly following Cartman (aka The Coon) provokes a weak jibe at escort missions, for example, which felt contrived and would have been cut with a sharper editor’s pen. Worse are attempts to make light of issues such as misogyny, when you must take prostitutes under your spell by slapping them and turning them against their pimp. And that is before we even get to the farts, which assail the ears (or nose?) at such a rate as to render them almost - gasp - unfunny.

South Park: The Fractured But Whole, outside of combat - enjoys most of its success by putting the seemingly endless stream of superhero movies from DC and Marvel to the satirical sword. Ubisoft, Parker, and Stone have taken this idea and ran with it with aplomb, and nowhere is this better demonstrated than in the game’s magnificent sound design. Even the frequent posterior puffs have their own admirable range.

Each location, from the Peppermint Hippo strip club to an old people’s home features their own stellar musical theme. As you are wandering through South Park, the music swells in such a way as to make you feel like a world-saving Captain America, as opposed to an eight-year-old kid in a poorly stitched-together bug costume.

South%20Park%20The%20Fractured%20But%20Whole%20crab%20people.jpg


The Fractured But Whole is a better RPG than Obsidian’s original effort in almost every way: everything you do counts towards increasing the power of your party. It’s hard not to find watching the numbers tick up addictive. That said, multiple sets of collectibles and progress trackers threaten to get a touch out of hand. Perhaps it is a comment on smartphone culture and wearables tracking every moment of our lives, but between the action-packed main missions, it can feel like padding.

Where it does not falter, as with The Stick of Truth, is in how the game nails the spirit of the TV show as if to feel like a feature-length entry into the series. On top of that, the excellent and refreshed combat system and the complex coexistence of new RPG systems mean The Fractured But Whole renders its predecessor entirely forgettable. If it was once The Avengers, now it is Batman vs Superman.

TV show stalwarts should breathe easily and those on the fence about the game’s penchant for outrageous humour to definitely give it a go for the sake of its fantastic gameplay. However, if South Park has never been to your taste, The Fractured But Whole makes no attempt to change that.

Verdict: 8/10
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
http://www.gamebanshee.com/news/119808-south-park-the-fractured-but-whole-reviews.html

IGN 8.5/10:

South Park: The Fractured But Whole is another epic-length episode of the humor that’s kept fans of the show laughing for 20 years. The Marvel vs DC parody delivers regular laugh-out-loud moments with only a few faltering gags, and the combat soon evolves into something much more complex and interesting than The Stick of Truth’s simple system. Navigation and repetition of some of its simple puzzle mechanics drag a little, but it’s otherwise an excellent South Park game that’s also a strong RPG.

Destructoid 8.5/10:

South Park is partially responsible for raising a subset of a generation of kids that can laugh at anything and that takes no subject too seriously. (Chances are you already know exactly how you feel about the previous sentence.) The Fractured but Whole steps right in line with this mindset. It's all on the table. It's usually funny but sometimes it falls flat, just like the last 20 years of the show. It's not afraid to try, though.

Despite its sometimes uneven writing, The Fractured but Whole is worthy of the highest compliment a game like this could get: It feels like a long, quality episode of South Park. It's an improvement over The Stick of Truth in terms of combat mechanics, ridiculous plot escalation, and amount of content. It's really all that a South Park lover could ask for.

The guy selling tickets at the movie theater flippantly asks every time you see him "Aren't superheroes kinda played out?" As it turns out, not quite yet. Not as far as South Park is concerned, at least.

PCGamesN 8/10:

The Fractured But Whole is a better RPG than Obsidian’s original effort in almost every way: everything you do counts towards increasing the power of your party. It’s hard not to find watching the numbers tick up addictive. That said, multiple sets of collectibles and progress trackers threaten to get a touch out of hand. Perhaps it is a comment on smartphone culture and wearables tracking every moment of our lives, but between the action-packed main missions, it can feel like padding.

Where it does not falter, as with The Stick of Truth, is in how the game nails the spirit of the TV show as if to feel like a feature-length entry into the series. On top of that, the excellent and refreshed combat system and the complex coexistence of new RPG systems mean The Fractured But Whole renders its predecessor entirely forgettable. If it was once The Avengers, now it is Batman vs Superman.

TV show stalwarts should breathe easily and those on the fence about the game’s penchant for outrageous humour to definitely give it a go for the sake of its fantastic gameplay. However, if South Park has never been to your taste, The Fractured But Whole makes no attempt to change that.

Eurogamer Scoreless:

South Park: The Fractured But Whole is an RPG with tangible qualities and enjoyable passages, but without the bite or imagination you'd expect of the name. For anyone who grew up with the TV show, there's still some thrill to be had in simply walking around that familiar town, rubbing shoulders with its famous denizens and savouring the feeling of having an episode play out around you. But these were qualities of the last game too, and they have that bit less impact the second time around. Ubisoft San Francisco's rebuilt combat system goes some way to push back the sense of deja vu, but it entirely can't shake off the suspicion that this is a sequel which exists because its predecessor was so popular, not because its creators were brimming with more ideas.

WCCFTech 9/10:

By RPG standards, The Fractured but Whole is a bit on the shorter side but still clocks in around what The Stick of Truth took me for a Platinum trophy. By the time South Park was finally freed from the terrors of villainy, I had spent somewhere between twenty-five and thirty hours to finish nearly every side quest hidden throughout the town. One of the trophies required playing through as a Black Mastermind (Mastermind being the difficulty and race being a character customization perk that shows up partway through the game) that required more time spent grinding up artifact slots and playing much more conservatively. The hardest difficulty feels well-tuned for RPG veterans and would be my preferred recommendation if you’re willing to invest the time to build a heroic team with synergies.

Would I recommend The Fractured but Whole to someone that’s a longtime fan of South Park? Absolutely. The entire town is filled with pop culture references and little winks and nods to even the less notable events in the show’s history. Thanks to Ubisoft’s Snowdrop engine and the creative teams putting it to use, The Fractured but Whole captures the look and feel of the TV show right down to the most minute details. This is South Park at its most crude, yet the make-believe superheroes and roleplaying combat transcend genres to create a masterwork experience that’s an absolute gas to play.

GameSpot 8/10:

Much like The Stick of Truth, The Fractured But Whole can be appreciated as a standalone adventure, accessible to those who've fallen off the TV series over a decade ago. Fans who have kept up will appreciate the handful of recent call backs to the show plus at least one timely spoof that creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone previous said they would not tackle. And if there's one aspect of the show that hasn't changed in its 20-plus years, it is the endearing qualities of the kids' reality-breaking imaginations. This is best exemplified in the classic pronouncement that the floor is lava, which is represented by initially impassible red building blocks strewn throughout the town.

Fractured But Whole succeeds as an interactive South Park mini-series, while effectively emulating the show's current style of adult-targeted entertainment and satirization of political correctness. In other words, it's consistently amusing and provocative without the edginess the series used to be known for. Both the game's combat and explorative strengths effectively bridge the many comical plot developments, which range from mildly amusing to downright hilarious. It's an accomplishment that this game will wholly entertain devoted fans while delivering a heap of jokes that won't fly over the heads of casual viewers.

Polygon 7/10:

At the beginning of this review, I outed myself as someone who’s not a huge South Park fan, but I’ve watched enough of the show to understand that this is its modus operandi. It foregrounds loud, over-the-top, “edgy” humor, and it backgrounds surprisingly thoughtful character arcs. South Park: The Fractured But Whole matches the show’s strange mix of intentions; it is totally aligned in that way. And in that way, it provided the perfect reminder for why the show (and, to a lesser extent, this game) aren’t for me.

The Fractured But Whole’s breezy combat and puzzles provided a few days of entertainment, and the best moments of the game had me either laughing or, against all expectations, emotionally touched. I don’t particularly regret my time with the game, but it mostly made me think about how much better the creators of both South Park and The Fractured But Whole could do if they were given the opportunity and space to grow up a little.

USgamer 4/5:

Like Stick of Truth before it, South Park: The Fractured but Whole plays like an episode of the show. One of the good episodes, mind you, that's more about the kids interacting with each other than politics. Though it drags at times, The Fractured but Whole carries a sweet, twisted charm that makes it hard to resist if you're similarly twisted. It's still not recommended for anyone who never found the show funny to begin with, though.

Twinfinite 4/5:

Despite some noticeable issues, South Park: The Fractured But Whole is a must-play for fans of South Park. There’s no experience like playing through a massive episode of South Park where the hero of the story is you. The superhero angle really lands, and is an excellent wrapping for the story this time around. It’s obviously not going to be for everyone, and while the combat is great, it’s not revolutionary enough to convince someone that despises South Park to set it on mute and play it anyway. That said, there aren’t going to be that many people that are on the fence with a game like this. If you watch South Park and like video games, than the Fractured But Whole should is a no-brainer pick up.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2017/10/16/wot-i-think-south-park-the-fractured-but-whole/

Wot I Think – South Park: The Fractured But Whole
Fraser Brown on October 16th, 2017 at 4:00 pm.

SP-620x303.jpg


South Park: The Fractured But Whole [official site] is essentially the show’s greatest hits, with 20 years worth of call backs, characters and gags, all built around a LARP-inspired RPG that sees the town’s foul-mouthed kids beating the snot out of each other. If this sounds extremely familiar, that’s because I’ve also just described its predecessor, The Stick of Truth.

Crab People, magical farts, obsessively collecting social media pals, Morgan Freeman — they are all back. Only the switch from wizards and Elves to superheroes, something that could have been a superficial change, manages to keep it from feeling like watching a repeat.

The Fractured But Whole picks up right after The Stick of Truth, with Cartman putting an end to the fantasy LARP so the neighbourhood kids can start working on the much more important business of solving South Park’s crime problems and working on their superhero franchise of movies, cartoons and Netflix series. That Marvel money is tempting stuff.

sp3-620x349.jpg


Once again, we’re put in the shoes of the New Kid, the mute Chosen One and super-powered farter from the previous game, and now the newest member of “Coon and Friends”, the town’s premier superhero team.

Instead of picking a class and sticking with it, superheroes are defined by their origins, and thus much of the game is spent crafting an identity for your hero’s character sheet. First, though, there’s a powerset to pick, and a costume to create, though the latter is an entirely aesthetic decisions that you’ll undoubtedly change over and over again as you discover new costume parts, from exposed brains to Iron Man armour.

sp1-620x349.jpg


A powerset gives you four themed abilities, three regular ones and a fourth super-charged ultimate that you can only use once your ultimate bar has been filled by successfully pulling off some light QTEs when you’re attacking or defending. Like The Stick of Truth, the trick to winning fights is using attacks enemies are weak to, giving them negative status effects like shocked, bleeding or grossed out.

The change from JRPG battles to turn-based tactical brawls on a grid, however, adds an additional and welcome layer of complexity by making positioning and control of the battlefield important. Say you have a punch that can knock enemies back. To get the full use out of it, you’ll want to knock them into something. If it’s one of your allies — you’ll usually have a team of four, but that number often increases or decreases for narrative reasons — they’ll hit your foe when they bump into them. If it’s another enemy, they’ll take damage as well.

sp9-620x349.jpg


Abilities also come in different shapes and ranges. Some can only be used against enemies on a square right next to your hero, others might only work if you’ve got two squares between you and your enemy, so you can charge them, while some have large areas of effect. So a lot of the time, you won’t be able to pull off an attack unless you force enemies to move, pushing them back or sucking them towards you by using another ability.

Four abilities doesn’t give you much to play with, but then you’ll also have all of your superhero pals adding their own powersets to your list of attacks, so you’re able to create combos and craft plans that take advantage of different styles. As the Coon, Cartman can leap around the battlefield, slicing up enemies and leaving them a bleeding mess. Kyle, The Human Kite, on the other hand, can shoot burning lasers out of his eyes, but he’s best at supporting the team by healing and defending them with his kite.

sp2-620x349.jpg


Eventually you’ll be able to, in comic book tradition, retcon your origin (complete with hilarious origin stories told by Cartman) and gain new powers, so you can change your loadout depending on who you’re about to fight. Once you start getting new powers, that’s when the limit of four begins to feel a little stifling, but a lot of that is down to the fact that they’re all so fun to play with.

Like its predecessor’s, combat in The Fractured But Whole seems slight at first, but it eventually reveals itself to be surprisingly elaborate, though never overwhelming. It captures what’s great about tactical RPGs, creating plans, getting all your little heroes in position to pull off something devastating in a single turn, but it’s also really easy to get to grips with, even when it’s throwing new obstacles and solutions at you, like bosses whose abilities charge up in real-time, or fights where you have to escape rather than just beating everyone up.

sp4-620x349.jpg


Instead of finding stat-enhancing weapons or patches, like The Stick of Truth, you’ll be on the lookout for artefacts and new DNA, because superheroes. They function largely in the same way, augmenting all manner of things. Some increase knockback damage, other make status effects last longer. Since you don’t pick new abilities or select what stats get increased when you level up, artefacts and DNA are where you actually get to think about how you want to build your hero, but you never have to feel like you’re stuck with a decision you made.

Farting is, once again, a pretty big deal. The New Kid has a magical bum, which can be used to pause, fast-forward and rewind time, and can also be employed in combination with other characters’ abilities to get through obstacles or into new areas. If lava, or red Lego bricks, is blocking your way, you can summon Stan, who will plug a sandblaster into your bottom, which you then power up to blow away the lava. And in battle, you can rewind an enemy attack, making them waste a turn while you’re none the worse off.

sp8-620x349.jpg


As handy as these abilities are, after two games the fart jokes have started to smell a bit stale, though I confess that it might be worth it because I was able to hear this wonderful line after battering a catnapping meth addict: “He farted on my dick, and then my dick was 20 seconds in the past.”

That was a long diversion, but let’s get back to the character sheet. As John noted in his The Stick of Truth review, it wasn’t really about anything. There wasn’t a topic or timely issue that Obsidian, Matt Stone and Trey Parker had much to say about. The Fractured But Whole certainly does, however, and it’s rather appropriate for the superhero theme. A lot of time is spent on exploring identity. So as you set out to fill out your character sheet, you’re trying to figure out who you are.

sp7-620x349.jpg


PC Principal, Mr. Mackey and others provide assistance in this regard, helping you pick your gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity and religion. There are few games that go into this much detail. My version of the New Kid, for example, is a pansexual, genderless Native American. The Fractured But Whole is probably the most inclusive game I’ve played, and that’s more than a little crazy. And the subject matter is handled… surprisingly well. When there are jokes, they are at the expense of the adults or continuity, since the New Kid was a boy in the first game. However, since Mackey and PC Principal are written to be buffoons, it can undercut what should be positive moments.

When picking your gender and then sexuality in Mackey’s office, he gets nervous, misgenders you, corrects himself, and then calls your parents to confirm what you’ve told him. This is awkward and obviously not the way to handle a child telling you about their gender or sexual identity, though ultimately he is still supportive and empathetic. The game doesn’t always explore these issues in the most appropriate ways, and perhaps a game created to shock and joke isn’t the best place to explore such a nuanced subject, but for me — admittedly someone who has it easy being straight, male and white — the good outweighs the bad. The scene doesn’t try to brush a complex issue under the rug or force players to make a binary choice, and the game succeeds in making each gender and sexuality feel equal. Aside from a few lines, Mackey treats each choice in the same way, and there’s no obvious default option.

SP12-620x349.jpg


All of this eventually connects to the plot, but it also seeps into other aspects of the game. PC Principal teaches you all about microaggressions, which lets you get a free hit against an enemy that uses one. If they say something like “You hit like a girl,” then you can punch them outside of your turn. But after that, I also started to notice them everywhere, not just in the middle of a brawl. “You look feminine for a boy,” a character would say, and I’d immediately feel really uncomfortable. That, of course, is the point. It’s an effective reminder that little comments add up and make people feel ill at ease.

I should briefly mention the race/difficulty slider that got so much attention before launch. When you first make your version of the New Kid, before you make all of these identity choices, you’ll need to pick your skin colour from a slider. The darker the tone, the harder the game — or at least this is what is implied. In practice it’s just a gag — the game doesn’t get any harder no matter your choice, though just as with other parts of your identity, characters will respond to you differently at certain points. Given that there’s a whole other section of the game that looks at race and ethnicity, it’s a weirdly superfluous moment that probably shouldn’t have made it into the final cut.

SP13-620x349.jpg


It’s not until you meet the aforementioned PC Principal that race is treated as something other than the source of a quick joke. By talking to him, you can pick both your ethnicity and race from a large list. He notes that they are different things, though it’s unfortunate that he doesn’t explain why. It’s equally unfortunate that PC Principal is an obnoxious caricature of a social justice warrior. He’s the joke here, not race, but it does threaten to diminish the game’s sincerity. It could also be argued that a game that includes a racist kid whose superhero alter-ego is a racial slur can’t ever be sincere in matters of race or ethnicity. Cartman is someone we’re meant to laugh at, not with, but laughing at racism at all can be a problem.

There’s still 20 years of offensive jokes running through it, but The Fractured But Whole does feel like progress. It matters that I can choose to play as a Scot, or a Lithuanian, or a Pacific Islander instead of just another white American with no identity beyond that, even though it only comes up a couple of times. It matters because I can play as myself. You probably can too. And despite the complexity of modern games, that’s a rare treat.

sp5-620x349.jpg


None of this is to say that The Fractured But Whole isn’t still willfully and anarchically offensive. Rape is played for laughs, almost every woman and girl in the game is treated terribly by both other characters and the writers, and the game crosses the line as a matter of course. Yet there’s frequently a point to it. In one quest, you’re tricked into being part of a racist ploy, but from the get-go it’s clear what you’re actually doing, even if you’re being lied to about it. As I was going through it, I kept thinking to myself that I wasn’t really complicit. By the end, the game itself made it clear that I absolutely was and that putting your head in the sand doesn’t allow you to escape responsibility.

Moments like these make it feel authentically South Park, but still somehow less than the first game. It’s oddly tame. Outside of the subject of identity and inclusion, it’s largely devoid of surprises or shocks. And after a very strong start, the jokes start to peter out or fall flat. Often, it seems like characters from the show simply appearing is meant to be the joke.

sp10-620x349.jpg


This isn’t helped by the novelty of walking around South Park, hunting for collectibles, having worn off. We’ve done it all before, and very little has changed. It’s the same town, with the same people, and we have to do the same sort of things. That’s fine when it’s a 20 minute show with each episode tackling a different storyline; it doesn’t work nearly as well in a 15 hour game. And even The Stick of Truth let us visit Canada.

It’s a shame because initially I was belting out Brian Blessed-level laughs, and more than a few guilty giggles, but the well dries up pretty quickly. The real threat to the comedy is the repetition. Early on, you’re sent to rescue a teammate from Raisins (think Hooters for kids), culminating in an entertaining fight and plenty of jokes. But then you’ve got to do it again, fight a similar battle, and listen to the same jokes. Then the Raisins girls start appearing everywhere, and it just gets old. This is very much par for the course.

sp6-620x349.jpg


The Fractured But Whole also struggles to juggle the many narrative threads that it kicks off. There’s the New Kid’s miserable home life, the civil war between Coon and Friends and the Freedom Pals, police corruption and a really half-hearted Trump parody, and few of them end in satisfying ways. The final act in particular is simultaneously a bit of a slog and rushed, as the writers attempt to tie everything together.

Frustrating bugs crop up from time to time as well. Playing with a gamepad (you can rebind keyboard controls this time, but it’s still more comfortable with a gamepad), I occasionally encountered problems where the game wouldn’t register my inputs. And during the final few hours, battles kept freezing between turns unless I alt-tabbed out, which then set the game to windowed mode, so I’d have to change it. Though not game-breaking, I really started to lose my patience. By then, I just wanted to finish the game.

sp11-620x349.jpg


With the combat system and the way it’s actually trying to make a point with its exploration of social issues, The Fractured But Whole does improve on its predecessor in some ways, but it quickly starts to coast, relying too much on familiarity to get by. It’s still South Park, so we get to summon a drug-fueled Kyle’s dad to conduct a Heavy Metal bombing raid, and if you go into the back room of a church, yes, priests will try to have sex with you — it can be horrible and hilarious, just not as often as it needs to be to fill 15 hours.

South Park: The Fractured But Whole is out October 17th on Windows for £40/$60/€60 via Steam and Humble.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Oh, it's out already? Guess they were afraid of releasing at the same time as ELEX. :smug:





The reviews don't look that bad to me.
 
Last edited:

Suicidal

Arcane
Joined
Apr 29, 2007
Messages
2,208
From the videos it seems that the combat is much better now - 4 character party, movement grid, positioning influences skills, etc. I guess that's one of the perks of not having your game made by Obsidian - your combat system won't suck as much dick.
 

orcinator

Liturgist
Joined
Jan 23, 2016
Messages
1,704
Location
Republic of Kongou
Can't exactly make the combat worse when Stick was shallower than your average RPGmaker game.
But did they make it good enough to justify pressing all those buttons over watching it on youtube.
 

Urthor

Prophet
Patron
Joined
Mar 22, 2015
Messages
1,872
Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire
Wasn't the first literally just attack spell item flee like Pokemon? Surely you can't be worse than that.
 

Immortal

Arcane
In My Safe Space
Joined
Sep 13, 2014
Messages
5,062
Location
Safe Space - Don't Bulli
Game is pretty fun. It's silly, the turn based combat takes very little skill, the mechanics are pretty shallow.
It is an improvement on Obsidians combat system in every way though.

You can mix and match abilities from other classes (They even make a joke / reference about multi-classing)

It's not a hardcore RPG but it is a funny little time waster and allows you to dick around in the world of Southpark if your into that type of stuff.

Overall I've enjoyed it but I bought it before Ubisoft price hiked it by 20 bucks back in 2016.. Also the Ubisoft / Denuvo garbage is cancer. I wouldn't blame anyone for arr yarrring it.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom