Review: DeathSpank

DeathSpank has come to us from the creative mind of Ron Gilbert. Famous for his early work creating adventure games for Lucas Arts, he has been the man behind games like Maniac Mansion and The Secret of Monkey Island. It’s been a long development cycle for the DeathSpank. Since 2004 it has been in either pitch or development mode and it was only a year ago at PAX 2009 that we saw our first real look at the game.

So does DeathSpank come off as a game which has been tempered in time and love? And does it reflect the great story-telling muscles that Ron Gilbert is known for?  Well, read ahead my little sycophants for our review of DeathSpank.

DeathSpank (XBLA, PSN)
Developer: Hothead Games
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Release: July 13, 2010

Welcome to the world of DeathSpank.  It’s a fantastical place with crude humor, sexual innuendo and DeathSpank himself who’s anti-hero personality is a perfect vehicle for us to experience all of it through.  You play as DeathSpank as he embarks on an epic quest to find a mysterious item called “The Artifact.” In your search you’ll meet various townsfolk, complete various main and side quests, fight all manner of demons, monsters and zombies and, pretty much, do what one normally does in a game imbued with fantasy RPG fair.

Though the story itself may seem a bit on the generic side, the way it’s told is anything but so.  The masterful storytelling of Ron Gilbert is evident throughout the game with characters that are infectiously interesting and often times hilarious.  Needless to say, the writing is top notch. And often times you’ll find yourself picking the dialogue tree options which most likely lead you back to the main tree simply so you can be sure to try them all.

The comedy is well thought out and exceptionally witty at times, with obscure gamer related humor thrown in for good measure.  It is heads above the comedy found in previous games like Monkey Island and one can tell that Gilbert’s comedy muscles have surely grown over the years.  This is all supported masterfully with the voice work of Michael Dobson who provided the “full of himself douchbag” touch to the voice of DeathSpank.  All other voice actors, though doing a fine job, pale in comparison.  DeathSpank becomes a larger than life personality which carries the weight of the Gilbert narrative like no other could have.

There is a lot to laugh about and love in the story of DeathSpank and Ron Gilbert does a fantastic job of showing us that it’s not always the story itself that’s important, but the way it’s told.

But DeathSpank is more than a narrative. If that was it then we would call it a “book,” and you know what books are?  Things that keep us away from video games!

Graphically, DeathSpank is truly a twinkle of genius.  It has a pronounced “pop-up book” feel that really provides a fantastic backdrop for the narrative.  The world itself is placed upon a cylinder which “pops up” into view as DeathSpank traverses it. Stylistically the world is done in cartoony 2D fashion which makes it look like pieces of paper setup on 3D plane adding even more continuity to that Pop-up Book feel.  Characters and locations are highly detailed, especially for being a download title.

The gameplay of DeathSpank has been described as being inspired by that of Diablo, especially when it comes to the extensive loot system that the game offers.  Thankfully, since we are using the controller there is no excessive clicking on enemies to make DeathSpank attack.  Fighting is done in a similar way to most action games, with Brutal Legend being the closest that comes to mind.  DeathSpank can equip 4 weapons, chosen with the D-pad, to fight with. Switching these weapons on the fly is exceptionally easy, and almost required since doing so causes him to do combo attacks, which in turn, fills up DeathSpank’s power meter.  Once the power meter is filled up DeathSpank can unleash much more powerful attacks whose effects are fully dependent on the weapon they are being unleashed with.  They are perfect for taking out large groups of enemies or the more particularly hulking monsters you will be facing,

The combat, however, does feel stiff and though you are doing chained attacks you never get a sense that they are very fluid. Honestly, most of the time I just felt like I was hacking away at enemies with no sense that I was doing anything particularly flowing.  Sometimes, with the slower weapons, it felt like it was taking way to long for the attack to reset and I thought I might be a slave to the slash animation rather than the speed of the weapon itself.  This never lost me a fight but it made battles feel much more like a button-mashing affair than anything else.

DeathSpank’s Diablo-esque loot system is also something that I never really felt the pull of. There are a TON of weapons and armor throughout the game to be sure. But I never really felt all that compelled to look for them since most enemies can be dispatched with the above mentioned button mashing.  The game also allows an option for DeathSpank to automatically be equipped with more powerful armor when it’s picked up.  When turned on you basically never have to look at your armor again since you know that you’re always going to be wearing the best gear.  Thus, any amount of stat checking gets thrown out the window.  Sure it’s nice if you’re not into that stuff, and it surely moves the game along, but for a game to basically neuter one of its main mechanics seems like an odd move to me.

Choosing the best weapons is still, thankfully, always left up to the player. The weapons themselves are often useful, even though many will have one great effect with one weapon killing effect which makes it just not worth it.  (Honestly I found this problem in the loot system Borderlands utilized as well).  But at least it requires the players attention, and there were a few times where I thought the fights seemed to be getting a little harder just to learn that the next great weapon had fallen, unbeknownst to me, in my loot bag.

And herein is the main problem with DeathSpank.  The gameplay just isn’t that deep. Fights seemed to be relegated to button-mashing events and the loot system has been partially neutered by automatic equipping and fairly easy enemies.  But just because these two things aren’t particularly profound it doesn’t mean the game itself doesn’t offer a lot. DeathSpank is loaded with side missions and an extensive main mission quest line which is mostly very enjoyable.  I found that there were some basic fetch quests but not an overabundance of them. Most of the side quests were littered with interesting characters who, often times, entrusted you with doing some fairly comical things.

DeathSpank also sports two player Co-operative mode. While one person plays as DeathSpank the other plays as his tiny wizard sidekick “sparkles.”  Of course games are always more fun when played with someone else so saying the mode is fun is nothing if not redundant.  Sparkles is basically support for DeathSpank. He has some offensive power but will basically be relegated to healing duties most of the time.  Ultimately I’ve found that the person playing Sparkles really isn’t having as much fun. In my playthrough with other people they have said that they feel more like healing mules than anything else.  So it would have been nice for Sparkles to have a little more diversity, and for the character to have a little more use and functionality in the gameworld itself.

Ultimately, DeathSpank is a fun title, with a fantastic narrative, that seems to suffer from a lack of depth in terms of both game mechanics and control.  It reminds me of another title, by another well known gaming storyteller, that suffered from some of the same problems.  In this way, Tim Schafer’s Brutal Legend and DeathSpank have a lot in common.  As a downloadable game, however, some of DeathSpank’s issues do not seem nearly as dire. Though they are evident, it is still a fun title which I would consider a worthy purchase if simply for the narrative itself.  Even though one might never be compelled to do a second playthrough.

Score – 75