South Park: The Stick of Truth Previews

We have rounded up a few recent South Park: The Stick of Truth previews, based on a recent hands-off presentation held at New York Comic-Con.

GamrReview:
As soon as Stan, Kyle, Cartman, Kenny, and the new kid stepped on screen, I was enthralled. It's almost impossible to decipher if you're watching an episode or playing the game, as the crappy, construction paper-like art style and poor animations remain exactly as the show portrays. Everything fits perfectly with the boys' imaginative fantasy game, from the rag tag costumes they've made out of household items to one of their living rooms being a Tavern filled with adventurous folk and a basement doubling as a dungeon.

As Matt and Trey had much creative input and clearly provided all the voices, the humor is spot on, offering a ton of laughs in just the ten minute demo span, with Kenny the princess on the verge of being raped and Cartman being every ounce as funny and maniacal as ever. At one point when Jimmy was speaking and getting hung up on a word, you could literally watch him go on for a couple minutes until you decided to move on. Even though I didn't actually get to play the game, sitting back and watching how accurately the developers have captured the essence of South Park was good enough for me.

CraveOnline:
From what we can tell, you get the feeling like you're playing out an episode of the show, and we couldn't as for more.

The gameplay features party style turn based combat. One departure from traditional RPGs is a combat radial which replaces the standard menu that takes up the entire bottom of the screen. This leaves the screen open to show of the hilarious animations.

You still get the character level ups, inventory management, class choices and a variety of spells to use. The devil is in the details, and South Park is shaping up to deliver everything you could ask for.

Tom's Guide:
The best part about "Stick of Truth" is that it remains true to the crude humor and spirit of the renowned cartoon. In addition to using traditional weapons in combat, players can light farts on fire to burn enemies, and in some instances even use farts as a Dragon Shout-esque technique in a reference to "The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim."

Rochambeau is one of the move sets you can use in battle a reference to first season's "Mecha-Streisand" episode. In the same very clip, "Stick of Truth" references another episode from Season 13 when Butters says, "I think I just found my new bottom b-tch."

From what we've seen, a large part of the gameplay in "Stick of Truth" has to do with how you interact with objects around you. For instance, shooting targets along the wall in the Giggling Donkey reveals hidden objects or triggers events in the game.

TechnoBuffalo:
This is a turn-based RPG, at least what we've seen, and it packs an attack system that requires timing and strategy. You won't just select the hammer attack, you'll have to time a button press up with the on-screen swing in order to deal out a higher amount of damage. For those of you who have played any of the Mario RPGs, expect a similar system.

The world itself looks very much like a classic 2D adventure game. You'll move about each environment's space and solve puzzles or clash with enemies.

The look and sound, though, are what makes this game a pure slam dunk. It is South Park, plain and simple. The animation, the illustration, the audio, the jokes, the offensiveness and the quips are all consistently smart and in line with the show.