Several years ago, I played (and subsequently blogged about) a first-person shooter called Painkiller. This game was one of the first games of its kind — a hybrid shooter that combined arcade-style elements with the realistic physics of a PC game. I affectionately remember the Stake Gun. Ahhh, I spent many an hour impaling demons onto just about every hard surface you could think of. Concrete, wood, dirt, stone, and even other demons.
That was circa 2004.
I knew that a sequel was made. Actually, it was more of an expansion pack to be honest, and it was called Painkiller: Battle out of Hell. That game was soooo bad that I just basically ignored the series from that point forward. Painkiller: Overdose and Painkiller: Resurrection followed, and I never played either of those games.
Well, it just so happens that tonight I was in the mood for a mindless shooter, and Painkiller: Redemption was on Steam for $4.95. Even if it was utter crap, I couldn't beat that price. And this add-on is NEW. It was just released on February 25th, 2011, and it's only $4.95. Yeah, I knew what I was buying, and what I was getting myself into. But I didn't care!
Ok, for starters, I should provide some back story. This will be really simple. A guy named Daniel dies and goes to Purgatory. He then becomes a bit of a hitman for God in order to cleanse his soul so he can be re-united with his dead girlfriend in heaven. That's pretty much all you need to know in order to understand the plot of all these games. Really.
So you may be asking yourself, “Why has this series lasted so long?”
That's actually a simple answer. Basically, this game has perfected the art of “LET'S THROW 10,000 ENEMIES AT THE PLAYER AT ONCE AND MAKE HIM FEEL LIKE A BADASS AS HE WIPES THEM ALL OUT!”.
It works. You do feel like a badass and the game does get you pumped up. It's very fast paced, and it's a hell of a lot of fun.
When I first started the game up, I found myself playing this demonic-like character with very long fingernails, holding a strange cube that looked very much like the Lament Configuration. I could use this to either “Primary Fire: Spinning Blades to chop enemies to pieces”, or “Alternate Fire: Throw the box and punch the shit out of enemies”.
I went through THREE LEVELS of this, and was started to get INCREDIBLY bored and wondered when the hell I was going to get a real weapon. Suddenly, though, I realized that I had been picking up different kinds of ammo for quite some time now. Finally, just out of curiosity, I pressed Number 2. And I switched to a shotgun. Wat.
Yeah. So, apparently I had all the weapons in the game from the get-go, and just needed to pick up the ammo for them to begin using them.
/facedesk
Moving on. So now that I knew I had weapons, I started using them. A shotgun, with an alt-fire that slows down enemies. A machine gun with a rocket launcher alt-fire. A cross-bow with a AoE exploding arrows alt-fire. A severed demon head that shoots a laser beam out of its mouth. Wait, wat?
In any case, I keep dying on the third level because I suck. It's wave after wave after wave of baddies, and I just keep getting my ass handed to me, so I am thus taking a little break from the game right now.
But it's good mindless fun. Nothing that I would rate above a 6 or 7 out of 10, but it's just what I needed tonight, and I'm enjoying it. That's all that really matters. 
Now playing: Awolnation - Sail
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