Deadpool on PS3 is a game that does a damn fine job at breaking the 4th wall. Heck, by the time you’ve reached the 2nd level the wall will be nothing more than a pile of rubble. Case in point… here is what Deadpool has to say about his very own game:

There are a few important things I need to say before you crack into my insanely sweet game. (Oof. Here we go again.) I’m a mercenary with an accelerated healing factor. I’ve been described as unstable, which is just plain coo-coo. (Wait, do sane people say coo-coo?) I’m gonna battle for the safety of humans and mutants. (And even mumans.) Be prepared for just about anything. (Holla!)

I made sure to capture all my good sides, so I made my game a third-person action-shooter. (Yep, you get to look at my heinie.)

Keep a look out cuz some of my X-Men pals (Whoa, what pals?!) are making an appearance. (Hope you don’t mind picking hair out of your tacos.)

I’m really good at killing, so I made it a blast stringing together combos, jumping from REALLY high places, and totally eviscerating my enemies. (Ev-is-cer-a-ting!)

I brought my skills and a buttload of my favorite things. Katanas (check), guns (bang!) explosives (boom), duct tape (quack) and of course, yours truly – ME! (Checkmate!)

This adventure(developed by High Moon Studios) starts when Deadpool presents a pitch for a videogame starring himself which is rejected AND approved within a minute (after the merc with a mouth creatively convinces the game’s producer to go ahead with development), and after this setup, you can imagine it only gets crazier and crazier as you progress in the game.

Since Deadpool can regenerate (like Wolverine, but different), he can’t technically “die”. The game just goes over this problem by including a health bar and several checkpoints so that when your bar goes to zero, Deadpool sorta faints, and you’re taken back to the last checkpoint. Hey, if it worked for Wolverine’s game, then it’s good enough for Deadpool.

You can press R1 to lock-on to enemies but, unfortunately, if you move the lock is broken is broken and you must target enemies again. R1 DOES help you when you’re in a gun fight with several enemies at a distance since you can target them one by one, but at close range you’re better of forgetting about R1 and just combo enemies with your close range weapons. One ability that IS very handy is Deadpool’s teleport skill. At first you can only teleport three times to avoid enemies or any other dangerously close hazard, but you can use Deadpool Points to increase it to allow for five teleports in a row.

The game does a nice job at letting you know where you need to go, so you’re never really stuck. This can either be by using light sources to point the way, leaving Deadpool Points pick-ups here and there, by letting you know that pressing up on the D-Pad will move the camera around towards your next goal, or even by highlighting the special objects (levers, panels, buttons) you can interact with in order to open up the way.

What’s that? You want to know more about Deadpool Points? Sure, why not? Deadpool Points are awarded by killing enemies, performing long combos or obtaining pick-ups that are all lying around every single level. These points can then be used to unlock new melee weapons and guns, new skills and abilities for Deadpool or to improve all weapons. At first, it won’t take many points to unlock new things, but as you go on you will realize that fully upgrading a weapon will require hundreds of thousands of points and, therefore, you must maximize your combos and seek every spot on each level for Deadpool Points that will make it easier to enjoy your journey.

Nolan North is the one in charge of providing Deadpool with its quirky and chatty voice, and you’ll be surprised to see how different this performance is from North’s other work in gaming. When you add the fact that Deadpool actually has voices inside his head (one “sane” and one extremely crazy) and that the writing is actually funny, Nolan’s contribution to the game really gets a chance to shine.

Overall, the graphics for the game are nice, but they do tend to be a bit dark for my taste which sometimes leaves you squinting at the screen trying to find where Deadpool is. Other than that (and some mild texture pop-in when loading a new area), the texture, lighting and character models are top-notch and really help us get into the Marvel universe (especially since you will also run into some of the X-Men, some X-Villains and the odd D-List villain).

Another extra mode is available for you to play specific Challenges that pile the enemies against Deadpool, which is why it’s a good idea to complete the main game in order to definitely know the ins and outs of the game’s combo system as well as how effective each of the guns is against the different enemies you will face. Oh, and always, there are a couple of trophies tied to this game so you’ll need to play if when going for Platinum.

Deadpool is a genuinely fun game both in its gameplay and its writing. You will spend 10-16 hours before the story is over (depending on the difficulty level you pick), and those aiming for a Platinum trophy can add an extra 5-10 hours on top. There are no missable trophies thanks to a level select option, and luckily difficulty trophies stack which means you can pick the highest difficulty setting and aim for a single run trophy run. The graphics, content and voice acting do a great job of taking us into the Marvel Universe and joining Deadpool on his quest to make this game is so meta it is cool.

[review score=”80″ pros=”Mindless Fun.
Superb voice acting.
Nice upgrade system.” cons=”Higher difficulty level features several cheap-shot spots.”]

Disclaimer

This review is based on a PS3 copy of Deadpool provided by Activision