Fans of PCF's Painkiller are patient people. They always had to be. Bugfixes, Updates, multiplayer improvements - every single step of Painkiller's evolution took its time. Although not everything went well or worked as expected in the first place, although a lot of people got angry over publisher politics and neglecting the community, fans stuck to the game. Its simple yet addictive gameplay and the high replay value helped in forming a small but very loyal community that kept squeezing new and unseen things out of this game even years after its release - tricks, shortcuts, speedruns, easter eggs. No wonder rumors about an upcoming Painkiller add-on caused some turmoil amongst the fanbase. Now it's only a few days left until Painkiller Overdose will be in stores. Time for Darkscorner to take a closer look at what's in the package for you demon lovers. 

*Please keep in mind that this preview is based on a beta version. Weapons, levels and enemies may be different in the retail version.*

Story

You play Belial, offspring of a Demon and an Angel. Because you are half and half you are persecuted, have your wings ripped off by Cerberus, and are then imprisoned for thousands of years in a cage in Purgatory. The strength of the locks on the cage are linked directly to the power manifested by Lucifer. Suddenly your shackles disappear (thank you Daniel Garner), and you are able to escape your prison. You are filled with hate and you are looking for Cerberus. And you mean business!

Facts

Let's take a not so quick look at the facts. Painkiller Overdose will be a stand-alone game, which means you don't need to have Painkiller or Battle out of Hell installed to play it. Overdose does not share any of Painkiller's original files, though of course it uses the same, slightly modified engine and makes use of all of Painkiller's base technology. Overdose will feature 17 brand new singleplayer levels, split into three chapters:

Chapter 1: Cataclysm, Japan Massacre, Desert, Asteroids, Dead Marsh and Black Tower
Chapter 2: Riot, Nuclear Plant, Animal Farm, Field Ambulance and Ragnarok
Chapter 3: Haunted Valley, Village of the Damned, Studios, Loony Park, Air Combat and Sammael's Lair

Overdose also introduces eight new weapons, although some of them are remodelled versions of Painkiller's armory -- which is a good thing, because people love those unique instruments like the Stake Gun or the Painkiller weapon. Here are some details:

Cube (aka Razor Cube)
This is Overdose's remake of the original Painkiller weapon. It basically works the same, which means its spinning razors are a great close combat weapon, while the secondary fire mode shoots a slow yet powerful laser beam that can bring down even stronger enemies.

Bonegun
A demonic shotgun replacement with a secondary fire with a similar effect to that of the original one, although the overall behavior is slightly different, which unfortunately makes the well know shotgun combos impossible.

Cannon Gun
The remodelled version of the Rocket Launcher. The alternate fire still features some sort of a machine gun (minigun).

Magic Crossbow
One of the most powerful weapons in the game. If you're familiar with Battle out of Hell's Boltgun, you know how to use this baby. Secondary fire mode throws explosives, just like the heater bombs of its predecessor.

Screamer (aka Head)
This is a complete new weapon, modelled as a demonic head that shoots laser beams ("evil eye") and psycic screams at your enemies.

Hell Blade (aka Sword of Shiva)
A broken but magical sword that shoots out three target seeking heads or summons a rotating blade to inflict damage.

Ectoplasmer
Although it looks completely different, that one behaves like the Stake Gun of Painkiller and Battle out of Hell.

Egg Bomb (aka Goo Gun)
Cool organic bombs that stick to every surface when you throw them, even monsters. Secondary fire mode allows you to use as many of them as you want and trigger them all at once.

Besides those new weapons Overdose also offers more than 40 completely new monsters, including huge bosses and also some mid-sized mini-bosses. It also makes use of some of the original Painkiller monsters which fit perfectly into some of the new levels. There's no need to tell that this game includes several hundreds of megabytes of new textures, sounds, music and videos that tell the story. A cool new feature is the talking of your character, which kind of reminds me of Serious Sam. Belial makes comments about each level, and also in certain scenes (like sometimes when he picks up souls he says things like "tastes like chicken").

Gameplay

Ok, now we know the facts, but what about the game itself? The short answer is: Overdose lives up to its name. Mindware Studios did a great job to push this game to the limits. Each of the levels is a unique piece of work and brings you fresh ideas. Your journey will take you through lovely fairy tale like sceneries, to an ancient Egypt like desert level, outer space, the perpetual ice where you'll meet Vikings (or should I say Viking demons), farm houses, the Civil War, movie studios, even a mid-air combat scene with airships and much more.

Most of the levels are really huge, at least bigger than what you may be used to from Painkiller, with some having more than 300 enemies. Speaking of those, you'll meet some really freaky creatures in Overdose. It's like Mindware's designers held an internal competition who can make the most insane enemies. This may cause some discussions, because some fans may feel it sometimes is too weird, but with the wide variety of content in this game, EVERYBODY is going to find a favorite level of their own. The new demonic weapons with their bizarre look and feel are just the icing on that cake.

Overdose also takes the difficulty of Painkiller to new levels. I'd say I have quite some experience in playing Painkiller, but the Nightmare setting really gave me nightmares in Overdose. I can't even imagine how to finish some of the levels in Trauma at the moment. If you played through the demo, which includes the two levels "Field Ambulance" and "Haunted Valley", I have to scare you a bit: these are rather easy levels. Overdose took my personal swearing experience to unknown highs with levels like "Dead Marsh" and "Studios", which were painfully difficult. Of course this is a beta version. We've been told that we should not worry about balancing and the degree of difficulty. Obviously this is something that is fine-tuned until the very end.

So how many hours can you expect from Overdose? It took me more than 37 hours to finish the game in Nightmare. I think that is something the average gamer can expect from this game. If you're a hardcore fan you obviously want to fulfill all tarot card requirements, some of which seem impossible to me at the moment, and you may also five-star each level (I already did that for some) and replay in Trauma (or Nightmare and Trauma if you started on Insomnia) - so you can easily triple that 37 hours, which is a lot of fun for your money.

Conclusion

The beta version already is of high quality. There are no severe bugs, at least none I'm aware of. There are however some minor glitches, like objects out of the level bounds that prevent you from getting five stars, monster counters that are off, the partly unbalanced difficulty, and - some of you may now be disappointed - way too easy secrets. Most of them are totally obvious or not even hidden. We still have hopes that this will be different in the retail version. Especially for the first chapter item placement doesn't seem to be final, so this may something that is still being worked on. Fact is that most levels offer great places for GOOD secrets, Mindware just has to make use of them :]. It also would be great to ease the player's restrictions a bit. In some areas, your abilities and movement is restricted through invisible walls too much, especially if you're one of those people who used to climb everything and up anywhere in the original Painkiller.

Besides that Overdose really is a great game that I'll spend a lot of hours on. My personal opinion is that apart from VERY few the levels are a total match for those of Painkiller and Battle out of Hell, and some of them are even better. Especially those already well-balanced were so much fun to play I instantly got caught by the old Painkiller feeling.

We had to wait years to get some fresh Painkiller, but like I said in the beginning: Painkiller fans are patient people, and sometimes patience pays off. Overdose will be worth every cent you pay for it!

Kalme