![]() ![]() Movement through the world is fairly “standard” action-adventure fare from the era. Game play feels both like a throwback to an older era of games, and a still-fresh set of concepts that I’ve not seen recreated or reused elsewhere, at least not to the level of effectiveness here. The game’s story is surprisingly well-woven, with some solid twists and compelling plot developments, which help to further drive you through the game as you progress. The stakes for Stranger increase pretty rapidly, and as he takes on bounties of increasing notoriety, he finds himself embroiled in a conflict he didn’t expect. ![]() If you’re new to the game, Stranger’s Wrath centers on a character simply named “Stranger,” a caricature of old west bounty hunters whose dialog clearly draws inspiration from the likes of Sam Elliot, making a living for himself by taking down pesky bandits and ne’er do wells to earn his living. The Switch release of the game delivers everything that made the original such a great experience, wrapped up in a highly performant package that lets you focus on reliving your older memories, or discovering the world of Stranger’s Wrath for the first time. Stranger’s Wrath is certainly no stranger to being ported to new systems, but getting to see the HD remaster running unrestrained, in its full glory on the Nintendo Switch hardware is truly an exciting spectacle. Admittedly, most games from the mid 2000’s era don’t age particularly well, but most games from that era weren’t forward-looking, successfully experimental titles that carved out their own space and became something truly memorable in their own right. Such is true of both Stranger and the game that bears his namesake, Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath HD. But sometimes, things are more than what they seem on the surface. However, the game is weakened by structural problems in its design, gameplay, and narrative, and as a consequence Stranger's Wrath falls just short of greatness.Sometimes a man is just a man. Judged on its technical and creative merits, Stranger's Wrath is an impressive game, and it easily ranks among the best of its contemporaries in those two areas. Unfortunately, it mostly stumbles along, becomes convoluted, and doesn't end up anywhere all that satisfying. It's also at this point that the narrative finally kicks in. ![]() ![]() The second half of the game keeps all the action and most of the humor from the first half, but the overall design changes substantially-the whole wild west theme gets tossed out the window. Everything that happened in the first half of the game is suddenly made of no real consequence anymore, and everything you acquired in the first half is essentially stripped away from you as the gameplay switches to the structure of a more traditional FPS. It's fortunate then that the game essentially starts over in its second half. These fights are fun and a couple of them are quite challenging, but after a half a dozen of them, a distinct feeling of repetitiveness began to set in and I found myself struggling to stay engaged with the game. The first half of the game could best be described as a series of boss fights, one after another, that are held together by a weak narrative. It's as if the developers had two different concepts in mind for this game, but couldn't decide which one to go with, so they just compromised and sewed the two together right down the middle. Stranger's Wrath feels like two separate games to me. ![]()
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