So the game drops us off with a Grindhouse style of animations and really well done comic panels explaining what happened to the Postal Dude in previous games and where he is now. He starts to recant from either a cell or a hospital bed to a very openly gay sounding man about how he got there. He blames the Global Financial Crisis and how terrible that was, as well as recapping the film based on the series.   Then we finally get some gameplay. A tutorial style level in which the Postal Dude escapes Paradise to get to Catharsis. It is a literal and metaphorical bridge between games which I saw as the Postal writers getting a bit of contextual relevancy bang for their buck.

To get into the graphics of the game, the Postal game relies heavily on PhysX and the Source engine and they make it worthwhile. Almost everything in the game is shootable or interactable. From picking up loose limbs to destroying potted plants with a good series of shots. The game also looks fantastic, such as the motion blur effect when the Postal Dude is running and it is not disorientating, weird looking or annoying like most games (See: Gears of War). The game takes care in the looks of their characters with a variety of pedestrians or authoritarian figures that look the same on the streets of Catharsis (a big problem in Postal 2). However, there were a few graphical glitches here and there but nothing too major except for it crashing from time to time.

The meta humour overflows in the game with references to being a PC gamer, meme-spouting citizens and pot shots at everyone from the game industry to Sarah Palin. There is a lot of voice acting in the game from people such as Jen Walcott, Uwe Boll and Ron Jeremy. The voice acting is top notch quality in terms of quality and quantity. The only times you'll hear repeated dialogue is if you die constantly and even then, it doesn't get too annoying. The sound design is quite well done as well.  For example when you pick up a cat the varied cat noises and the terrifying guttural draw of the badger weapon is just frightening the first time you hear it.

I do have to say the game is incredibly violent with limbs and god knows what else flying everywhere and the variety of weapons is intensely similar to the second game sans a few I haven't found/discovered yet. The response is usually a series of vomiting, dizziness or death from multiple weapons being fired. Early in the game you receive a vacuum used for picking up "used" tissues in a porn parlour to shoot at hockey moms which causes them to vomit. Also a fart gun which dazes people.  While I think a fart gun would make someone throw up, it's this cartoon based logic that makes Postal 3 easy to not take too seriously. 

The self aware nature of the developers at Running with Scissors helps keep the ball in their court. They are more than aware that you can be non-lethal in the game, even when the game eggs you on. During the first mission in the game you have to protect a big red button. You are then ordered with big red text and the Dude himself to press the button. It is a bit of a comment on violent and societal peer pressure but really it's just to drive the game onto the next part.

I do have to say early in the game there is little to actually drive you on to doing the next thing without a simple marker or incentive to do so. Most missions will end with you not getting paid (GFC) or simply being shafted for your work. While you don't really need to buy anything in the world of Catharsis, you will need to rack up points. There is also a Morality Meter (happy face, psychotic face) which may or may not be a commentary on games which have Morality Meters. I have to give credit to Postal 3 for setting up simple and single room situations and creating dilemma's for you as a player to go and kill everyone or figure away to do it non-lethally. I tried for several levels with just using the Fart Gun on people, such as during a shoot out between police and Ecologists. It was quite effective till you got to the part with a GIGANTIC HELICOPTER SHOOTING AT YOU FROM AN OPEN WINDOW.

Postal 2 told you that you the game is as only as violent as you and had a lot of difficult moments to prove that but Postal 3 has thrown that warning in the waste basket and has left for you to fend for yourself. I do know that like it's prequel the game takes a lot of chances on player reactions other than programmed ideas. I love this about the series.  It takes mundane or simple problems and turns them into farcical situations from which there is no escape. It shows that people can be as violent or as simple in their nature when confronted with such a problem even if it's not their fault or choice to do something. That being said, the game will not let you leave certain levels.

The interesting thing is that it plays into the postal dude character more than your questioning of who he is or who you are. We've established he's a pretty bad character and unlike characters like Roman Bellic or Cole Phelps, you are not congratulated or promoted or praised in anyway for your actions.  Except your own vain hubris. It's incredibly immersive but it does give you a question regardless of what you would do in Postal Dude's shoes rather than your own..

As the story goes on, Postal Dude talks to the gay stereotype, which is not exactly funny but something to play off. I do have to say at least PD isn't a homophobic character or incredibly racist.  Ron Jeremy is quite amusing as always in his cameo and I take the vacuum levels as a tribute to Luigi's Mansion considering how much they suck. The Sarah Palin jokes and scatalogical humour abound but often seem dated, even by satire standards, but the meta humour is spot on. One of my favourites " I didn't know about Valve had a shader for that" was something I was glad they said.

The game take no prisoners and pulls no punches but executes everyone equally with vigour and quip (excluding a lot of the game industry, guess you gotta keep working). However, I do have to make a comment somewhere that being a cat owner, the AIDs infected cats which you can use as weapons had no context in Postal 2, but here have some kind of Postal-sense. I'm still opposed to them being used as silencers, even if they are sick. Lets just say I am for the euthanasia for sick dying cats but only in a humane, relaxed fashion. I shall not say anything more about the seriousness of that situation.

Of course, it's not all good. Nothing ever is. Okay, so the game isn't great, it's mean spirited and lacking in heart and mocks everything except it's cameo appearances from Porn Stars and mediocre directors. I tried to like this game a lot but at almost every turn there was something offensive for no good reason other than mean spirited satire. It falls into Family Guy territory more than South Park. It is creative and it is funny and dark, but more often than not it's for no good reason. It is often contextually relevant and rationalised in the game's world.  I just hope no one takes what the guys at RWS are saying seriously or they would have a gender, race and vilification war on their hands.

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