izigame.me

Who would have thought a silly sequel would have so much history to it?
I have a shocking amount of hours on this single-player game, and for good reason. Postal 2 somehow marries a lot of sandbox elements that we’d see later in open-world games. While not exactly open world, Paradise is a pretty beefy map with a lot to explore. Most buildings, especially residential, can be entered as Postal Dude completes mediocre chores like getting milk or having pinkos sign a petition. Here you can find and use a plethora of weapons to go, well, postal with.
And that’s really where all my sunken hours went; it is SHOCKING how many weapons there are and how slightly different each of them function. But here’s what makes Postal 2 so fascinating: the game is only as violent as you are. If you so feel, you can complete the game without harming a single person (or animal). This was a direct response to the media’s response to the first game, similar to the public reaction to Doom and Mortal Kombat. So rather than having Dude kill every last moving thing on the map before being able to move on to more massacre, 2 let’s the player choose how to go about their Monday through Friday.
Sadly, the gunplay isn’t great, as some weapons are strangely useless. The pump-action shotgun and shovel are pitiful, but luckily have better versions that are not too hard to find later in the week. My favorite weapons are the double-barrel shotgun, the baseball bat, and the scythe (the latter honestly being the best weapon in the game). It is wild how many weapons there are, and how they all work slightly differently. This adds to the sandbox gameplay and replayability.
The humor is pretty timeless, especially compared to Postal 3 or 4. It doesn’t feel tryhard or like it’s trying to be relevant, which even Brain Damaged suffers from a little. A big part of the humor comes from the NPCs’ AI, which just works as it should. Pedestrian pedestrians shriek and vomit when you’re being especially violent, and on harder difficulties whip out their own firearms. Even little details like the billboards seen around Paradise are pretty funny to this day.
Overall, it is simple fun. It can’t be good for me, but I feel great playing it.