“Memba snow days? Memba missing school and playing with your friends? Memba?”
For those of you that have lived under a rock for the last 25 years, South Park Snow Day is based on the popular TV show South Park. The quaint little town of South Park is experiencing one of the worst snowstorms in its history, and while the adults are freaking out, the kids are happy that school is cancelled, and they have the whole day to play outside.
I had high expectations for this game. As a huge South Park fan who loved the last two games, I figured Snow Day would be as good, if not better, than its predecessors, Stick of Truth and Fractured But Whole. However, Snow Day is a completely different type of game all together. Instead of using the typical South Park look that we all know and love, the developers decided to go a different route. Similar to South Park 64, everything is now 3D. I’m not a huge fan of this look. In my opinion the graphics don’t look bad at all in terms of quality, I just preferred the 2D visuals that made it feel like I was playing through an actual episode of South Park. But I’m trying to look at this as a separate title from the first two, because honestly there is no comparison.
South Park Snow Day is better with friends. For example, when you have to go visit your grandma for the summer, but you can bring a friend so it’s a little more tolerable. As you wonder through the town of South Park, battling enemies you can play with up to three friends in online co-op. If you choose not to play online you will be joined by three AI partners that will aid you in battle. And let me tell you, they are not the brightest comrades, but they help a bit when you’re overwhelmed with enemies. I was able to join up with some other players online and it was a lot more fun than playing alone (when everyone was cooperating). After a while though, the game can feel a bit repetitive. Using a mix of button-mashing and special abilities you’ll fight your way through just five chapters before the game is over. So when I say underwhelming, its not because the game looks or plays differently. It’s just not what I expected at all as far as quality or gameplay.
At the end of each level you will fight a boss of some sort. As far as gameplay goes these battles are a little more exciting, as you have to be more strategic and they give you a break from the repetitive random battles you encounter throughout the map. As you explore you can purchase upgrades, abilities and armor from various little shops, using TP (toilet paper), and eventually have access to helpful items and more powerful weapons. However, it doesn’t feel like there is much variety when it comes to upgrades or weapons either, so that was a little disappointing.
Fighting can feel really clunky at times. I noticed some frame-rate drops and glitches during my time playing but nothing game breaking so far, just annoying. It almost seems as if there is a lag when pressing the action button. And while I enjoy the challenge of not using “auto aim”, Snow Day really could have used that feature to make combat more fluid. Whenever I had to shoot a long-range weapon it was frustrating to say the least. If you enable motion controls it makes it a little easier, but I don’t like to move around too much when I’m playing my vidya games, so that’s kind of a me problem, I guess.
To get a little more in-depth about the repetitiveness I mentioned earlier, the button mashing really gets old. It feels like the same fight every time, no strategy or anything, just pressing one button, a lot. Over time you will also realize that there isn’t a huge variety of basic enemies either. You’ll be attacked by the same groups of kids, sometimes numerous times. There’s such a huge cast in the show, it’s a shame we didn’t get to see more of them in 3D.
As far as the things I liked about this game, Snow Days story delivers the same hilarious humor that South Park is known for. Cutscenes are done in the original 2D animation style. Sometimes I would forget I was playing a game because I’ve been watching so much South Park lately. Another good thing about Snow Day is that it really is kind of fun to play with friends or strangers online, especially if you are all fans of the show. Lastly is the price tag. If this game was going for the typical $60-$70 I would say pass on in immediately, but $30 isn’t too bad if you’re looking for a silly co-op game to play with your buddies.
