PAX 2008 Preview
Back in May, gamers and Penny Arcade
fans were treated to Penny Arcade Adventures, a fun downloadable RPG title that
allowed players to play through a fun and clever story in the universe of
everyone’s favorite webcomic, Penny Arcade. Now, developer Hothead Games is
readying their follow-up to the original, Penny Arcade Adventures: On the
Rain-slick Precipice of Darkness: Episode 2.
Episode 2 will keep the narrative
very similar to the first episode, continuing the storyline while offering up
some improvements to the original’s gameplay. The fantastic sense of humor from
the first game is also kept intact in the follow-up, effectively capturing the
wit of the popular web comic. Make no mistake, fans of the original Penny Arcade
Adventures will want to check this one out.
Penny Arcade Adventures: Episode 2
begins where the original game left off, with Gabe and Tycho trying to clean
their lives up after the events of the first game and still trying to fight off
the nefarious Fruit-****ers. Just as in the original, you’ll begin the adventure
by making your avatar through the game’s character creator. If you have a
character from the first Penny Arcade Adventures episode, they will
automatically be detected and carried over to the new episode, complete their
experience intact.
There are a few new additions to the
three main protagonists. Gabe and Tycho will each feature a new set of weapons,
as Gabe will now have attachments for his hands when he punches, Tycho will have
a shotgun as opposed to the Tommy Gun in the previous game, and your custom
avatar will have new garden tools with which to defeat your foes.
The staff at Hothead Games has been
listening to their fans when it comes to requested improvements for the game,
and really took a lot of the suggestions to heart when developing Episode 2.
Whereas the original game featured some rudimentary puzzles here and there, the
new game will have more complex puzzles throughout, which promise to be more
satisfying than before.
Combat has also been updated a bit
to keep things fresh. Special moves have also been updated to be more fun and
challenging, as the mini-games have been made to require faster fingers and
reflexes in order to build up the strongest moves. Blocking is also a lot more
intuitive and easier to pull off, thanks to more prominent indicators on the
screen. All in all, Penny Arcade Adventures: Episode 2 is shaping up quite
nicely, bringing in more fun story elements and enough improvements over the
original to make it a worthy investment for fans of the comic and of the
original game.