Deadpool Hands On impressions

Deadpool is not the first or hell even the last character that one would think of making an entire game based off of. He’s not a good guy, he’s technically not evil. He’s delusional, psychotic, and insane among other similar outlandish traits. Somehow his dickish, sarcastic, witty banter make for a hell of an idea for a game. Activision and Marvel have entrusted this to High Moon Studios for the job of bringing this character to life in a way that could only fit Deadpool. We got a demonstration and hands on impression of the game thats going to drop later this month.

The first thing we noticed is that he is fully self aware that he is in a video game and that he wants to ultimately be featured in one. If you get the subject at hand and what this does for a character like Deadpool, then you know it’s pretty solid material. Starting out in his apartment before even getting into a mission there is plenty to actually mess around with like go to the bathroom. Once he was ready for action, we got our first mission.

This game has a very familiar style of play, as many third person action shooters do. You will be able to upgrade weapons for more moves and stronger attacks. Some of the key differences is the franticness and ability to chain all sorts of combos and attacks together. Each melee weapon and gun also has its own stealth kill, yes while hard to believe, Deadpool has stealth attacks. There are even some areas where it is preferred to do so.

When performing combos you will raise the focus meter on the corner which has a set of four bars. Each bar lets you do a different move that attacks all enemies at once in the vicinity. There doesn’t seem to be an auto aim for guns that we’ve noticed but given the high fire rate we didn’t mind that much. As of now and are sure in the final version will only ship with two modes being the campaign and the challenge mode.

Much of the game you will be coming across other Marvel heroes that he actually encounters in Deadpool comic scenarios. We had the pleasure of being introduce to Cable which not surprisingly brings you a message from the future. Some of what makes this game great so far is that wall it breaks for Deadpool and player interaction. Much of the game he puts himself in the 4th person view, trying to engage with you while your playing … him. An example is Cable debriefing Deadpool on what is going on in the future and how to prevent it, Deadpool is only hearing what he wants to hear and actually starts to fall asleep, commanding you to put him out of his misery to make it stop.

While the experience is in a linear fashion, there looks to be hidden unlockables, easter eggs, currency for weapons and different elements of play like fighting off hordes of enemies with a helicopter. High Moon Studios is delivering a unique form of story telling which fans will definitely appreciate and its level of humor. Nolan North who voices Deadpool and Deadpool writer Daniel Way which penned the story do a superb job of bringing this character to life. Expect our full review when it hits store shelfs on June 25th for the Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.