Video Game Vintage Title: Postal III

Postal III

Postal III is a third-person shooter video game developed by Russian game company Akella. It is the third game in the Postal series and is a spin-off sequel to Postal 2. It was the first game not developed by Running With Scissors but rather licensed to Akella to produce and develop.

Postal III was released in Russia for Microsoft Windows on 23 November 2011, and in North America on December 23rd, 2011. Releases were planned for Linux and Mac OS X. PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 ports were announced in later stages of development, but it has recently been revealed that budget constraints are holding back these console ports.

Postal III Plot

In Postal III, The Postal Dude emigrates to Paradise's sister town of Catharsis as he previously blew up Paradise with a nuclear bomb. Due to the economic meltdown, the Dude drives into town and becomes stranded because he can not afford a tank of gas. He must then find work and do various odd jobs to escape the town.

Through the course of the game, the player can choose one of two paths: the "bad path", which includes joining in on the schemes of Mayor Chomo and Uncle Dave, or the "good path", which involves the Dude joining the Catharsis Police force. The game plays out in a fairly linear and cinematic way, although the player's actions affect the outcome of the story and the game. Although the "good path" is more difficult to play, it offers more story line and a longer campaign.

There are 3 Endings to the game as Postal Dude must escape from the impending Venezuelan Invasion with Hugo Ch�vez leading the charge.

Evil Ending: Escaping Carthasis with the skin of his teeth and leaving Chomo, Dave and Bin Laden at the mercy of Hockey Moms. Postal Dude winds up at the mercy of the law enforcement who was quick to give him and his dog the death penalty for his slaughter. His appeal to heaven completely fails and Postal Dude is sent to hell.

Neutral Ending: Postal Dude succeeds in escaping Carthasis without resorting to murder or delivering swift justice and meets Jennifer "Jen" Walcott who tries to hijack his car but winds up marrying him instead and enjoying the honeymoon in Peru. He wins the lottery and has a bestselling book which details his personal view of the exploits in Postal 2 as Champ bites on the groin of the talk show host.

Good Ending: Saving the world from Hugo Ch�vez, Postal Dude become one of the most popular yet controversial heroes of American history. He winds up becoming the President of the United States with Jen Wallcott as his wife and head of Secret Service who winds up annoying both sides of the political spectrum. As he moves into the White House, a certain nuclear button sparks the inner psychopath within.

Regardless of the endings, Postal Dude's final words are "I regret nothing!"

Postal III Gameplay

Postal III includes performances by a wide array of minor celebrities, including Ron Jeremy, Jennifer Walcott, and Randy Jones. The game also contains characters depicting Uwe Boll (director of the 2007 Postal film), Sergei Mavrodi, Osama bin Laden and Hugo Ch�vez.

Reception
Rating aggregation site Metacritic found Postal III to be critically slammed, with an average review score of 24 out of 100.

GameSpot gave the game 3/10, while Game Informer also lambasted the game, giving it a score of 1/10 and saying that "the people behind Postal III don�t have the writing ability to back up their gutter-dwelling mouths. As it turns out, they also don�t have the design or programming chops to create a stable game.". This makes it one of a handful of games to ever receive such a low score.

In a more positive review, QJ.Net stated that the game was "one of the most interestingly written, psychotic and harmful games I've ever played" and that the developers had "ended up with a product that looks good, sounds great and is often funny", but also complained that their "experience was marred with constant crashing and a lot of graphical glitches" as well as complaining that it often comes off as "mean spirited and lacking in heart".

Original Gamer gave the game a rating of 7.5, deciding that it was "a good game, just not a great one". The reviewer praised its storyline, wide variety of weapons, and creativity while deriding the games "linear level design and gameplay" and complaining that it takes "a while to get to the meat of the title". It also called out the games use of good and bad paths, which he believed unfairly favoured the good path, deciding that the game "punishes you for being bad, by being bad itself". That said, it concluded by saying that the "fun is there in Postal 3, you just have to work a little for it."