Frank Castle arrives on the gaming scene, and he wants to punish someone.
The Punisher's story is a story of revenge and conquest, before Frank Castle became The Punisher his family were wiped out during a Mob hit and Castle was meant to die too, the story then picks up one day later with Castle in a maximum prison on Ryker's Island, and he tells these two detectives about the events leading up to this point. So, the missions are flashbacks that describe what Castle was going through to get the information about the guy who killed his family, John Saint. During those flashbacks you face a mob family called the Gnucci's, that's pronounced as Nuchiis. You face a local gang in a Crack house and Chop Shop too. Also, The Punisher makes good use of other Marvel heroes and heroines like Black Cat, Iron Man, Kingpin and Bullseye make brief cameos. But the real star is of course The Punisher and his real rotten mood almost makes you feel sorry for his victims.
Even though you do interrogate a lot of foes, this is still a shooter and you have a large arsenal at your disposal. At the beginning of each mission you get to choose the weapons you want to take with you, that you've unlocked of course. You can hold two weapons at once, and not just pistols and SMG's, you can dual-wield two shotguns, assault rifle grenade launchers and the like, you get hold of flamethrowers and rocket launchers and it's all effective. When you choose your weaponry you can toggle a description which has Castle explaining what he thinks of the weapon, the history and the caliber type of bullets it takes, don't worry it's brief. Frank Castle may sound like a gun-ho nerd when he talks about it but learning's fun right?
You can only hold two weapons in the game, a two handed weapon and a dual wielded weapon like two pistols or SMG's. The shooting handles very well, you can take cover, pop out and take some shots, duck back down and reload, but Castle can take a bunch of bullets thanks to his upgradeable Kevlar vest. During combat if you duck down into cover your health will regenerate over time but if you go into Slaughter Mode by pressing the Triangle button. In Slaughter Mode, The Punisher drops his weapons and takes out two knives which can be thrown to stun your enemies and you can get up close and give them a stinging sensation as you rip through the crowds. Slaughter Mode juice can be filled up by wiping out enemies and getting good combo multipliers in your score which when added up at the end of the mission will determine what rank of medal you got, bronze, silver or gold.
What makes this game shine are its ultra-gory and over-the-top interrogation sequences and its original ways of killing foes in a bang. In the first mission within a crack house, you’re introduced to two kinds of “Splashes”: Gold and Silver splashes. Gold splashes are special kill regions, this means when you’ve got an enemy as a human shield, you can drag him over above the splash and press Square and you watch the animation. Unfortunately, there are just not enough of these but they are funny and fun to do. Silver splashes are special interrogation regions, now this is where the violence hitches up. You’re primarily meant to use these against the foes with The Punisher Skull icon above their heads, like in The Godfather. Once again you have to take a human shield over there and press X this time and you have to use the left thumb-stick to tease your foe with death. There’s lot’s of these like pushing a foe over a rail and into the sea, or threatening to feed an enemy to a rampaging rhino or great white shark. Also, after the interrogation, Castle always cracks a quirky joke afterwards, like after you’ve cracked a crook’s face over a curb Castle says: “Next time, stay six inches from the curb.” You can also do standard interrogations, these can be done on anybody, and they consist of choking, gun tension, face-smashing or punching. Some of these interrogations are harder than others because the stress gauge is sometimes too sensitive as you’re meant to hold the bar in the middle of the stress gauge for three seconds to get the information out of the poor sap in your clutches. So, this can lead to frustration.
The graphics and sound work in the game is also pretty good. Since this game is based on the comics not the film, it’s got the comic feel to it but it does blend in the film aspects for example where you’re fighting The Russian in your apartment. It’s got a Max Payne film noir feel to it, especially in the first mission. The sounds are good, guns sound great, the enemies cuss at you and scream when they see you slit someone’s throat or when they “accidentally” shoot their own pal, I put “accidentally” in inverted commas as this tends to happen a lot. Thomas Jane voices The Punisher as he played the role of Frank Castle in the 2004 film, shame he won’t be in the sequel. Overall, the game has good graphics and sound but the one thing the game lacks is enemy voice work. What I mean is, is the dialogue and accents they use. Take the Russians for example, the Russian accents are really laughable but at least the Yakuza sound abit better, well they are Japanese so the accents have to be good.
In a nutshell, The Punisher is a great game that blends interrogation with shooting very well, it’s not the longest game in the world but the multiple paths and play techniques the game possesses is what will keep you coming back to blow someone’s head clean off.