![total overdose papa muerte total overdose papa muerte](http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/totaloverdose/images/a/ad/Heavygun2.jpg)
I will say with confidence that the content is extremely not funny and works to the detriment of the intended Robert Rodriguez flavor.Īlso I just realized while writing this that the aforementioned drug kingpin named Papa Muerte, who ordered the death of your character's father, never actually shows up in the game. I'm not going to try to characterize this sort of thing as 'harmless' because, to be honest, I'm not fully educated on what sort of harm this kind of representation can have. Total Overdose is what I'll call, "food racist." That is to say, there are no overt political messages being made, but some of the characters will just talk about how much they like tacos in the middle of conversations that are otherwise unrelated to tacos. Before I wrap up, the tone needs to be touched on a little bit. Total Overdose is a flawed game with huge gaps missing, but the shooting gameplay is fun enough to justify some time spent with it. I enjoyed trying to get high scores in missions to unlock bonuses and health upgrades, and in spite of my states reservations, I like having to constantly switch up my weapons on the fly in order to meet the currents of combat. Slow motion diving may be cribbed from Max Payne, but it's still fun to do. I actually had more than a little bit of fun playing through this confusing mess of a B-list game. I'd either find myself realizing that I have no shotgun ammo until it's too late or completely ignoring my shotgun because I had assumed it was empty. The feedback for cycling through weapons and keeping track of what you have access to is poor. This makes for an interesting experience, but it also feeds into my biggest gripe with the game. Carrying capacity for ammo is low all across the board, so you're constantly made to swap weapons and improvise with whatever you have at your disposal. Since you can't buy weapons or ammo in the open world, everything needs to be scavenged from dead enemies or pickups in the level. I know that it doesn't, but please bear with me. You have to aim the camera, but you don't have to aim your gun.
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Gunplay is mostly based on an automatic soft-lock on, which was common in the PS2 days but makes less sense here as the camera is fully controllable with the right thumbstick or mouse. That is, unless you're standing next to a wall, in which case it will probably glitch out as your character tries and fails to do a cool Matrix-style wallrun thing. You can press a stunt button at any time during combat to enact a slow motion dive. There are sometimes other minor activities such as delivering vehicles, but it's always in service of forcing you into places with lots of guys that must be shot at.
![total overdose papa muerte total overdose papa muerte](https://pcgamesguru.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Total-Overdose-screen-2.jpg)
Each mission is roughly the same setup: you are in a place and must shoot all of the guys.
![total overdose papa muerte total overdose papa muerte](https://images.igdb.com/igdb/image/upload/t_screenshot_big/yrt07qmlllamfhygshqx.jpg)
There are eleven story missions in total, which makes the game shockingly short. Why is it even there? Was it a publisher mandate? A prank that got out of hand? I refuse to speculate on the matter. This environment is the barest of the bare minimum required to be mentioned in the same breath as GTA. Even going on a little rampage is meaningless, since there are no police or wanted systems to fight against. There are no stores to buy things from and no diversionary minigames. There's literally nothing to do in the open world. Except it's not used for that, because at any time you can bring up the pause menu and select any active mission or side activity from a list in order to start it immediately. Except it's not a GTA knockoff at all, because the open world is completely pointless all you use it for is driving from one mission to the next.
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Except it's also a Grand Theft Auto knockoff, set in a semi-open city environment (divided by loading screens into five or so districts) where you're free to wander and steal cars. You do a lot of diving in slow-motion while shooting at guys. On one hand, Total Overdose is a Max Payne clone. It's like the game is being open about its own identity crisis. And then at the end of his first mission he hurts his leg so he calls in the real protagonist, his twin brother. At this point the perspective shifts to the real protagonist: his son, who is also a DEA agent and is out to find the truth. At the end of the tutorial he is killed off by another agent who was secretly working for the kingpin Papa Muerte the entire time. Total Overdose starts with a tutorial mission in which you play as an old DEA agent, blasting up drug runners who operate from an Aztec ziggurat.