Sin and Punishment - Ok, that was fun, but what did I just do?

Hey everyone! No this is not my review of NCAA 2011, I am going to be extra thorough with that one, and I just got it today because I was going to my cousin’s wedding the day it came out. The wedding was great so it was totally worth the delay...at least for me anyways.

In any case, because I am so wise and you all try to emulate me, I can only assume that you also watch the same TV networks as me. And if you have been brushing up on your Spongebob trivia, or enjoy the pure comedy that is the Penguins of Madagasgar, then you have probably seen a weird commercial for Sin and Punishment: Star Successor for the Wii. I don't know if it was the intention of the commercial to be just vague and weird enough to make me look up more info about this game, but that is what happened. Turns out the "Star" that this game is the "Successor" of is the first Sin and Punishment game which was only released in Japan.

Photo courtesy of ign.com

This is not good news for those of us who like to know the whole story behind a game. And I think it is completely reasonable to ask for the whole story. If you didn’t read the first couple of the Harry Potter books, you probably never felt it was necessary or even worthwhile to read the later ones. You had no emotional attachment to the characters and had no understanding of why should give a crap about Harry Potter. The same goes for video games.

But the gameplay for Star Successor looked good enough for me to look into it. I just happened to have a gift card and decided this good be a worthwhile investment. And it turns out I am right.

The game is about a guy and girl who are on the run from some baddies called the Nebulox. It is unclear at the start of the game why you are running, but apparently it because the girl is a monster of some sort and you need to protect her from the Nebulox that are also kind of monsters. Oh and you’re a Nebulox, but you want to help the girl instead of capturing or killing her like you are supposed to. You know, its your classic story of boy meets girl, girl is a monster, boy’s former co-workers try to kill both of them.

That bat-thing is...er...was a human...well sorta...anyways he's bad...I think...Look man, I don't know what's going on - photo from ign.com

You might be thinking, “Wait…what?” Exactly! This story makes next to no sense, and I didn’t even tell you about the Lion and Eagle that twist themselves together in order to blast you with fire and lasers, or the giant monster that you defeat, but still manages to spit out its baby which happens to be a hamster with a license to operate cranes and other heavy machinery.

That's the hamster baby and this is what you can expect from the gameplay; constant action

But the good news is that this crazy story is completely secondary to the great game play. If you were anything like me as a kid, you probably played your fair share of arcade shooting games at Chucky Cheese’s or between games of Laser Tag at your local purveyor of laser tag and laser tag related goods. Sin and Punishment is just like those games. Even on its easiest setting the game is tough and you will have to try some parts several times before you will beat it. And the constant flow of enemies never lets you down. You are constantly fighting for your virtual life and you will never be bored with this game.

It is really refreshing to find a game that is just so much fun to play that you don’t even care that you don’t really understand what it going on, or why anything happens the way it does. Nintendo should take a lesson from Sin and Punishment: Star Successor and make more rail shooting games that aren't zombie shooters like House of the Dead. The Wii is made for this kind of gameplay and with a little storyline they just may come up with some truly incredible gaming experiences. Sin and Punishment: Star Successor gets 3/10 for storyline and 9/10 for gameplay so that averages out to 6 evil hamsters out of 10.