It’s a carefully balanced mix of jokey fun and sincere character drama, complete with arcs, set up and paid off story beats, likable heroes, and moments of cleverness you’d never expect from this franchise before now. Jonas and Verena Kyratzes’s writing is brilliant in how much emotion is squeezes out of its stereotypical cast by just giving them moments to breathe and emote, not to mention the fun meta playfulness. Dick style sci-fi story and using that both for comedy and straight drama. One thing that instantly stands out is the fixed tone issues of the previous games, settling on a 80s action movie cast set in a Phillip K. The team is tested in turbulent trials of combat, unexpected allies are found, and all set against the scenic backdrop of lived in European countryside and towns. However, they have to deal with the general in charge of Mental’s European front, Lord Achriman, to get there. The set-up is that we’re in the middle of Mental’s invasion, as Sam (now confirmed as a former space captain) and his crew travel the world in a play to find the holy grail and get a new weapon against the hordes. The game is another prequel…maybe? Serious Sam 4 is purposefully playful with its continuity, with nods to the time travel concept possibly affecting the current story, and it ends on a note that could go in all sorts of wild directions. It’s not without some leftover issues from BFE, but you can really tell just how much Croteam have grown as a game studio, even keeping the amateur vibe of their past games with the constant borrowing of ideas from the big boys alongside their own shenanigans. Serious Sam 4 isn’t just good, it might be the single best game in the entire franchise, a smoothed out perfecting of just about every mechanic and design concept in the series with a surprisingly strong script and characters, with some of the largest fights in any game period, the first and last level (the first being a tease for the last) having 100,000 enemies on screen, just as promised (though they’re mainly props, it’s still very impressive). There were warning signs everywhere, plus some iffy word of mouth due to some review builds before the day one patch missing tons of content. The marketing machine for SS4 was there but not as large as you’d expect, trailers being cagey with showing off details on what the game would contain. Croteam had members leave and return, released a demo to show off some ideas they had for Serious Sam 4, realized those ideas were better elsewhere and made The Talos Principle, got the writers of that game to pen SS4‘s story, finally re-announced it as Serious Sam 4: Planet Badass, dropped the subtitle and branding a few months before release, and, due to money, the console versions were delayed for Stadia timed exclusivity. ![]()
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