In this mode, Stranger whips out his trusty crossbow to shoot at varmints with live ammunition, essentially little animals and critters you collect that all have different uses depending on whether you want to outright kill your foes or capture them for more cash. It feels a little sluggish, especially when the camera seems to have a hard time panning up and down in this mode but it does give you a keen advantage when figuring out how you'll deal with enemies.įirst-person, on the other hand, is where everything shines with the usual weirdness that Oddworld is known for along with the better combat potential. For example, the latter is naturally ideal for traversing across the many surprisingly large and detailed environments you'll be visiting since Stranger can run pretty quickly, along with jumping across platforms and climbing things with ease. One of the notable features is that you can switch between a first and third-person gameplay style whenever you please by clicking the right stick, with different advantages depending on the situation. This sounds both boring and repetitive but the flexible gameplay and open level design mixes things up, allowing for a lot of improvisation that constantly keeps things feeling fresh throughout the entire game. After you've kicked the outlaw around a bit you take a convenient shortcut back to town and do it all over again.
Most of the time it's a similar deal you head into a town filled with ugly chickens, take your pick from the available bounties, and then head to their location.
Shifting away from its roots, Stranger's Wrath primarily focuses on hunting down outlaws instead of saving slaves. The plot isn't the only aspect that subverts expectations though. Some might call it a tad too preachy, but there's no denying that the core message is perhaps more impactful now than it's ever been before. It's mature stuff for a game that also has a lot of really silly moments, but it all ends up coming together to make something with a strong moral compass and a life lesson that anyone can adhere to. Stranger initially comes off as a stereotype who fits into the surroundings like a glove, but as everything becomes clearer you begin to understand the affecting motivations and conflicts that drive him forward. It's all straightforward and laid back at first, but after a damning reveal later on everything becomes far more dramatically rich. He ain't strolling into town to make pals though, thanks to his ambition to catch outlaws and earn a ton of 'moolah' for a mysterious life-changing operation he's desperate for. Switching up the oppressive hyper-capitalistic factories for a straightforward spaghetti western theme, Stranger's Wrath puts you in the boots of the titular intimidating, deep-voiced bounty hunter named Stranger. Thankfully, Stranger's Wrath HD manages to be even better than it was 15 years ago despite its age, and this Switch port is a golden opportunity for players to experience this golden cult classic. Whether that was because of the incoming console generation or down to baffled gamers is another matter, but it's undeniable that Stranger's Wrath deserved more love. Despite getting showered with praise when it came out in 2005 only 600,000 copies were ever sold on the original Xbox, cementing it as a commercial failure. There's something uniquely odd about Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath, and that's not just because of the franchise name.
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