At the beginning of every year, there's that one game that sets the pace for the rest of the year's releases. It makes you forget the year before it, and get excited for what's to come. Ladies and gentlemen, Postal III is not that game. In fact; it's pretty much as far as what the game industry wants to be known for this year as you can get. To be fair, it's not a terrible game, it's pretty middle of the road, it's just the exact opposite of what the gaming industry needs right now. It's crude, it's classless and it's hateful -- and all this for no real reason other than the desire to offend.

Haven't played through the previous two Postal games? Don't worry -- for two reasons. First, the game opens up with a rather lengthy movie sequence detailing the history of our protagonist The Postal Dude. The other reason you won't have to worry? You won't need to know any of the series' roots to understand just what's going on in Portal III, because there's literally no plot worth following. Postal III doesn't focus on story, it just gives you tasks and jobs you'll have to do to get out of bad situations -- and that's when things start to go downhill fast.

These aren't your normal fetch this, kill that quests, oh no -- Postal III does things differently. In one mission, you're cleaning up used Kleenex in an adult video arcade and then slinging them at Sarah Palin lookalikes. Go ahead, read that sentence over, it says exactly what you thought it did. Later on in the game you'll murder a gay biker gang and even decapitate pedestrians and piss on their bodies. And why? For some lesson? To advance the story further? Nope. It's all done just...because. Now, I'm no prude, but it's a bit much. A bit more than a bit.

"...you can hack off any of your opponent's limbs..."

Maybe I'm being a bit unfair, as I did have a bit of fun with one of Postal III's mechanics. At any point in the game, you can hack off any of your opponent's limbs, and then proceed to pretty much whatever you want with them. I had a great deal of fun taking the limbs of a few enemies and then tossing them at other enemies. It's a small plus in a game filled with negatives.

Perhaps all of these lewd acts could be excused if there was any substance what-so-ever to Postal III. This is as bare bones, run-of-the-mill as shooters as you'll likely ever see. The game does very little to differentiate itself from other shooters, and somehow even manages to mess up the basics. Moving seems to be a major problem here, as you'll constantly get caught up on everything from terrain changes to objects in the environment. It's incredibly frustrating to keep taking fire as you're stuck on a small hill.

"...features some of the worst AI I've ever seen."

Postal III also features some of the worst AI I've ever seen. Picture yourself in a heavy firefight, against a slew of undead enemies, it's just you and one of your closest allies. You hunker down in a corner to avoid getting shot, then look over to see how your ally is doing. Apparently, he's just standing there. In the open. Doing nothing. Yeah, great strategy. Both the enemy and friendly AI exhibit almost no awareness for what's going on in the game that it would almost be laughable...if it wasn't so frustrating.

Presentation wise, Postal III is pretty much what you'd expect. It looks alright, but also miles behind what other AAA PC shooters are packing these days. The Postal Dude has a few interesting one liners he spews out, but there's not enough to keep them fresh and they get old very fast. Oddly enough, the audio has a tendency to freak out at times and get tiny or not even work at all.