Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath
| Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Oddworld Inhabitants |
| Publisher(s) | Electronic Arts |
| Platform(s) | Xbox |
| Release | January 25, 2005 (NA) March 5, 2005 (AU) |
| Genre(s) | First-person shooter/Third-person shooter/Action-adventure |
| Mode(s) | Single player |
Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath is the second Oddworld game for the Microsoft Xbox. It details the adventures of The Stranger, a fearsome bounty hunter. Throughout the game, The Stranger pursues and captures outlaws in order to collect bounties. The apparent goal is to ultimately earn enough moolah (in-game money) to pay for a mysterious life-saving operation. You start the game just having captured a filthy outlaw. You must then continue to capture his minions using live ammo, which is literally ammunition made of living creatures, and collect their bounties in various towns throughout the land.
It is said this will be the last Oddworld Game release and that Oddworld Inhabitants will release the other chapters of Oddworld as movies, as they supposedly originally intended.
Story
Fierce is the spirit of her waters
It creates us
Binds us-flows in us
The fool who dare enslave her
Beware
She wash his life away
—Native Grubb Proverb
A cutscene plays when the game starts showing an outlaw named Blisterz Booty chasing after the bounty hunter Stranger. Blisterz Booty gets caught in Stranger's trap and the cutscene ends. The player then starts the game on the first level, entitled 'The Way Of The Hunter'. This level is where the player learns the game's controls and strategies. The player then enters one of the game's towns, Gizzard Gulch, where the player must capture outlaws to pay for Stranger's mysterious surgery.
Live Ammo
As mentioned, The Stranger's weapon of choice is a custom-made, double-barreled, semi-automatic, high-tension crossbow with optional sniper/snooper scope. Instead of arrows, the crossbow fires rather unconventional ammunition. Eight different types of critters are used: Zapp Flies, Chippunks, Stingbees, Fuzzles, Stunkz, Boom-bats, Thud-Slugs, Bolamites, and Wasps.
- Bolamites resemble four-legged spiders with huge, swollen abdomens. Filled to the brim with sticky webbing, these arachnids were fired from the Stranger's crossbow to entangle his Outlaw prey.
- Boombats resemble a pudgy bat's head with tiny wings for ears. Their unusual chemical-based diet renders them highly explosive. Any rough handling causes the bats to detonate, and the Stranger made use of these beasts as natural rocket ammunition.
- Chippunks are a race of tiny mammals possessed of seemingly high intelligence. They essentially fulfill the same niche as the Chipmonks of Earth, but differ in their ability to speak coherently in a squeaky, high-pitched voice. The Stranger uses these rodents as ammunition in his crossbow, firing the squabbling creatures as decoys: the Chippunk would hurl insults at any nearby Outlaws, luring the brutes into the Stranger's waiting fist.
- Fuzzles are a tiny race of furry creatures, often exploited as lab animals by the scientific-minded Vykkers. Fuzzles naturally resemble a little glob of fur topped by a pair of watery eyes, with a fang-filled mouth that is not seen until it is too late. Their appearance is often brutally altered, however, by the experiments performed on them by the Vykkers. By some unknown virtue, Munch the Gabbit is trusted by the typically vicious Fuzzles. The Stranger uses the bite-happy Fuzzles as living ammunition for his crossbow.
- Stingbees are essentially larger versions of Earth's hornets, albeit with four legs instead of six. These insects act as living machine-gun rounds in the Stranger's crossbow.
- Stunkz resemble a cross between a Fuzzle and an Earth skunk, and these striped furballs are capable of spraying an overpowering stench. When used as ammunition in the Stranger's crossbow, Stunkz render Outlaws helpless by acting as an olfactory ipecac, causing the helpless outlaws to continuosly vomit.
- Thudslugs are reminiscent of a huge wood-louse, rolling into a ball and leaving its enemies faced with its thick shell. The Stranger uses these insects as projectile blackjacks, bludgeoning Outlaws with the Thudslugs' heavy exoskeletons.
- Wasps are tiny insects possessed of a long, needle-like beak. Used in the Stranger's crossbow, these bugs function as crude sniper bullets.
- Zappflies are large insects that produce a significant electric charge, enough to shock even large creatures into unconsciousness. The Stranger puts these bugs to just such a purpose.
Ally Races
- Clakkerz are a chicken-like race of hillbilly people, clustered along the Mongo River in Old West style desert towns. They have little sympathy for the native Grubbs, and are only concerned with themselves, the latest gossip, and Moolah. They are the settlers of West Mudos, and appear to be the middle-class consumers in Oddworld's Industrial society. Clakkerz are extreme cowards, and enlist the help of bounty hunters to rid their towns of Outlaws.
- Grubbs are a salamander-like race that inhabits western Mudos, and have made their settlements along the Mongo River. However, due to the arrival of Sekto and his Wolvark thugs, they have been forced away from the river and hence their water supply. Grubbs once relied on the protection provided by the Steef, but due to the Steef's apparent extinction, the Grubbs are now fair game for anyone who wants to give them a hard time. Their culture is a spiritual one that lives in harmony with the land, carving massive temples and statues from the living rock.
- Steef are a legendary breed of centaur-like creatures with the lower body of a horse, the upper body of a gorilla, head of a lion and the horns of a ram. Once the protectors of the meek Grubbs, wild ones are now a rare sight. These mighty beasts have become a favored game animal for hunters from Oddworld's industrial races, so being a Steef can be quite hazardous to your health nowadays.
Enemy Races
- Gloktigi are massive, squid-like creatures that form the largest species in the Glukkon family tree. Their body is similar to a large cuttle-fish, with a bulbous head and tentacled mouth, but these creatures walk upright on a pair of limbs. These walking arms end in a tripod of talons, the deadly claws of which are equal in length to the rest of the limb. Despite their huge heads, Gloktigi appear no more intelligent than a guard dog, and fulfill just such a niche in Industrial complexes. A Gloktigi's deadliest weapon is its "webbing", a sticky green substance that is used to entangle victims. It is possible the "Gloktigi" encountered in the game are not in there entirely natural form - there body's have several inorganic components - blades, claws, mechanically enhanced limbs, an ability to teleport and unlimited stamina.(This could also explain their ability to walk and breathe on land) It is most likely that Sekto captured Gloktigi specimens from the wild and cybernetically augmented them to make them far more effective at their role as guards.
- Oktigi are head-sized, octopus-like creatures that are in the same species lineage as the Glukkons. They appear to be naturally aquatic, but can breath air and survive on land with the aid of a host body. Oktigi are parasites: they attach themselves to their victim's head (essentially replacing it) and use the victim's body as their own (similar to the head crabs from Half-Life). They seem to prefer obtaining the strongest host body possible. Like their cousins the Glukkons, the Oktigi are driven by self-interest and corporate greed, and have a preference for fine business suits, expensive cigars, and exploiting the environment to the highest degree.
- Outlaws are a race of outsiders, who don't fit comfortably into the native or industrialist lifestyles. They loot, plunder, and steal for a living, and use intimidation to get away with it. The Outlaw species actually includes several sub-species, ranging from small hunch-backed lackeys to big jowel-faced bruisers. Regardless of their varied appearance, however, the Outlaws are united by their shared life of crime. These deep-voiced brutes usually tough it out in the wild, building crude shantytowns as their hideouts, or simply hijack facilities from the Clakkerz.
- Slegs are the guard dogs of Oddworld, serving as trackers and security for Industrial and Outlaw facilities. While these creatures use the same barks and whines as their Earth counterparts, all physical similarity ends there. A Sleg resembles an eyeless, fang-filled mouth, supported on a pair of therapod-like legs. Slegs are dark colored and have a beak-like nose, as well as several ears or antennae. Wolvarks and Outlaws train Slegs to guard their facilties and hideouts. There is also a sizeable wild Sleg population on the banks of the Mongo River.
- Vykkers are tall, purple beings with huge heads and small, atrophied bodies. Their seven limbs consist of two fore-legs and one hind-leg (their lower half resembling a grisly tripod) and four spindly arms. The Vykkers are hermaphrodites and are uncomfortably androgonous, exemplified by their high-pitched voices and effeminate gesturing. These creatures act as the scientists and surgeons of Oddworld, and prefer sadism and masochism in equal portions. Their experiments are always punctuated by unnecessary torture of the subjects, while the Vykkers themselves are constantly the victims of their own surgical "self-improvements". While undoubtedly Oddworld's most technologically advanced species, their plans are often hampered by a lack of common sense and a fanatic devotion to causing pain.
- Wolvarks serve the Sekto Springs Bottled Water Company by running factories and doubling as security for those facilities. They often bully the Grubbs, and continue to force them off of what little land they have. Wolvarks are pear-shaped and ungainly, their ill-bred face dominated by a toothy underbite and upside-down ears. Several Outlaws (include D. Caste Raider) are quite similar in appearance to Wolvarks, but whether this is coincidence or a result of cross-breeding is unknown.
Locations in Stranger's Wrath
- Gizzard Gulch — A desert region containing a dusty Clakker town.
- Buzzarton — Another Clakker outpost, plagued by sandstorms, but with an impressive sewer system.
- New Yolk City — The capital city of the Clakkerz, complete with black market and barge service.
- Mongo River — Its waters are the lifeblood of the Mongo River Valley.
- Dusky Hollow — Where the native Grubbs cling to the scraps of their civilization.
- Wolvark Docks — The shipping piers for Sekto's corporation. Heavily guarded by the Wolvarks.
- Last Legs — The Grubb's capital city, standing sentinel upon an icy Northern shore.
- Sekto Springs Dam — The fortress-like headquarters of Sekto's bottled water company.