I really like when Nightdive just randomly announces they are remastering a game like half a dozen people had played in the past. PO’ed is a clear example of this practice. It’s a first-person shooter originally released on the 3DO. Yep, the 3DO. The console known for Gex, Plumbers Don’t Wear Ties, the actual best version of Street Fighter II ever released (no joke, look it up), and an odd amount of erotica. There was a shooter where you played as a chef stranded in an alien world, and you had to kill sentient legs with, uh, “holes” in between them with cleavers and all that. And Nightdive decided to bring that game back from the dead.

I’ve mentioned this in the past: good games aren’t the only ones worthy of being remastered or re-released. If your intention is to preserve the history of gaming and ensure those games don’t become vaporware, you can’t just put the good ones in a museum and call it a day. The bad ones deserve to be remembered as well. I’m mentioning this because, yes, I commend Nightdive for yet another impressive remastering effort… of a truly bad game. I own PO’ed on the 3DO, and know it truly madly deeply sucks. It’s a really bad game in every conceivable aspect. This remaster is vastly superior than the original, but that only means that Nightdive was able to make something horrendous feel just… bad. I guess that’s still an improvement, right?

Being a retro shooter from the mid-90s, the first thing we need to do is explain where PO’ed fits into the timeline. It has polygonal graphics for its environments, and it has freeform movement, jumping and even a jetpack that lets you fly around a level as if you were playing Descent instead of a Doom-inspired title. In terms of technology, this is what made the game stand out back in the day. Levels aren’t always maze-like; sometimes all you need to do is figure out how to reach the endgoal, which is right in front of you, with only a humongous chasm separating you from it. The other thing that made it stand out was its imagery.

I don’t exactly know what was the thought process behind designing PO’ed as a whole back in the day. Look at the screenshots in this review. Those legs. They are everywhere. They are obscenely off-putting to look at. I don’t think these enemies were designed with humourous intents, but they aren’t hideous enough for me to consider that the developers’ intentions were to gross out their players. They are just… weird. Everything in PO’ed is weird. But also not weird enough to feel memorable.

The level design is quite generic, and a bit confusing at times. There are lots of walls you can pass through, meaning that you have to constantly fly towards a wall and see if there is something behind it. Was this a glitch? An artificial means to make the game last longer? I really don’t know. All I know is that most levels are frustrating to deal with. They are mostly comprised of rudimentary polygons, simplistic shapes, and spaceship-esque textures. Everything is stupidly generic and tiresome to look at. To make matters worse, there’s barely any kind of music or sound effects. You will only hear grunts from enemies or from your protagonist, whenever he gets hurt. Spoiler alert: he gets damaged constantly.

Combat is kinda crappy, at least at first. During the first couple of levels, you have a frying pan and infinite throwable cleavers. The latter are weak and really slow, whilst the former suffers from terrible collision detection. Things get better after grabbing your first actual laser weapon, which acts more like a traditional Doom gun (just allign yourself with an enemy, press the fire button, enemy gets hurt). I also appreciated the jetpack, even though it felt more like a novelty than anything else. For the standards of the time, having a jetpack that allowed you to roam a level with some sort of freedom may have been revolutionary. Sadly, the level design is really bad, so I never felt motivated to use the jetpack more than necessary.

Reviewing PO’ed: Definitive Edition is weird because, sure, the game is actually terrible, but it’s not Nightdive’s fault at all. On the contrary, they have done quite a lot of work remastering its visuals and improving its controls. Sadly, the core ideas, the original level design, those haven’t changed at all, and Nightdive wouldn’t have been able to do anything about it. PO’ed was really bad back in the day. If anything, they were able to make it less obnoxious. If you are a retro aficcionado, you may find some kind of sick enjoyment out of PO’ed: Definitive Edition, but for basically anyone else, that’s not a retro shooter worth revisiting, even though I’m glad such a game got a remaster in the first place, ensuring its preservation on more modern systems.

Graphics: 4.5 Having played the original PO’ed in the past, I can safely say Nightdive has, once again, remastered an old game’s visuals in a very impressive manner. Sadly, it’s a game that was absolutely hideous back in the day, so remastering efforts have just made it look less ugly, at best.	Gameplay: 5.0 Poor combat, poor aiming, poor movement, poor level design… but I kinda liked the jetpack, mostly out of novelty.
Sound: 5.0 It is oddly very quiet and very loud at the same. There’s no music, but levels are constantly bombarded with enemy growls and your character shouting whenever he gets hit. Spoiler alert: you get hit all the time.	Fun Factor: 4.5 I have played worse first-person shooters, but this is far from being considered good, or even remotely amusing. I commend Nightdive for yet another great remastering effort, though. The fact PO’ed is this lame is not their fault. If anything, they were able to make it less obnoxious.
Final Verdict: 4.5

PO’ed: Definitive Edition is available now on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X, PC and Switch. The original PO’ed is available on 3DO and PS1.

Reviewed on Xbox Series S.

A copy of PO’ed: Definitive Edition was provided by the publisher.