Going down to South Park, going to have myself a time. Well, at least we tried to have ourselves a good time. When you think of the South Park franchise, you can probably remember some funny moments that would be controversial in today’s society. Going into South Park: Snow Day, we hoped that despite the game changes it would hold on to the successful aspects of the previous franchise games South Park: The Stick of Truth and The Fractured but Whole. Does South Park: Snow Day live up to the game franchise’s recent success or fall into the shitter? Read our review to find out!

Game: South Park: Snow Day
Developer: Question
Publisher: THQ Nordic
Platforms: PC (Steam) (Reviewed), PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S
Release Date: March 26th, 2024
Players: 1 to 4
Price: Base: $29.99 USD

South Park fans return to the franchise with South Park: Snow Day. After Cartman’s wish for a snow day is seemingly granted, South Park faces an armageddon level blizzard. While the citizens of South Park are dying and fighting to survive, the children gear up to battle it out as elves and warriors (like in Stick of Truth).

Rather than introducing a new “New Kid”, the game states that all stats from last time have been reset so that no one is overpowered. Despite stating that no one is overpowered, the four protagonists each have their own unique special abilities that you will have to face.

As the player progresses through each chapter, they can gather Dark Matter (Poop), Platinum Points, and Toilet Paper. With Dark Matter, the player can upgrade their stats through the help of Mr. Hankey; this dark matter empowers each character’s abilities while also turning the townspeople into monsters.

The biggest problem with Dark Matter is how much you have to grind in order to unlock abilities; the game gives players a variety of possible skills and abilities but limited chapters make it rather hard to obtain without grinding. Even if you choose to sacrifice skill cards to Henrietta for Dark Matter, it will still take multiple playthroughs of the story to unlock all the abilities.

Platinum Points can be used to unlock different character outfits. Completing difficult challenges within the story can also unlock different character cosmetics. Additionally, by completing objectives, the player can unlock different weapon types and abilities. Finally, toilet paper is used to upgrade or reroll cards when talking to Jimmy.

South Park: Snow Day is the story of a Blizzard gone wrong. While the kids are happy to have a snow day, something more dire is transpiring. By using Dark Matter, the New Kid and South Park can cast magical abilities to fight one another.

At the start of each chapter, the player determines which cards they want to use to aid them in their fight against that chapter’s boss. The Bull shit card the player chooses will be with them for the rest of the level but the first card can be scrapped or upgraded.

Through exploration and combat, the new kid and the gang seek to uncover who is behind the snow day. Slay waves of children and adults using your Dark Matter abilities. Abilities can be used by spending some of the player’s Pissed off Meter (Mana); the meter recharges by slaughtering your foes.

The player can change out which abilities they want to use with Tolkin before each mission. As the chapter progresses, the cards Jimmy offers can upgrade the player’s abilities and damage stats. Damage within the game feels rather low and with the inability to level gear, feels like trying to chop down a tree with a dull sword.

Combat within the game itself is rather repetitive and a bit dull. Depending on the difficulty the player chooses, combat can go quickly or feel like each minion fight is a miniature boss battle. With the inability to upgrade weapons damage, killing bigger enemies solo can be a challenge.

Don’t worry if you don’t have any friends to help you, the game provides the player with up to three AI “new kids”. These AI new kids will typically distract enemies and weaken them. The only downside to these AI characters is they bug out and will sporadically die; thankfully, if you manage to go down, they have been programmed to rush over and revive you.

Playing with a group of players makes the five Chapters of South Park: Snow Day much more bearable; however, trying to find a match can be a bit of a challenge. When we attempted to host a match, we were unable to find any players, but when we searched for a match, we were able to find one. If hosting, you are unable to start the chapter without a second person in your lobby.

Once you complete the chapter you will stick with your party unless the game bugs out. Having a group of players work together versus three AI companions is much more satisfying. When playing solo, I found myself becoming fatigued and bored with the gameplay loop but when playing with a group of people, the game felt passable.

At first, I thought the fatigue was due to the game’s color scheme so I checked out the settings.  The color scheme within the game can be difficult to navigate for some but thankfully, the developers have added different color-blind features to help players. Players can also remap the controls to suit their needs. Sadly, it wasn’t the game’s colors that were holding it back.

If you are reading this review, you are probably on the fence about buying South Park: Snow Day or want to know why people are complaining about it. Snow Day‘s gameplay loop is incredibly grindy with very little payoff towards the endgame.

When you compare it to the RPG games in the franchise, it seems like a rush-together unpolished turd. Most of the jokes are dated and feel out of touch compared to how South Park normally is. Within the story, they joke about hoarding toilet paper and make multiple poop jokes that feel uninspired.

The game’s combat, whether you are playing with random players or the game’s AI, is just a repeated loop that becomes stale quickly and feels unrewarding. The game does not feature a lock-on option so it is very easy to miss a target or get lost with the camera angles. If you want all that the game has to offer, you will have to grind for a ton of hours and will still be left feeling unaccomplished.

The Horde mode in the game feels like something that was added to subsidize the game’s short story mode. The game does not offer the ability to start a new save and if you accidentally skip the tutorial, you can easily be lost. The game doesn’t make it easy to find the tutorial to replay it and where it is located many will miss.

At the end of the day South Park: Snow Day is an unpolished turd that should have stayed in the toilet bowl of its creators’ minds. Ultimately, we are left wondering/questioning why THQ Nordic approved of Question’s game design. The gameplay loop is repetitive and lacks content to keep the player coming back.

Combat within the game feels unsatisfying with a limit to the abilities. The jokes within are dated and feels like an AI wrote them after being fed information about South Park. Arguably, the only fight we enjoyed with the game was the final fight and that was because it broke the mold the game had established in the prior chapters.

If you are thinking of picking up South Park: Snow Day to play it with friends, don’t, or at least wait until it goes on sale. The $30 asking price feels to high when you compare it to other games in the same price range and you will get less replayability from it. If developer Question can add content to the game, then maybe it will be worth picking up, but as it is now, you should wait until the game is under $20.00 before picking it up.

South Park: Snow Day was reviewed on PC (Steam) using a copy provided by THQ Nordic. You can find additional information about Niche Gamer’s review/ethics policy here. South Park Snow Day is now available on PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.