Over the past few weeks, we've shown you all kinds of bloody horror that Conan the Barbarian can unleash on pirates, bandits and assorted ancient-world thugs in his self-titled slash 'em-up, due to hit stores this October. You've seen what he's capable of when he's wielding asmall, ordinary sword, apair of swordsand areally, really big sword. But the true measure of a rampaging badass isn't what he can do when he's holding a sharp chunk of metal. It's whether or not he can grab a grown man and, while looking him in the eye, rip him in half like a phone book. For the final installment of our ongoing video series, we'll show you what Conan, mighty barbarian and terror of the ancient world, can do to people with just his bare hands:
Here's a rundown of some of the moves you just saw:
Piledriver
Circle, Square (PS3)/B,X (360)
This is probably the goriest move Conan can pull off in just two button presses, and it's especially fun to watch if you do it over and over on a horde of low-level baddies. It involves Conan sweeping his enemy up off the ground in his sweaty, manly arms before leaping into the air, roughly flipping his enemy upside-down and bringing both feet down on the man's chin. Naturally, the impact between the ground and a 300-pound steroid hulk's boots causes the enemy's head to go flying off, looking confused, while blood spatters all over the place. This is probably why Conan doesn't like wearing clothes - they'd only get stained.
Body Throw
Circle (PS3)/B (360)
Sometimes, you just need to put a lot of distance between yourself and your enemy in a hurry. The best way to do that is to pick them up and throw them, which isn't particularly gory but is mildly funny. Particularly when you toss your hapless foe off a cliff or into a wall. Ha ha, nothing spells "hilarity" like S-N-A-P-P-E-D F-E-M-U-R.
Body Slam
Circle, Circle (PS3)/B,B (360)
Despite the name, this doesn't involve Conan climbing up on something and crushing his enemies under the weight of his plummeting body. No, Conan's too dignified for that. Not too dignified to wear clothes, but too dignified to hurl himself around like a wrecking ball. Instead, Conan will simply grab his enemy by the ankles, lift him up into the air and slam him down with a great meaty thud. Again, not exactly gory, but still satisfying, especially if it took a while to get the bastard to stop blocking.
Backbreaker
Circle, Triangle (PS3)/B,Y (360)
For a loincloth-wearing barbarian living in a prehistoric fantasy world, Conan sure does have a lot of modern pro-wrestling moves up his sleeve. (Or he would, if he ever wore a shirt.) In this classic move, Conan lifts up his enemy, jumps into the air and brings the man's back down on his knee, effectively snapping his spine (most of the time) and sending a high-pressure spray of blood shooting out of his enemy's face for reasons we can't quite fathom.
Camel Punch
Circle while running (PS3) /B while running (360)
This fairly unremarkable punch would be a lot more interesting if it were part of a camel-punching minigame. Or if there were actually any camels in the game for Conan to punch. As it is, it's a slow-to-wind-up haymaker that deals mild damage to skirt-wearing thugs and the odd lion. Weak.
Death Stomp
Square while enemy is prone (PS3)/ X while enemy is prone (360)
Conan's never been one to kick a man while he's down. Certainly not when he could stomp on his face instead. While this looks brutal, though, it tends to take a few tries before Conan's stomping turns tougher opponents into corpses. However, if Conan's all pumped on the Song of Death - which he'll get if you kill enough enemies in fast-enough succession to make his swords glow red - this can actually take a bad guy's head off. Again, we're not quite sure how this works - when we stomp on something, it usually gets crushed, as opposed to bouncing spectacularly into the sunset - but so long as it results in copious amounts of the red stuff, we're not complaining.
