Like most sensible people, I long ago wrote off the Postal series as an idea that started terribly, enjoyed some fleeting glory in the same wave of cultural disaffection that brought us Limp Bizkit and the Attitude Era, and has spent the decades since thrashing around in search of relevance. Yet several times over the last few years, I’ve heard furtive whispers from various corners of the internet that there is one Postal game which is actually, genuinely good.

No, I’m not referring to Postal 2, which despite inexplicably having the same Steam rating as Half-Life 2, is a pretty shoddy game. Its open world may have been ahead of the curve back in 2003, but even when I first played it as a socially awkward 15-year-old (the primary audience for Postal games) I could see through the fountains of blood and voluminous arcs of urine that it wasn’t a good shooter.

Rather, I’m referring to Postal: Brain Damaged, a spinoff FPS released in 2022 that, crucially, is not developed by series creators Running with Scissors. Instead, it’s made by Hyperstrange—a team of Polish indie designers that specialise in shooters. Hyperstrange’s other projects include the sword-and-sorcery hack ‘n’ slash Elderborn and the grimdark cowboy blaster Blood West, both enjoyable retro shooters that are infused with modern ideas. But is it really possible to take the crusty tube-sock that is Postal and make something worthwhile out of it?