The Postal franchise has never exactly been a hit with critics. In fact, every game in the Postal series has earned negative reviews, with 2011's Postal 3 especially panned by critics. Over a decade after Postal 3's release, developer Running With Scissors is set to launch Postal 4: No Regerts, which has earned overwhelmingly negative reviews so far.
Early reviews for Postal 4 are being published online, and they indicate that the game has serious problems. IGN gave Postal 4 a 2/10, calling it "cringingly juvenile" and "painful to play." GameSpot, meanwhile, gave the game a 1/10, calling it "abysmal" and saying that one of its only redeeming qualities is the fact that it eventually ends.
At the time of this writing, Postal 4's review aggregate score is 44 on Metacritic, making it one of the lowest-rated games of all time. And when one considers that there are still many publications that have yet to publish their Postal 4 reviews, one has to imagine that the score will go down even lower. OpenCritic, meanwhile, has the current Postal 4 overall review score even lower than Metacritic, with it currently sitting at a mere 36.
Based on the reviews that have been published so far, it seems the main problems people have with the game are its crass sense of humor and technical problems. So even if one does enjoy the Postal series' jokes, they may still find the game hard to enjoy due to its poor optimization. However, some reviewers have complaints beyond that, with some criticizing the game's quest design, combat, and general entertainment value. It seems anyone hoping for Postal 4 to suddenly turn the series around will be disappointed.
Hardcore Postal fans likely saw this poor critical reception coming, however. Besides the fact that all of the Postal games have earned negative reviews from critics, Postal 4 has been available in early access for a few years now. These problems will have already been apparent to anyone who picked up the early access version of the game, and so they may not be surprised at all by the overwhelmingly negative reviews.
In the meantime, those who are disappointed by Postal 4 can return to the original game through Postal Redux, a remake of the original Postal game that was released in 2016. Unlike Postal 4, Postal Redux has a console version on PS4 and Nintendo Switch, so it's definitely more widely available than the new game.
Postal 4: No Regerts is out now for PC.
Source: GameSpot, IGN, Metacritic, OpenCritic