Postal III

Postal III
Developer: Trashmasters Publisher: Akella Platform: Windows Released internationally: November 23, 2011 This game has a hidden developer message. This game has hidden development-related text. This game has unused graphics. This game has unused models. This game has unused cinematics. This game has unused sounds. This game has unused text. This game has regional differences. This game has revisional differences. This game has a prototype article This game has a prerelease article

Oh dear, I do believe I have the vapors. This page contains content that is not safe for work or other locations with the potential for personal embarrassment. Such as: Vulgar dialogue.

This article is a work in progress. ...Well, all the articles here are, in a way. But this one moreso, and the article may contain incomplete information and editor's notes.

Postal III is a cautionary tale for why having no regrets isn't always a good thing.

To do: Document changes from the updated versions of Postal III from ZOOM Platform: https://www.zoom-platform.com/news/postal-iii-im-filled-with-glee Unused textures. Pigeons. Seed weapon (attracting Pigeons). Bulky weapon-type (fully programmed). Two-handled weapon-type (totally unfinished, but referenced in Hammer). Motorhead one-handled gun anims. Jumping. Cut/Normally unseen NPC animations (for example Champ can eat limbs of Human NPCs and will poop shortly after). Maxel Sniper (leftover from alpha). Police arresting (leftover from open world) https://whackjobint.github.io/postal3script/targetingfuncs/assisttarget_enemy/#arresttarget Alternative K.O. for the Taser which is unused: https://whackjobint.github.io/postal3script/npcbehaviorfuncs/stunout/#stunout Unused In-game cutscene camera (only used for the main menu). NPCs getting blinded by the laser pen (likely cut or unused by mistake). Remnants of the HL2 Combine Chopper code (likely used by the SWAT Helicopter). Outside of the Dude's coat, some other elements are, or were, PhysX elements, mainly for wind physics. Swimming SFX. Remnants of a stamina bar. More stuff. A devkit dating to around 2010 has recently been discovered from a Xbox 360 devkit and it amounts to a whopping 80 gigabytes. Its contents could go on a Development page. Xbox 360 build of the game dating to 2010, aswell as one from 2009.

Sub-Pages

Prototype Info

Prerelease Info

Valve Leftovers With so many games coming out around the time, who blames them for leaving in a couple of assets.

Unused Weapon

An unused "seed" weapon, meant to attract the cut pigeon NPCs.

Development-Related Text

Original	Translated
Сюда класть энвмапы, которые хочется чтобы были свои для каждого уровня В vmt прописывается: "$envmap" "#blablabla" При загрузке, например, уровня level2 будет искаться текстура level2_blablabla.vtf Если ее нет, то ищется просто level2.vtf Ну а если и ее нет, то будет наша любимая эмо-текстура	Put the envmaps here you want to be used on each level Write into the vmt: "$envmap" "#blablabla" When loading, for example, level2, the level2_blablabla.vtf texture will be searched for If there isn't one, it'll look for level2.vtf If even that's missing, there'll be our favorite emo-texture

A developer message in Russian telling them to put environment map directories in a .vmt file.

Unused Text

unusedcontent.cfg

unusedcontent
{
	"dir"		"maps"
	"dir"		"materials"
	"dir"		"models"
	"dir"		"scenes"
	"dir"		"sound"
	"ignore"	""
	"ignore"	"reslists"
}

A leftover from Portal 2. Its purpose is unknown.

Unused Models

Most unused models are from old character designs or scrapped ideas.

Early Main Menu Postal Dude

An early, surprisingly different version of the Dude's menu model that resembles the old 2007 Postal Dude by Josh Leichliter. It can be found in models/main_menu/dude_main_menu.mdl. The version found in the finished game lacks the lower half of his trenchcoat, and only has a single animation for lazing around in the main menu. The Igromir 2007 prototype of the game, as well as the leaked 2009 Xbox 360 build, has the full model completely intact, including the lower half of his trenchcoat.

Unused Test Town Hotel Models

The final game still has models from the Test Town hotel. These are all still in the game files due to Postal III still technically being in development when it released.

• 

  Test Town Hotel Bar

• 

  Test Town Hotel Entrance

Early Test Character

In a folder named "postal_rage", you can find a character named "Maxel", a leftover from Axle Rage, an Akella project cancelled in 2006; he looks very different to everyone else in the game. Interestingly, in a developer screenshot that came with the prototype leak, the developer is playing as Maxel, meaning Maxel was used as the placeholder player model until the Postal Dude's was properly implemented.

Unused Postal Babe Model

This unused model, F_Avg_Postal_Babe, is an untextured model of one of the Postal Babes, which are characters that originated from Postal 2: Apocalypse Weekend.

Unused Female Character

The model's filename is F_Avg_SS_Skirt. It has no animations, which means it was most likely cut very early into development. This model is also in the 2007 leaked build.

• 

  Model

• 

  Concept art

Unused Videos

A placeholder video in the media folder; just a white backrground with the text "cutscene in progress".

An unused video in the p3_english/media folder that was meant to play during the Cash Mart mission.

An unused video in the p3_english/media folder that was meant to play during the Homeland Insecurity mission.

Unused Textures

Postal III has many unused textures. Many of these are either leftovers from the in-game cutscenes or from unused ideas that were scrapped.

Bloody Zealot Textures

Inside the "cutscenes" folder of the "characters" directory, there are unused bloody textures for the Zealot in both cutscenes of the AIDS-infected cat hunting mission.

• 

Bloody UN Soldier Textures

The United Nations soldier has an unused, blood-covered texture; this is most likely a remnant from a cutscene.

• 

  Uniform.

• 

  Head texture.

Unused Spade

Originally, the shovel was intended to be a spade. The textures for this original design are still in the game, with the model being found in the leaked 2007 build.

• 

  Spade texture

• 

  Spade Model (world model)

• 

  Second Spade Model (view model)

Unused Big SWAT

These textures, along with leaked concept art and model, are the only remnants of M_Big_SWAT, a character made and scrapped very early in development.

• 

  Body

• 

  Head

• 

  Teeth

• 

  Model

• 

  Concept Art

Unused Dev Textures

Postal III only uses a handful of developer textures in its maps from Half-Life 2, and a few of them go unused.

Unused Sounds

The game's unfinished state means there's a fair few sounds that go unused, some of them from early builds of the game.

Temp Voice Acting

Used in early stages of development, these clips, voiced by Mike Jaret, are generic citizen remarks and screams. These go unused in the final game, though they can be heard in early footage and are used in the leaked Xbox 360 builds.

"Aarrgh!"

"Aak!"

"Aughh!"

"Christ!"

"Fuck!"

"Oh my god, he just killed that guy!"

"Look out!"

"Man down!"

*weakly* "Mommy!"

"My shirt!"

"Ow!"

"Run!"

*screaming*

*high-pitched screaming*

"Shit!"

"Somebody call a cop!"

"Somebody call an ambulance!"

"Somebody stop that guy!"

"What?"

"What the fuck!?"

"What the hell you doing!?"

"You fucking asshole!"

Revisional Differences

To do: Document more worth noting changes made with the patches.

After the game's release, Trashmasters released a total of three patches in an attempt to salvage the disaster the game was. One of these additions was a "free-roam" mode that wasn't much other than all the outdoor maps from the game's missions (and specific maps like Porn World and the arcade) strung together with level transitions and the mission logic removed. The Postal Dude also starts free-roam with every weapon unlocked.

Before the 1.12 update the game used a remix of the song "Goodbye Almond Eyes" by Tokyo Rose for the Porn World and Jen Walcott's Bodyguard missions, but because Akella didn't own the rights for the song it was replaced by "Illegal Makro Recipe" by The Hen.

Regional Differences

Fart Gun / Гамамет

This was an exclusive bonus weapon that was given for pre-ordering Postal III Гама-edition from the Russian digital game key store Gama-Gama, which originally can be only unlocked on the digital non-Steam or CD Russian versions of the game. Later on, that add-on DLC could be bought on its own from Gama-Gama. The weapon was finally added in the Zoom Platform version since version 1.2, though it wasn't added to the Steam version until January 29th, 2024.

Despite the Fart Gun, being an exclusivity for Russian buyers, an official English translation was found in the Japanese copy of the game, which was then later officially ported to the English version.

A screenshot of the Gama-Gama store offering the Fart Gun DLC for Postal III that cost 699 rubles (around 7 dollars) at the time.

Similar to the Shop Vac, the primary fire dispenses a foul gas that immediately knocks out any enemy in the vicinity in a non-lethal way. While its ammo capacity is unlimited, it does need to be reloaded, which is done by holding down the alt-fire button.

Oddities

с & c texture parameters mistakes

To do: Try to search a list of borked textures and perhaps, if they do create issues in-game, provide a before/after comparison.

A couple of texture for the game doesn't work properly due to the developers mistaking the letter c (The usual, Latin letter) with с (The cyrillic letter). As a first example, in the cat model, .vmt files such as "cat.vmt" & "cat_01.vmt" in "materials\models\Characters\", this mistake is seen in the writing of the $nocull parameter, making it incorrect.

• 

  materials\models\Characters\cat_01.vmt as seen in a text editor (The last line was commented out to prevent an end of file error)

• 

  materials\models\Characters\cat_01.vmt as actually interpreted in-game. Notice how $noCull became $noÑull due to this typo.

This issue also affects some file-names, such as textures in the Porn World level, which cause some to be missing or not be unpacked. In materials\concrete there's "concrete_light_inner_old_wall01_ñ.vtf" (Which, on cyrillic enabled system, will look as "concrete_light_inner_old_wall01_с.vtf"). However, its dedicated actual texture parameter .vmt file is correctly named "concrete_light_inner_old_wall_01_c.vmt"

• 

  A clear view of the concrete_light_inner_old_wall_01_c.vmt typo filenames.

• 

  The content of concrete_light_inner_old_wall_01_c.vmt pointing out to the incorrectly named c cyrilic filename.

Both of these issues above has been fixed with the Zoom Platform version of the game since patch 1.3.