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Shadow Warrior 2
PC (Steam)
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Wang.
4.5/5 stars
In 1997, 3D Realms, a then-new purveyor of garbage PC games, produced a new IP called “Shadow Warrior.” This game was built on the same engine as the company’s more widely known – and for some reason beloved – “Duke Nukem 3D,” but never managed to step out of the shadow (pun intended) of its more famous sibling. Nearly two decades later, in an attempt to stave off death and bankruptcy, 3D Realms sold a number of its IPs to other developers, with the Polish Indie developer, Flying Wild Hog, gaining custody of ‘Shadow Warrior.’ After rebooting the ‘Shadow Warrior’ story continuity with a “Shadow Warrior” remake in 2013, Flying Wild Hog created the most ambitious sequel they could three years later with “Shadow Warrior 2.” I was initially skeptical of ‘Shadow Warrior’ anything, based solely off my contempt for 3D Realms’ prior work, as well as the fact that the ‘Shadow Warrior’ IP under the management of our Polish friends didn’t seem to be much more than a typically dumb, violent, ‘shock-value’ FPS the likes of ‘DOOM,’ ‘Quake,’ or any other turd squeezed out by id Software back in the day. However, with “Shadow Warrior 2,” Flying Wild Hog has actually managed to hone the fast, frenetic gameplay of old-school FPSes upon the grindstone of modern Shoot & Loot games like ‘Borderlands’ to create one of the finest, smoothest, most joyful-to-play Shooters of all time.
Presentation
“Shadow Warrior 2” is built in the Havok Engine, giving it a relatively generic look and feel as a typical 8th Gen polygonal game. Environmental designs are fairly diverse and occasionally colorful, with unique caverns, woodlands, and urban areas to battle through. These environments even feature mild procedural generation, stitching together a ‘new’ map from a handful of pre-designed chunks and randomly scattering treasure chest and enemy locations each time the player revisits an area. This is the type of procedural generation I can embrace, as I have long called for the FPS genre to have its maps diversified using that process (though my reasons were primarily concerned with PvP, which “Shadow Warrior 2” doesn’t possess in any way). Unfortunately, the procedural generation occasionally screwed us over, placing a boss or mission item inside a wall or other unreachable area, forcing the host to restart the mission and hope for a better procedural roll.
Character designs are a bit of a mixed bag, though, as the demonic characters and enemies typically look really interesting and are well animated, whereas human characters look a bit puppety and have somewhat wooden movements. Cutscenes are fully animated in-engine and feature some well-done motion-capture – both for body movement and facial expressions – but I have the feeling that anyone playing “Shadow Warrior 2” in a decade will consider the cutscene animation to have ‘aged poorly,’ as there tends to be a bit more uncanny valley than I’d like to see. Of course, when one considers that Flying Wild Hog is both an Indie developer and located in Poland – which was once synonymous with Eastern European Block Hellhole – the fact that they were able to even come close to hitting the visual stylings of a typical monster-budget “AAA” release is impressive. It also bears mentioning that both the environments and enemies in “Shadow Warrior 2” are partially destructible. Enemies can have limbs blown/sliced off and gain dynamic battle damage (ranging from small amounts of blood splatter to huge holes clean through them), which is quite impressive. Enemies also contain viscera/guts, which can be sent flying in the event of a particularly violent death: Yeah, “Shadow Warrior 2” is ridiculously violent, but in an almost artistic way.
The audio in “Shadow Warrior 2” is mostly excellent. The sound effects for weapons and enemies are top-notch and the voice acting for all of the major characters is incredibly well done. Unfortunately, a couple of incredibly amateur performances by minor supporting characters hearken back to the days when videogame voiceacting was a laughing stock. The soundtrack is a quirky mix of Asian classical music and Heavy Metal, with a bit of 80’s Power Ballad thrown in as bookends for the game. It’s an unorthodox mix, but it certainly works well and helps to provide the game with a unique sense of identity. It even has a signature title theme reminiscent of the iconic ‘Deus Ex’ title theme, yet 1000% less annoying.
“Shadow Warrior 2” would have scored higher on presentation, however, if the game wasn’t riddled with annoying glitches. None of the bugs we ran into were game-breaking, but they are certainly annoying. Most prominent of these technical issues is the game’s crappy netcode, which lead to frequent disconnects from the host (at least the error message, “Your Internet Connection Couldn’t Handle the Wang,” is in character). Next-most-annoying is the fact that the Havok Engine couldn’t quite handle the amount of particle effects thrown out by a full team of four players using elemental weapons at the same time, leading to major frame rate drops or outright crashes in such circumstances. Hell, even walking by a mission checkpoint – which spews out a few sparks to show that it’s active – causes the game to hitch and stutter for a second. Playing “Shadow Warrior 2” as a group also caused us to run afoul of the game’s stupid progress saving system, in which only the host player’s save is updates. Guest players – of which there can be up to 3 at a time – get to keep all the weapons and skill points they earn, but none of the progress through the game’s story and side missions, which is really annoying. Lastly, the load times to start the game or enter a mission are pretty terrible, and using a solid state drive doesn’t make a shred of difference.
Story
I hate old-school FPSes. They have the lamest excuse narratives, and really only seem to exist to titillate mouthbreathing middle-schoolers with over-the-top violence and gore. “Shadow Warrior 2,” on the other hand, offers a compelling narrative, a fully fleshed-out backstory, and a cast of amusing characters. It’s basically ‘Borderlands’ level writing, but with more cussing and dick jokes.
Our hero is Lo Wang, a Chinese ninja living in Japan as a mercenary for hire. Through his previous actions in previous ‘Shadow Warrior’ games, Wang caused an event known as The Collision, in which the Shadow Realm – a parallel universe populated by demons, spirits, and the gods of Oriental mythology – overlapped with the world of mortals. As a result, all of this supernatural stuff has been spilling into the real world, warping nature and nearly ending human civilization (in Asia, at least, nothing is said about The Collision’s effects on the wider world).
Struggling to make due in the aftermath of the mess he created, Wang takes odd jobs for the Yakuza. When a simple mission to rescue a mob boss’ granddaughter goes sideways, Wang finds himself with the girl’s soul bound to his as the two of them become entwined in the plots of the last three remaining Immortals.
Wang is exactly the type of action hero I like. He’s not a burly, surly, bullet-chewing refrigerator full of gravel, but a happy-go-lucky, flippant goofball who combines the best aspects of Marvel’s Deadpool and classic (pre-Daniel Craig) James Bond. He’s got a dirty mind and a dirty mouth, and is ready and willing to throw in his two cents – and plenty of insults – in any given situation. His previous relationships with the supporting cast come through quite organically, and his developing rapport with the girl – Kamiko – stuck in his head makes for a great ‘Buddy Road Trip’ type of sub-narrative.
Unsurprisingly, some of the harshest criticism I’ve seen of “Shadow Warrior 2’s” story and characters comes from the SJW camp. They love to moan and complain about sexualized women and dick jokes and yadda yadda yadda, but in actuality, “Shadow Warrior 2” has a very progressive world. The plot features just as many powerful and important female characters as males, characters are constantly insulting Wang for his immature behavior, and every single human enemy can randomly spawn as male or female. The world of “Shadow Warrior 2” is a world of true equality, where Wang can dismember ladies just as vigorously as he dismembers dudes, and nobody judges him for it (they judge him instead for his love of comic books and porn – some things never change). When will the bandits and psychos in ‘Borderlands’ receive this same gender-neutral treatment?
For a player just rushing through the main story, “Shadow Warrior 2” can be completed in roughly 4 hours. This expands to 30 hours for completionists who want to do all of the side content (and honestly, it’s really good side content that helps to flesh out the characters and world lore). I ended up playing for roughly 80 hours with multiple playthroughs because I was having such a good time with the gameplay systems.
Gameplay
Most FPSes, even the old so-called ‘fast’ FPSes, feature characters that trundle around like tanks, turn slowly, and jump like a fat Basset Hound. “Shadow Warrior 2” instead features the most mobile character to ever grace the shooter genre. Out of the box, Wang can double-jump, sprint, and perform a dash maneuver slightly reminiscent of the sideways lock-on dash Samus can do in the ‘Metroid Prime’ games. However, there is no obsolete lock-on mechanic in “Shadow Warrior 2”: Wang can dash in ANY direction, there’s no cooldown period, and he can even dash while in the air. To top off this delightful concoction of mobility, Wang can grab onto ledges and pull himself up if he doesn’t quite get high enough to land on top of them.
Combined with Wang’s excellent mobility, “Shadow Warrior 2” also features absolutely wonderful melee combat. Yes, first-person melee combat that’s actually good! Wang can wield a large variety of swords, claws, baseball bats, etc., but the way he wields them is key. Out of the box, Wang can perform standard attacks or special attacks, including a ‘Sting’ lunge attack or a 360-degree ‘Vortex’ whirlwind attack seemingly inspired by good old Link from the ‘Zelda’ series. Also seemingly inspired by ‘Zelda,’ Wang eventually gains the ability to shoot Force Blades out of his sword. Parrying is also an option when Wang engages human-sized enemies that are also doing melee, allowing him to block incoming blows and unbalance the enemy for a short time. Furthermore, powerful attacks – be they melee or ranged – that don’t outright kill an enemy have a tendency to knock them off their feet, leaving them vulnerable to follow-up attacks while the flail around, struggling to get up, giving combat a feeling of impact that is sorely lacking is most other games.
What really makes combat in “Shadow Warrior 2” work, though, is the fact that the devs and Flying Wild Hog understood that the Wang will get smacked around in melee. It just happens! Instead of relying on the popular contemporary gimmick of giving players a regenerating ‘shield’ of temporary health that acts as a barrier to their ‘real’ health, “Shadow Warrior 2” allows Wang to cast a cheap healing spell whenever he wants (provided he has enough Chi), while simultaneously providing many opportunities for the player to outfit Wang with Life Drain, allowing him to recover health as he dishes out pain.
Healing isn’t the only magic trick up Wang’s sleeve, though. Throughout the game, Wang gains access to Grip of Darkness, which temporarily immobilizes enemies; Chi Blast, which can knock-back enemies; Vanish, which allows him to become invisible for a short time and deal bonus surprise attack damage; and Shadow Fury, which allows him to transform into a rage machine for a short time with increased damage output and resistance. Unsurprisingly, several of these Chi powers resemble the Action Skills of certain ‘Borderlands’ characters (Lilith and Brick, especially). Wang’s Chi pool regenerates quite quickly, making these powers incredibly useful.
What about guns? Oh yeah, there are lots of guns, and lots of things for the player to do to guns. I have perpetually railed against the random loot system employed by the ‘Borderlands’ franchise, with its focus on bigger and bigger numbers that force players to throw away their favorite guns in favor of a garbage weapon that just happens to be a higher level. “Shadow Warrior 2” implements Shoot & Loot mechanics absolutely perfectly, flipping the ‘Borderlands’ paradigm on its head and setting the bar for this style of FPS. As the player guides Wang through story and side missions, Wang earns weapons. Nearly every mission rewards Wang with a weapon or a skill, and nearly every mission features an optional mini-boss who drops a weapon or a skill (or both). These weapons are fixed. Their stats are always the same and once Wang has a weapon, it’s his for good, even through multiple New Game+ playthroughs. However, each weapon features three upgrade slots into which the player can insert the numerous magic gems that drop like candy from slain enemies, treasure chests, or out of thin air. These gems typically feature percentage-based modifiers that improve the equipped weapon’s capabilities, from damage to crit rate to clip size, and more. There are also special subcategories of gems that can add an elemental attribute to a weapon (fire, ice, poison, shock); change the way it fires (such as firing all the barrels on a multi-barrel gun at once, mounting a heavy weapon to an autonomous turret [Roland, anyone?], or dual wielding; or change the ammo type (such as explosive, piercing, or flaking). I love this weapon customization system so much that I spent a lot of enjoyable time just toying with Wang’s arsenal, and managed to come up with many devastating tools of demon-death that were incredibly pleasant to bring into combat. I never had to give up on my favorite weapons, but could just keep improving them over time, allowing me to hone my play style.
Just because “Shadow Warrior 2” doesn’t have ridiculously ballooning numbers doesn’t mean it doesn’t have any character development, though. While Wang’s stats do stay largely flat throughout the game, he can equip a number of augment gems to his armor as well, plus the skill system allows him to buy perks that expand his capabilities. In lieu of ‘experience’ points, Wang earns Karma, and upon earning enough to fill his meter, gains a Skill Point. While he starts with a number of available skills in which to invest these points, picking up new skills from slain bosses/mini-bosses really broadens Wang’s horizons, allowing him to improve his melee specials, carry more ammo of each type, improve his Chi spells (or just his Chi in general), increase his max HP, and more. Each player can build their Wang the way they want… but they’ll never run into a level cap that prevents them from maxing out ALL of Wang’s skills, as there is no level cap in “Shadow Warrior 2.”
Finally, I’d like to address the game’s difficulty. “Shadow Warrior 2” has a nice base difficulty curve, and a plethora of out-of-the-box difficulties to play. When creating a multi-player coop game, the host even has the opportunity to adjust enemy scaling for 2-4 players. We found that playing on Normal 4-Player resulted in enemies that weren’t threatening, but just took forever to kill because of their bloated multi-player hit point pools, so we instead changed the game to Hard 2-Player, which made enemies more dangerous while simultaneously less bullet-spongey. I love this granular difficulty control, and wish more games would consider implementing their multi-player mode in a similar way. Too many coop games – from ‘Borderlands’ to “Mercenary Kings” – rely on bloated enemy health bars to make things ‘fair,’ not realizing that not all coop groups like to stick so close together that they might as well be conjoined at the butthole. With “Shadow Warrior 2,” we got to experience the game exactly how we wanted.
Overall
I really, really wanted to give “Shadow Warrior 2” a perfect score, but the slew of technical issues simply won’t allow it. For those who can overlook those flaws, though, “Shadow Warrior 2” offers a compelling story, fun characters, and utterly sublime gameplay. This game sets the gameplay bar that all Shooters, be they FPS or TPS, should strive for.
Presentation: 3.5/5
Story: 4.5/5
Gameplay: 5/5
Overall (not an average): 4.5/5
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