Shadow Blasters
released on Dec 31, 1990
The evil god Ashura has unleashed hordes of monsters and demons onto Earth, hoping to take control of the planet as well as the hearts of men. The powerful god Hyprion has recruited four of Earth's most powerful warriors and assembled them into a team to fight the encroaching darkness. The player assumes control of this group of warriors in order to defeat the armies and their god, Ashura.
Reviews View More
Surprised with the depth of the gameplay in Shadow Blasters. Love the surprises near the of the game. Definitely want to replay this game.
Cleared on January 4th, 2024 (SEGA Genesis Challenge: 45/160)
Shadow Blasters is a 2D Action game where you throw projectiles at enemies while walking very slowly. Now if you know me, you should know that I hate sluggish speed in video games, especially when it doesn't feel like it was built with the game in mind. The game at least allows you to upgrade to move a little faster and even jump higher, but more than that, it also lets you upgrade not one, but four characters each of which you can swap to on the fly. Each of which has their own projectile they can fire at the foes which can be charged to unleash its full power, but gradually collecting white flames can allow them to reduce the charge time until it becomes instant
There's Kotarou/Horatio who has the power to unleash fire on their foes. At full power, he can unleash a dragonflame that curves up and down while travelling in a straight line. Great for clearing a wave of enemies.
Ayame/Tiffany can unleash wind and at full power fires a tornado that homes in on the enemy. Not exactly practical against a wave of enemies since it disappears after hitting one enemy or a few small ones, but can be very good against bosses and in particular cheesing the penultimate boss just by staying just close enough to it where the projectile cannot hit you, wait until he high jumps every other jump, and just spam tornado until it dies.
Kidenbou/Marco can unleash lightning and at full power can fire 3 in a spreadshot. He is possibly the best character in the game as he covers a lot of ground, and seems to be the most capable of taking damage in contrast to the previous two who seem rather frail.
Senshirou/Leo can fire a blade projectile and at full power can unleash a spinning blade that goes back and forward. Arguably the best character for damaging foes backwards.
The game starts out feeling frustrating because you are so slow and weak, but once you pick up power ups and even learn how to switch characters at any time, the game is actually pretty fun. Even the bosses can feel manageable, but I do think even at max upgrade, they are extremely hard to evade, particularly the golem and the alien. Had it not been for the ability to switch between characters to have them soak up damage, they could've easily been among the worst Sega Genesis bosses.
The final boss is ok... the scenery in outer space is really cool and it had that power rangers vibe to it, but it really amounts up to just circling around the boss and shooting projectiles until it dies. It will take a few tries to get it right, but not exactly an impressive fight. Then again, it is one day away from 1991 when this game came out, so I shouldn't expect anything too compelling.
But I did enjoy the game for what it tried to do, and the progression is really satisfying. Just whatever you do, do not let any of the characters die. Not only will you be unable to use them until you get a game over, but even when you continue from a game over, all of your stats reset which will force you to slog through the game with slow ass movement speed.
Shadow Blasters is a 2D Action game where you throw projectiles at enemies while walking very slowly. Now if you know me, you should know that I hate sluggish speed in video games, especially when it doesn't feel like it was built with the game in mind. The game at least allows you to upgrade to move a little faster and even jump higher, but more than that, it also lets you upgrade not one, but four characters each of which you can swap to on the fly. Each of which has their own projectile they can fire at the foes which can be charged to unleash its full power, but gradually collecting white flames can allow them to reduce the charge time until it becomes instant
There's Kotarou/Horatio who has the power to unleash fire on their foes. At full power, he can unleash a dragonflame that curves up and down while travelling in a straight line. Great for clearing a wave of enemies.
Ayame/Tiffany can unleash wind and at full power fires a tornado that homes in on the enemy. Not exactly practical against a wave of enemies since it disappears after hitting one enemy or a few small ones, but can be very good against bosses and in particular cheesing the penultimate boss just by staying just close enough to it where the projectile cannot hit you, wait until he high jumps every other jump, and just spam tornado until it dies.
Kidenbou/Marco can unleash lightning and at full power can fire 3 in a spreadshot. He is possibly the best character in the game as he covers a lot of ground, and seems to be the most capable of taking damage in contrast to the previous two who seem rather frail.
Senshirou/Leo can fire a blade projectile and at full power can unleash a spinning blade that goes back and forward. Arguably the best character for damaging foes backwards.
The game starts out feeling frustrating because you are so slow and weak, but once you pick up power ups and even learn how to switch characters at any time, the game is actually pretty fun. Even the bosses can feel manageable, but I do think even at max upgrade, they are extremely hard to evade, particularly the golem and the alien. Had it not been for the ability to switch between characters to have them soak up damage, they could've easily been among the worst Sega Genesis bosses.
The final boss is ok... the scenery in outer space is really cool and it had that power rangers vibe to it, but it really amounts up to just circling around the boss and shooting projectiles until it dies. It will take a few tries to get it right, but not exactly an impressive fight. Then again, it is one day away from 1991 when this game came out, so I shouldn't expect anything too compelling.
But I did enjoy the game for what it tried to do, and the progression is really satisfying. Just whatever you do, do not let any of the characters die. Not only will you be unable to use them until you get a game over, but even when you continue from a game over, all of your stats reset which will force you to slog through the game with slow ass movement speed.
okay so as i've been migrating and re-writing my reviews for all these games I stumbled upon this on my list of games I've finished, not unlike how I stumbled upon this game while trying to find mega drive games to play, and while my original thoughts on this game seem to show that I enjoyed it, I genuinely do not remember anything from this game. Consdering the fact that the game has only 30 minutes of total play time, Im gonna just assume this is one of those games that you can play and enjoy, yet really garner nothing out of at the end of the day. Gaming junk food, if you will. Give it a shot if you have a half hour to kill, since I'll probably do the same in the future to see if i can remember anything more substantial about this one.
Shadow Blasters is pretty ugly but the core gameplay is kinda interesting. You can switch between four characters on the fly and slowly upgrade them with item pickups, and the idea is to split them evenly until everyone is maxed out. Once you have about two at their strongest the game becomes a lot more fun. The end result is pretty alright, nothing crazy, but not bad. Which, at least, was more than I was expecting from an initial glance at this game.
Lowkey great Genesis kusoge that really ticks my brain spiders. Very cool interpretation of a charge shot leveling system and the 4-character cast lends to some neat strategy and item pickup management. I've often described Genesis games as NES games under an arcade-esque lens, and you see that extremely prominently here.