Playing this reminded me how much I miss commandos.

So you have a squad of three dudes, two dudettes and one bloodthirsty tanuki. The story begins with your three boys trying to blow up the castle in Osaka to help your beloved shogun win the war. Everything goes well, your sniper loses a leg and a new threat in the face of mysterious Kage-sama starts looming above your shogun-chan. That's how you'll be spending your days from now on - you really want to make your shogun happy and his enemy unhappy. Story itself is pretty generic, but some scenes in the end make if worth not dozing off while listening.

All characters have their own gimmicks bringing some variety on the table. You have your typical sniper, spy, trapper, big guy who can bring down other big guys and ordinary guy with a stone in hand. This game, of course, was not designed for your reflexes and requires you to utilize that shiny smooth brain you have. And developers really know their stuff. They actually understand that plan go well = brain give feel good chemicals. That's why, to enhance that jolt of good, they gave you a way with one button to simultaneously start your great plan that you built for ten minutes and which for sure will not backfire in a second.

Level design is extremely cool. Locations are colourful, we have some seasonal change which affect gameplay and it's just pleasant to look and traverse. I just wish we could enter building with their own little screens like in aforementioned commandos.

I'll also speak a little about Aiko's choice because I'm too lazy to write another entry just for a DLC. It's basically more of the same. But a lot more. Yeah, there are just three levels but every one of them is at least two hours long and in a new location all of which look stunning.

My only issue with this game is that this is not commandos 2 and I'm not a ten year old boy playing it deep into the night.

Ear raping developer logo screen when starting the game will forever haunt me though.

Esta revisión de los dos primeros juegos de la saga Commandos (se eliminan cosas del segundo, al que se asemeja más en general, para que sea casi tan directo como el primero) quizá se antoje demasiado familiar para quien, como yo, haya jugado los originales. Aquellos títulos, estupendos, eran irregulares y problemáticos a nivel técnico. Había que tolerar, pero se hacía porque la experiencia propuesta era única y estaba muy conseguida. Y lo que viene a hacer Shadow Tactics es ofrecer esa misma experiencia sin aristas, sin puntos flojos, todo más redondo y aprovechando años de aprendizaje en diseño de nivel y otras disciplinas videojueguiles. Muy derivativo, ¿no? Por suerte, hay más.

Shadow Tactics posee dos elementos diferenciadores respecto a Commandos: las "Shadow Tactics" que dan nombre al juego, y el enfoque personal que cobra la narración. Lo primero es un sistema que permite almacenar las acciones a realizar de distintos personajes por separado para después ejecutarlas al mismo tiempo, y lo segundo una manera de conectar las misiones mediante sucesos que involucrarán emocionalmente a los personajes. El primer añadido debería ser gigantesco (por las posibilidades tácticas que abre) pero termina por ser mediano o pequeño, pues su empleo no suele ser necesario, pero el segundo, en teoría menos importante, cambia la manera en que procesamos nuestros actos, que terminarán por volverse cuestión personal, generando ese "efecto viaje" tan presente en videojuegos de aventura y que uno nunca esperaría en una propuesta así.

The reveal of Shadow Gambit reminded me that I had the studio's previous title in my Epic Games Library and I thought I'd revisit it. It was a game I had glossed over initially because it wasn't what I expected and found it obtuse to control. Now more veteran in the typical RTS control format, the game is absolutely superb. It has much of what I enjoy in Hitman but at a different angle, both literally and design wise. Highly recommend if videos on it intrigue you, though I must warn if you have no experience with this format of control schemes you will have to learn.

Shadow Tactics Blades of the Shogun will play in a very similar way to people who have played the Commandos series or Desperados Wanted Dead or Alive. It's a top down stealth based game that allows you to control five different characters, each with different passive and active abilities. Each of the 13 missions will have you controlling anywhere from 2-5 of the game's characters allowing them the ability to design missions around certain characters strengths or allowing each to contribute in different sections. Every mission has nine activities you can complete to earn a badge and three different difficulty settings, these don't unlock any new gameplay features but can give you a reason to try out certain missions with different playstyles or cause you to limit yourself to make the game more challenging. The game has good production values with some nice looking maps, good voice acting, a good soundtrack, and I only ran into a bug twice (one that caused a patrol to get stuck and one that prevented a badge from unlocking). There is more of a story to the game than Commandos offers, more like Desperados with the characters having more personality. The character personalities are shown more in the actual gameplay as well with them having different lines of dialogue based on the situation, time of day, or weather. One of the only negatives is that three of the characters have the same passive skills, one just has less passive skills, each has their primary weapon as an ability, and all of them share two of their five abilities (a gun with limited ammo and a healing item). Though each character only has three unique abilities they might have more options available, four of the characters can change their melee attack to be nonlethal, two abilities allow you to have new actions once used, and a grenade weapon one character uses can be switched between explosive or a non lethal gas.

One of my favorite games of 2016 and one fans of the games it is based on or fans of stealth games should play.

It's tempting to refer to any bird's-eye-stealth-real-time-strategy-esque game as a Commandos title, as that series introduced and defined this peculiar genre. In any case, Blades of the Shogun tries its hardest to make this style of game playable and I can't help but admire it (a decent story with genuine emotional turns helps). Nevertheless, it admits the shortcomings of its genre by pinging the player every sixty seconds with the reminder, “Did You Save?” As with its predecessors, BotS is more about save-scumming and brute-force replay than real strategy.

Pros: unique, good time period,mechanics

Cons: not my type of game

i see that its actually a good game made with care but it just isnt my type of game

This kind of real-time strategy games are not available. So fans of this genre are a bit unlucky (like me ☹). Shadow Tactics takes place in the time of the samurai. The game was developed by Mimimi Games, the developer of Desperados 3. Meanwhile, the flagship of the genre in the 2000s was undoubtedly the Commandos series. It isn’t be wrong to say that Desperados 3 has been carrying the flag of the genre recently (if you haven’t played Desperados 3, definitely play it, it’s awesome 😊). That’s why there are plenty of Desperados inspirations in Shadow Tactics. It would not be a lie if we say that Shadow Tactics is the trial before Desperados 3.


Let’s come to my thoughts about the game, I want to say the most important thing about the game firstly; I had a lot of fun and enjoyed the game during the game. Even if you’re not a fan of the genre, it’s a good idea to give it a try. Shadow Tactics is well-balanced in every aspect and manages to have a good time for the players. I don’t know what your expectation is for this kind of graphic, but for me, its visuality was quite sufficient. I must to say don’t wait too much things from the visiuality 😊 I think the strongest aspects of the game are the voice, effects and the fiction of the game. The effects of the samurai attacks with sword blows allowed me to feel the sword blows quite a bit. Apart from that, I liked the small talk and critique of the characters in the game. I have to say that the in-game riddles are also very diverse and cleverly incorporated into the game. You are happily trying to solve it.

I have to say that there are minor bugs in the game. But since these are at a very low level, they will not bother you so much. I can’t also speak very positively about artificial intelligence. Your enemies don’t have many options other than a few set routines. Game time and price are very reasonable.

Finally, Shadow Tactics has managed to bring me back to my old days as a commandos fan. It also made me have some serious fun. While doing all this, he also instilled in me little by little the samurai culture. A boon for genre lovers. It is a game that those who are not related or not interested in this genre should take a look at and give it a chance.

Un juego de estrategias en tiempo real con énfasis en el sigilo que fue una de esas muy agradables experiencias que conocí gracias a GOG. La historia un tanto papa sin sal, pero los 5 personajes tienen su carisma, es bastante divertido jugar con sus habilidades específicas y el planear tácticas en equipo es un subidón.

Como lo dicen otros usuarios, hay ciertos tramos donde el juego te presiona a tomar ciertos caminos, pero el diseño de niveles es excelente, las dinámicas muy bien implementadas y balanceadas, pone un buen reto, cada misión es bastante larga pero el gameplay es adictivo y divertido, con amplia libertad de escoger varias estrategias para alcanzar los objetivos que da valor de rejugabilidad y cada misión es bastante variada en objetivos y condiciones.

Las gráficas nada del otro mundo pero desarrollan bien la atmósfera del Japón feudal y la banda sonora, aunque un tanto genérica.

Comecei gostando muito do game, pois é bem diferente de qualquer jogo de stealth que já joguei, por misturar o gênero tático com stealth.

Você tem 5 personagens com habilidades diferentes, de modo que um completa o que falta no outro, deixando o jogo bem estratégico.

A história é bem ok, tem seus pontos bacanas, mas não é nada que te prende. O velho do tanuki foi meu personagem favorito, mas pelas mecânicas que ele possui.

Agora falando dos problemas...

Me peguei várias vezes, tendo que isolar muitos inimigos, um por vez nas fases. O que deixa a experiência extremamente cansativa, considerando que tem inimigos demais, principalmente nas fases do meio, pro final do game.

Outra coisa, é que, também é permitido salvar a todo momento, o que por um lado é bom e por outro ruim. O medo de ter que isolar e matar vários inimigos de novo, me fazia salvar toda hora. Parecia que eu estava jogando um jogo todo picotado.

Conclusão: o jogo deu uma estragada e se estendeu demais depois disso, fazendo com que eu demorasse meses pra zerar, mas pode ser que outra pessoa, mais stealthzera (alguém muito bom nisso) se de melhor e ame o jogo.

wonderful core gameplay with nice mission variety in both settings and mission objectives. loved the cast of characters and all of their varied skills/abilities, there was truly a use for everyone in most stages. the game didn't make the greatest first impression for me with the first few missions but by the time i had reached the fourth, i was all in.

wasn't so wild about the complexity of the controls (the sheer amount of bindings) and camera itself. i'm not sure what i'd suggest differently in terms of the controls/bindings as most of the abilities as seen here are essential and would be missed without but it was all a bit much at times. trying to juggle everything while doing precision movements with shadow mode later in the game using at times all 5 characters was a bit nightmarish to pull off. hopefully it all feels better in future efforts.

will be perched for the expansion for sure.

This is probably one of the best stealth games ever made, at least mechanically. I do think it's a little too difficult at times, but it only felt unfair once or twice so I can't judge it too harshly. I didn't care for the story or characters, but I will admit that I was just not in the mood for that type of story while playing the game, so it could have a lot to do with that. Other than that, I think the game's almost perfect, and I don't say that lightly.

I also played it on console and while the controls felt fine, the game was very much meant to be played with KB/M. Not everything translated well, I feel.

(BacklogBeat’s Game Club - Q2 2021 Nomination)

Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun is a squad based real time strategy game focused on stealth. The squad itself is pretty good, all of the characters have some use and their skills compliment each other very well. You can also cue different actions to trigger simultaneously which comes in handy for the most complex maneuvers.
The missions often include some kind of environmental factor to mix things up, as an example, guards will follow the player's footsteps in snowy levels which can get you spotted, but can also be used to lead enemies into an ambush. There are also challenges for each level, but I find that stuff kinda tedious and there's plenty of content in a regular playthrough as it is, in my opinion.
To conclude, I believe Shadow Tactics is an excellent game and I'd have no trouble recommending it to pretty much anyone. I wanna lead people into their deaths with a trained racoon and Shadow Tactics makes that dream come true.
Also, this is completely unrelated, but the developer's logo is awful, children crying is something that triggers fixed action patterns on people and who in their right mind thinks "children crying = fun game"? What an odd choice.

Shadow Tactics fully embraces the real-time tactics genre, with a particular emphasis on stealth, that was popularised by the Commandos saga. The plot is set in Japan and fictionally continues the events of the Summer Siege of Osaka (1615). The core of the title invites the cooperation of several characters, with different skills, to cross levels. In particular, the strength of the game lies in the satisfaction you get from setting up complex tactics with three or four actions. Some small passages require you to have worked on your mouse skills, but the experience is all the more rewarding. Thus, it is always pleasant to go on an adventure with our different protagonists to put an end to Kage-sama's rebellion: no character seems useless and it does not necessarily come to mind to try to complete the objectives with only one character, but the title has the merit of leaving this possibility open, thanks to its emergent gameplay. One regret could be the length of some levels. Learning the last four levels is quite long, requiring almost two hours to complete one of them: I would have appreciated the existence of checkpoints, especially to redo and experiment only certain sections. Some ergonomic options would have been appreciated – a stronger zoom, the possibility to select enemies through the scenery, an automatic save. Some players may be put off by the spiking difficulty of the final third, but that is the nature of the shadow life. Ultimately, Shadow Tactics is a thoroughly enjoyable title in Edo Japan.

Un jeu de tactique (sans blague) qui se déroule au Japon. C'est joli, l'histoire était intéressante et le gameplay assez riche avec les différentes aptitudes et utilités des différents personnages. Je ne le terminerais pas, je crois qu'il ne me reste que 1 ou 2 niveaux pour arriver au bout, mais j'ai laissé une trop longue période entre ma dernière session et celle ou j'ai tenté de terminer, reprendre à l'avant-dernier niveau sans se rappeler comment fonctionne les mécaniques du jeu c'est pas évident.