I’m sure the learned scholars of Backloggd will already be familiar with I, We, Waluigi: a Post-Modern analysis of Waluigi, a foundational lens through which we can view almost every video game mascot ever conceived - Ms. Pac Man, Ken Masters, Evil Ryu, Roxas, Shadow Mario, Dark Link, Dark Pit, Dark Prince, Dark Samus, and, of course: Shadow the Hedgehog. But who is Shadow the Hedgehog? Following the tenets of Waluigi Theory, it’s safe to say he’s a copy of the individual shaped by the signifier - a stencil-clone of Sonic the Hedgehog, who himself exists as a reflection of Super Mario, having been created for the express purpose of giving his codemasters a jumping mascot to stick on the box of a video game machine¹. Appropriate then that this black-furred badass lab rat would be called Shadow, existing as he does in the literal shadows of his progeniting mascots. You think I’m taking the piss, right? Well, Shadow the Hedgehog (the game) thinks the same thing I do about Shadow the Hedgehog (the character): that Shadow is just that - a shadow, an unindividual who ceases to exist when Sonic the Hedgehog inevitably moves from the light. And in the year 2005, Sonic the Hedgehog was almost standing in the dark.

Shadow the Hedgehog’s writing team, keenly aware that the 8 year olds playing the game may not have read the works of Swiss semiotician Ferdinand de Saussure, choose to expound this metaphor in a more explicit manner, and centred it in the game’s narrative. Shadow the Hedgehog (the game) begins with a literal Judgement Day, The Creator appearing to Shadow the Hedgehog (the character) in a biblical vision evocative of Exodus 3:3. The Black Doom asks: I created you, but who or what are you? And what form shall you take? Follow my commandments, and you can become as God. (Though unlike the Bible, Shadow the Hedgehog is more interested in getting you to follow the tenets of Collect 8 Orbs than not making unto thee any graven image) Late in the events of Shadow the Hedgehog (the game), it is revealed that Shadow the Hedgehog (the character) isn’t actually Shadow the Hedgehog at all, but in fact an android replica of Shadow the Hedgehog who is imitating the memories and actions of his predecessor, Shadow the Hedgehog. The shadow must define itself in a battle between the unconscious aspect of the self and the conscious ego that does not identify in itself, or the entirety of the unconscious; that is, everything of which a person is not fully conscious. In short, Shadow the Hedgehog is the unknown.

And how does the unknown choose to define itself? Well, this Sega of America-developed video game takes place during the great uncertainty of the War on Terror. Not just in the figurative sense that the game came out four years after 9/11; it literally places Shadow’s mission to collect the Chaos Emeralds in the middle of a war between the United States government (referred to in-game as Westopolis) and an enemy ‘terror force’ called “the black aliens” (the US President in the game always uses this term for them!! that shit is NOT a coincidence baby!!!!). As with his foray into Saussurian philosophy, Takashi Iizuka doesn’t quite trust the patrons of DeviantArt to grasp the nettle of his argument he’s making here, and eventually has to have characters say things like “we don’t negotiate with terrorists!” and “if you’re not with me, you’re against me!”. Star Wars: Episode III: Revenge of the Sith was released six months earlier.

To tie a bow on the whole treatise, the war is ultimately hijacked by a hypercapitalist/industrialist force - lead by a Northrop Grummanesque Dr. Robotnik - who reveals that Shadow the Hedgehog (the android) isn’t actually an android, but is in fact the original Shadow the Hedgehog (the character) after all, conditioned to believe he was an android replica of himself for a purpose the game doesn’t explain. Presumably the developers trusted the player to digest such philosophical matters on their own time, so allow me to explain the game’s message: capitalism has created your character, Shadow the Hedgehog, a being who can only exist in reference to other things. Shadow is the true nowhere man/hedgehog, without the other things he reflects, inverts and parodies he has no reason to exist. Shadow’s identity only comes from what and who he isn’t – without a wider frame of reference he is nothing. He is not his own man. In a world where our identities are shaped by our warped relationships to brands and commerce we are all Waluigi Shadow the Hedgehog.

To sum up this game in a sentence: Charmy Bee leads an assault on a United States federal prison.

——————-
¹ Super Mario himself is a reference to Jump Man (star of Donkey Kong (1983)), who was in turn an homage to Nintendo of America’s Brooklyn landlord. This arguably makes Shadow the Hedgehog the inversion of a reflection of a copy of a signifier of Mario Segale, a 62 year old landlord.

i've had a rocky relationship with this one to say the least

it may go without saying, but i'm the kind of person who thoroughly adores absolutely everything about this game's initial concept and presentation. i didn't grow out of my 'edgy phase' - it wasn't one. this shit's cool as fuck. it was cool as fuck 20 years ago, it still is today and it will be forever

shadow the hedgehog is a game carried by ideas, but they're executed to mixed results. this permeates the plot, script and gameplay. nothing's completely unscathed

narratively, it's incredibly ambitious - especially for such an obviously rushed game. the route structure is somewhat insane, even if the endings do split into 3-4 similar templates - almost all of which have really awkward line deliveries (shout out to 'journey to nihility' though - that one goes hard)

scriptwise... man, it's a mess. black doom is the biggest issue. he's effectively a caricature of a shounen antagonist who never shuts the fuck up. conversations tend to be pretty stilted across the board, but this dude just amps it to fucking 13. i contemplated dropping a half star here just because of how annoying his presence was during the final episode. in fact, i better stop fucking talking about black doom or else this game might be a 2/10 by the time i'm done

...on the contrary, shadow himself is thankfully as strong of a character as ever and the ability to constantly jump between routes really suits his whole mysterious/badass/what-the-fuck-is-he-thinking demeanor. that said, his stages could easily give you a positive or negative impression depending on which of those paths you end up on

personally, i started with the pure dark route... then after a neutral-only palate cleanser, pure hero - this was a fucking mistake! depending on your whims as a player your first run could consist of varied but mostly straightforward objectives, or menial tasks such as combing through multi-pathed environments for torchs to light and killing exactly specified quantities of enemies (it'll be a cold day in hell when i replay lost impact)

at his best, shadow disappoints as the star of a sonic game but actually excels as a shooter more akin to gamma's role in sa1, boasting faster movement and a solid variety of weapons that all feel fun to shoot - which is especially important because this game wants bullets to rain constantly, as it actively rewards killing enemies of both alignments, encouraging the ambivalent carnage no matter which route you're aiming for

in fact - i feel like this game would've likely gone over better with some fans if its A-ranks were stricter in places. you can basically hold forward and pass any normal mission with flying colors, but beyond that there's tons of room to optimize runs via effective usage of shadow's chaos blast and especially control powers. definitely a missed opportunity here!

with a few more months in the oven, some slower bits axed and some added speed to shadow's spindashing, homing and walljumping, this'd be a classic for sure

as it stands, it's pretty confused. i've come to enjoy the chaos quite a bit, but i'd only recommend it to someone who wished gamma had more of a presence in sa1. if you go in expecting sa3, then everything's all over before it can even start

the soundtrack, however, i can - and will - recommend to literally anyone with or without a pulse

(i only did the neutral-hero because 1) wreck farming enemies 2) it is easier 3) i was playing it with very low fps and if i continued, i would implode till i respawn in another universe. so, if you just don't consider my opinion since i've not played the entirety of the game, you can. but you could also just consider the neutral-hero route as the only one and we will be fine!)

people are very mean to this game. i can see why but honestly? is not as bad as they make it seems. first, i have to say that i really don't care about the "edginess" of this game -- to be honest, i really like it. the dark colors, the rock music, the guns! the opening is at square enix level of quality and is basically devil may cry meets sonic adventure meets linkin park. shadow, by itself, is a very curious character: he wants to know his own purpose - what is him? why is he alive? is he even "him"? is he good? is he bad? the one who decides this is the player and while i completely despise the objectives to go to another route, the idea of having multiples endings and three main routes is the way that sonic team found to translate the existential crisis of shadow the hedgehog as well the answer to who he really is.

and despising aspects of this game despite loving the whole concept is pretty much what this game is about, lol. shadow the hedgehog is a beautiful broken vase that instead of fixing it with glue or tape, sonic team just rearranged the pieces and prayed for no one dare to even look at it --- or it will broken. of course is not buggy at sonic 06 level, is very playable, but there's janky in there. it utilizes the butter-shoes gameplay from sonic heroes as the base, so shadow is very slippy. you can pretty much fall in a hole because of this + the weird level geometry. however, it is pretty interesting nonetheless: the guns are a very fun gimmick, since you are shooting while running, cleaning up your way to the end of the level. if you don't have enough ammo you will not use the gun again and it's arguably useless since you have homing attack -- but i disagree, is more of another option: homing attack is good but using guns is more safe and since this game have some weird geometry sometimes, the best way is using them.

the levels itself are very interesting, at least the ones i played in neutral-hero route: while they are very long, they change your fast-running-pace in very creative and funny ways, like the one that you pass through an acid river with a beyblade or the one that you use a mini-mecha to jump over tall platformers and this, together with the combat with guns, turns the experience to be very refreshing and not just "run". shadow can wall-jump, so you can skip some parts with that and while the levels are big i never felt REALLY tired? like, in sonic rush i felt that the levels could be 2x smaller but this one utilizes its size in a good way, imo: you run > have a new gimmick > run > battle with enemies > run > utilizes the gimmick in a more difficult way > run > battle > end of the level. its great because it seems that they knew how the gameplay would be so they just did bigger levels that Repeat Themselves But Harder in order to get players used to it. and since you probably will do another route in future playthroughs, conceptually, you “never” get tired.

it is . . . not really that good, but not really that bad. i liked, probably will not play again and if i do i will try to use some cheat to unlock levels and just appreciate this weird level design. its basically sonic - the kusoge starring shadow the hedgehog. you all like this kind of game, right? why not try it. at least its very funny, shadow just tells eggman to go to hell and he says the F-word in a cutscene. it is worth!

looking back, SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG has some overall major backloggdcore vibes lmao. at this point in time it’s been well over a year since i’ve last played the game but i’ve done so twice in the past. then why am i writing this review? to be frank it’s because i recently played DIRGE OF CERBERUS lol. funnily enough, both this and that game have some overlapping qualities mechanically and artistically (for better or for worse).
you open up with this fuckin insane ass intro where shadow, nah. we ain’t doin this. y'all know the story of this game to death whether it be due to hands-on experience or the more likely reason, internet culture. this game has such an insane presence online whether you’re a sonic fan or not. the obvious EDGY THE HEDGY meme may come to mind, but this game is kinda the laughing stock of sonic games online. i would say 06 is similar in that regard but for some reason there’s been a rapid resurgence of appreciation for that game for reasons i could not for the life of me tell you why. now i’m not saying this game is the MOST UNDERRATED SONIC GAME OF ITS ERA, hell no. this game sucks badly but there are key aspects that i can appreciate stylistically based on their own merits. hell i’m listening to the game’s ost while writing this. shit like that’s got me in the feels ya know? the way the menus have this gritty over-the-top mid to late 2000s charm that every 13 year old at the time was trying to pull off, or how a fuckin stock gunshot plays whenever you make a selection in said menus LOL. like this shit is really funny but cool at the same time. the fuckin, overlapping stylized arrows overlapping the degrading edges of the background borders overlapping some render of shadow with stock fire animatics overlapping the eyes of said overlapping model, overlaps bro. shit’s wild and differentiates itself from the rest of the games in this era of sonic and even the entire franchise. we will never get another “shadow the hedgehog” sonic game in an artistic sense.
you have this encapsulating atmosphere that lingers throughout the levels of the whole game. the bangin tunes ofc help this out immensely. melodramatic tunes for the slow infiltration of GUN hq, bleeps and bloops overlapping classic sonic rock tunes; it’s some good shit that helps the contextualization of each area, more so than sa2 but not as on par with sa1. the aforementioned grittiness carries over into the gameplay. of course shadow has his AK-47s and whatever which is seen as “nonsensical,” yet cartoon hedgehogs going super saiyan fighting a giant cock monster is completely sensical. i honestly do get the complaints about shadow simply wielding a gun as it’s defo a tonal contrast to what sonic is usually all about, but as its own thing i think its p cool. coming back to the gameplay, said guns do actually feel pretty good to use on their own. the downside to this is that they nerfed the shit out of the homing attack to focus on this which does kinda suck. shadow consistently falters in areas where heroes succeeded controlwise. shadow just feels a lot more slippery than in heroes which doesn’t help the abhorrent level design. levels either have stupid gimmicks further stupidified by the level missions or they just become exhausting slogs, sometimes both of these even. now, do i think the stylistic atmosphere carries this? no, lol. playing the game is just not that fun unfortunately. bosses are jokes and needing to play the game 10 times over is just plain redundant. conceptually, having multiple pathways was something ahead of its time for a platformer, but the issue is that the execution sucks. there isn’t a single mission in the game that i actually like. most of them break the flow and pace of levels entirely.
i think this is a game worth playing if you enjoy over personified mid 2000s style…but you also have to endure the conflicted gameplay. in conclusion, did the game succeed in its goal to resonate with edgy teens in the 2000s? no, but it succeeded in doing something else. being really really funny.

I first played Shadow the Hedgehog a couple of years ago where me and a friend laughed at the opening cutscene, went through a couple of levels, and then moved on with our lives, content to not play through the entirety of it on the basis of it being Shadow the Hedgehog. Yet since then, dropping it that fast has almost left a bit of a void for me--what was the rest of that game like? The premise sounded so bizarre that I knew I needed to come back to it someday and see it through to the end, and so I did, completing all 10 endings plus the true final boss.

Shadow is definitely an ambitious title: Guns! Vehicles! Branching paths and moral choices! It turns out that first thing actually works pretty well, for as memeable as the idea is. Shadow, Heroes, and 06 are all Sonic titles that will lock you in a room until you get rid of boring enemy waves, but in Shadow you're able to get past this nuisance the quickest, due to most enemies going down in just a couple of shots. The implementation is still clunky, but it's something!

Don't get too excited, though, as the level design is very clearly several notches below other Sonic games released around the same time, being filled with lots of copy-pasted rooms, repetitive environments, and absurd amounts of waiting for moving platforms. Given how the story expects you to do several playthroughs in order to reach the true ending, having to replay stages so often is something that seems like it would actually be faithful to the core design of Sonic: getting better and better at a level as you do more playthroughs, allowing you to speed through it quicker while taking all the fastest routes. Unfortunately, while the below-average level design could be passable in a vacuum, replaying it as much as you do just makes it more obvious how much of a step down it really is. There is also, of course, the notorious objectives that turn the level into a marathon in order to kill every last enemy or do some other mundane task. It's not great!

And yeah, that morality system sure is something! I was really interested to see how this was handled, how your decisions would affect the plot and characters, and it... doesn't, really. Sticking to a full dark/full hero playthrough leads to a fairly coherent run, but straying even slightly off the beaten path (which you will need to do to get all the endings and unlock the finale) leads to the plot becoming outright incomprehensible. You'll be teleporting around from stage to stage with no explanation for how you got there, plot beats will constantly be introduced and then dropped, and while characters will comment on your actions during gameplay, they'll completely forget about it by the time the next stage rolls around, as though their memory was just wiped.

It's a system that is certainly interesting on paper but it's too loose to go anywhere--when you can switch sides so often without anyone acknowledging it, it's hard to feel like anything you do has any actual consequences. It's a shame that the concept of the branching paths is also attached to this morality system, because if there was an alternate universe where a more traditional Sonic game picked up the idea of having alternate levels unlocked by completing extra objectives, without any of Shadow's baggage, without any of the hero/dark nonsense, it could make for something really cool. Unfortunately, the fact that it's part of Shadow means it's going to be forever tainted, and we probably won't see a successor to the concept. Everything about Shadow's presentation is antithetical to Sonic, but looking at the progression structure purely mechanically? They could've had something. (Although Sonic CD does admittedly have some mechanics that are kind of similar, to be fair.)

Shadow the Hedgehog is a failed experiment and it'll probably always be remembered as one, but I won't deny that this was also easily one of the most fascinating titles I've played this year. And hey, I Am All of Me is still the best Crush 40 song!

Shadow has a gun. It's good. Hardest Opening FMV ever, even harder than Adventure. I really think the actual movement and level design here are really strong, apart from Shadow's weird totally vertical jump, this could be a heck of a Sonic game. The thing that ultimately shoots it in the head is its obnoxious and tedious mission system. I'm not even opposed to them principally, it's basically just a recontextualization of Adventure's stage replay mechanics and an attempt to weave them into the narrative. It makes the stages more hang-outable and gives them the breath and breadth necessary for actual exploration, as opposed to the Boost formula's games hyper-structured obstacle courses. It's just those objectives suuuuuuck. 85% of the missions are based on exterminating every enemy of one type in a level without backtracking options, and the combat is sooooo bad so bad. If it was fun this game would easily beat A2, you shoot the president and also Sonic and find out finally WHO SHADOW IS.

It's Christmas day, 2005. The tree is surrounded by wrapped gifts for my siblings and I to open, I don't even know this game exists. Among the gifts are 3 particularly large boxes with no tags on. "Those are for decoration", Mother says, urging me not to touch them for fear of ruining the display. This is the first year we've used fake gifts as decoration, strange.

The day goes on, many a gift is opened and smiles fill the room. But a young Jake can't help but feel a little disappointed that he received no video games for his beloved Nintendo Gamecube console. How much longer must he replay Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, Super Monkey Ball and The Incredibles before his horizon would expand...

But then. The impossible should occur. "Jake, aren't you going to open your last present?" My face becomes the definition of bewildered. "L-Last present? I got them all didn't I?" I ask, naively searching under the tree for the lost gift. "Oh really? Then I suppose you don't want what's in here."

I couldn't believe my eyes. There she was, my own mother, whom I'd learned to trust and rely on, gesturing to the so-called 'decorative' box from earlier. Denial filled my soul. "Ha! I'm not stupid, there's nothing in there" I shake the box to prove its lack of contents. But then, what's this? A rumble. Contact is being made between objects beneath the santa-covered paper.

I can hardly contain my excitement, and tear the paper away in an instant! Inside, a large cardboard box. I open that.. and inside...

... Another box, complete with wrapping paper. Another, another, at least 9 boxes, all individually wrapped and progressively decreasing in size. It was a hard fought battle, but at the end I saw him. It was a face I knew well.

Shadow the Hedgehog. And what's this? He has A GUN!? I threw myself upstairs to play it. And have since forgotten almost every single thing about it.

I cannot rate a game I don't remember, but I do remember how I received this game, so I'm giving it 2.5 stars out of respect.

-major 2000's filter
-multiple branching story paths
-utterly insane
-Panzer Dragoon stages
-large variety of weapons
-edgy protagonist obsessed over a woman

Babe this isn't your average Sonic game this is fucking Drakengard

"Sonhos são reais se você acreditar", essa frase nunca fez tanto sentido na minha vida.

Shadow the Hedgehog é um dos maiores clássicos de todas as mídias do nosso entretenimento, aquele jogo é sensacional, gráficos incríveis, música perfeita e é MUITO Edgy. Porém, o maior fator do sucesso multiversal do jogo é o Black Doom, considerado por todas as 3 bilhões de pessoas como o maior vilão da história, superando até mesmo pessoas de peso tipo a Thaís Carla.

Ontem foi anunciado o Sonic X Shadow: Generations, um Remaster do grandioso Sonic Generations, no começo eu estava achando que seria só um remaster porco, até que apareceu o novo modo do Shadow... Depois de 19 anos ele voltou... O Lord Black Doom.

Não acredito que o Black Doom voltou... Foi o momento que mais ri na história dos Vídeo Games, foi muito engraçado esse filho da puta voltar depois de 19 anos.

Na minha cabeça era IMPOSSÍVEL esse corno aparecer em algum jogo da franquia depois de tanto tempo de ausência (por motivos de que ele é um personagem ruim) mas como diria o Deus Diggo: NADA É IMPOSSÍVEL!

Nunca fiquei tão feliz de ver o nosso querido Black Doom de volta!

Esse foi o meu "especial" de 500 Likes das minhas reviews de qualidade questionável do Backloggd.

There are two scenes in this game that I think fully articulate how profoundly absurd Shadow the Hedgehog is as a piece of Sonic fiction, and also why I absolutely adore it.

The first is a scene where the GUN Commander, no doubt imagining himself the hero of an 80's action movie, cocks a pistol before exclaiming "Shadow, damn you! It's been 50 years...justice will finally be served!"

The second is where the President of the United States Federation defiantly proclaims his country will "never surrender to terrorists" before gazing down and giving a longing look toward a framed photograph on his desk. A photograph of Sonic and Shadow the Hedgehog.

People used to claim this period of Sonic games was the worst. The dark ages, they called it. As someone that spent far too much time during the mid-2000s on a Sonic the Hedgehog message board, I remember it all too well. But I genuinely, sincerely miss it, because for all their faults these games back then were so uniquely different from one to the next. Even if they were memorable for all the wrong reasons, at least they were memorable. Shadow the Hedgehog may be a 2 1/2 star game in my head but it's a 5 star game in my heart.

November 15th 2005 must have been both weird, strange and terrible for both Pac-Man and Sonic Fans huh? 2 games that radically change up the tone and the gameplay of the series with very mixed results. (At least Rush was good).

Preamble: Originally never planning on covering this game but since i’m on a role with Sonic Games as of now, might as well do a bit more before Origins comes out.

Shadow The Hedgehog absolutely confuses me even though i’ve played like 4-5 Routes, it’s probably one of sonic’s worst outings yet I can’t help myself to laugh at it.

The story is one of the worst yet funniest Sonic stories ever made due to the pretty weak script, Heroes dialogue in stages returning and the awfully directed 4Kids cast who debuted in this game, things such as “Disgusting Black creatures” and “That Damn fourth Chaos Emerald!” Is probably the most tryhard lines in a game i’ve seen, the concepts of this game are also pretty funny like how Shadow straight up kills Eggman & Sonic, his new back story with the aliens and due to how the morality system works, Shadow’s character is all over place, like Heroes wrapped up his arc and bringing him back so well even though it was so simple, though I would think staying dead would have been better though i’m not opposed to him coming back, it’s just so try hard and edgy.

Gameplay wise, this would probably a so bad it’s good game but it’s not, gunplay while absurd for the idea of Sonic characters welding realistic fire-arms is surprisingly decent and in-depth but feels a bit too mindless for my liking though is probably the best shooting gameplay in the series, The Level design while not up to the standards of the other 3D games are still fun but are ruined due to the horrid morality system involving you to kill ALL the enemies in the stage or some awkward mission goal as you can tell these stages weren't made to have all of it’s objects to be ravaged like this leading to when you have collected almost empty for stages being pretty empty and mindless, even doing these missions isn't fun and pretty boring, especially when your “allies” are barking orders at you (which by the way you can play as with 2P). But even then the games is killed by it’s horrid physics and this is coming from someone who loves Heroes. They feel way worse for some reason to me as the level design can't suit for the slippery controls as your doing these mundane tasks and not going fast. There’s also hand to hand combat which is laughable bad as it barely does any damage. But I think just getting the goal in Shadow (Mostly Neutral routes) can be fun enough though definitely weaker than most Sonic games.

And the Presentation of this game is awful, boring environments, same glossy models from Heroes look even worse and the music is really forgettable to me.

So uh overall this game would be a so bad it’s good kinda game but unfortunately it sucks.

Now uh I guess 06 is next lol.

no game like this will ever exist again.
visually and sonically so much stronger than any other 3D sonic game past adventure 2. the story is so ridiculous that it becomes some sort of amazing campy mid 2000s dream. it really just owns it too! no cop outs or 4th wall shit. the tone makes it actually fun instead of suffering through something like sonic forces.

i cant put into words how the aesthetic makes me feel. it really is a time capsule of pop culture. i mean taking a risk like giving your beloved childrens character a gun is so batshit. i respect this game so much for just doing whatever the fuck iizuka wanted and being genuine about it. i literally dont know how to express in words how i feel about the style, its absolutely bizarre and i just love it.

so yeah.. the style is unironically good. and the physics are mostly unironically good. it's in the sonic heroes engine which def feels worse than adventure 2 but still pretty nice compared to what comes after lol. this is the last 3D sonic game before they overhauled everything with boost mechanics.
i stand by saying the only good boost game is generations. all the others are pretty mid or bad but ill still try every single one lol. wish they would go back to this kind of level design and physics that are loose but not completely broken. like the pacing & exploration in a sonic adventure style game level just feels much better than the 1-2 minute rigid levels they give us now. feel like theres honestly more momentum platforming pre boost.

thanks for reading my spew about this game that i believe is genuinely misunderstood. lmk in the comments how the intro where sonic falls to his knees while shadow is holding the glock makes you feel

You wouldn't understand, you could never understand.
If you find yourself thinking about this game too hard, you'll end up falling into an abyss of headcanon glory. With enough of a surprisingly good foundation for rumination to make you never wanna leave.....

Shadow the Hedgehog is STUPID, but it becomes fascinating to think about if you over-analyze it into being a story about getting manipulated and imagining all the different "what ifs" and possibilities that could arise from allowing yourself to be changed by others before deciding what it is you really want.

Obviously the major beats and endpoints of all the various narratives PROBABLY DON'T return the love you could end up dumping into this thing in any truly vindicating or resolutely satisfying way, but it's just so damn stupid and ultimately wholesome with the whole edgy cool thing its got going on - on top of all the potential heavy shit you could end up thinking about and projecting from playing anyway that you couldn't possibly stay mad at such a endearing and cheesy creation! You can just kind of end up making your own fun out of the whole thing; the acts of justifying plotholes with headcanon and deriving semblances of meaning through only the most tangential story relations being all a part of the fun! This is my absolute favorite kind of shallow, cartoon fodder to get overly into. Hit me up with those 'find and kill all 35 artificial chaos' mission types, I'll do em. I've lost my mind~ All of this slippery gameplay, probably-not-good bullshit is apparently well enough for me as long as I'm given a fun enough vessel for some melodramatic rumination <3

Can YOU imagine yourself having fun in such a space? do it if you dare...
at the very least, shooting dudes and strafe jumping around in a sonic game actually feels pretty decent...

replayed with the More Reasonable Missions mod as well as Dolphin's Max 99 Lives code, the former barely affected my opinion and like with 06, idrc I used the latter. Also, if you're like me and upscale any game on Dolphin, be forewarned this has some bloom offsets if you're particularly annoyed by that

Like with Forces, I can't make a review of Shadow The Hedgehog due to feeling like I'm unable to add much to it, aside from going "this gets a little too much hate" and "this isn't that far removed from the series considering the buildup from the past few games", so here's three things instead

- As soon as I finished this game, a mod called Shadow The Hedgehog Reloaded released just two hours ago, and from the looks of it, it addresses a good chunk of my issues, albeit I'm rather weary of the "harder difficulty" part. Life just fuckin hates me...

- I still don't think the OST is all that good, far too one-note but I'll admit there's a fair bit more I found to like here than pass by. Cryptic Castle, Death Ruins, and Black Comet are pretty dang good, and GUN Fortress and Lost Impact - which, by the way, isn't THAT bad, The Doom is far worse - are honestly two of my all time favorite tunes in the franchise. Plus, even I can't deny that Never Turn Back is pretty fuckin hype, same with All Hail Shadow.

- I need to like, find a place to hide since I gave this a lower score than Forces. I am well aware this doesn't mean much to most, especially to me since I find both rather mid, but yea.

So……. Shadow The Hedgehog, this is quite the game alright. I feel I must give my thoughts on this game. I’ll try to go into depth as to why I think the way I do about this game, with things I like in this game, and things I….. do not like about this game.

Positives: I think the Soundtrack to this game is really under-looked at, and is one of the best Soundtracks in the series, most of the people who say that Shadow’s Soundtrack sucks, most of their criticisms is that it's really forgettable, which I question, if you’re someone who thinks the Shadow OST is bland, I highly recommend listening to the Soundtrack outside of the game, cause there are a lot of goodies in this game’s OST. Tracks like Digital Circuit, Lethal Highway, Death Ruins, Mad Matrix, Cryptic Castle, Sky Troops, Gun Fortress, The Doom, Air Fleet, Space Gadget, Black Comet, Final Haunt, etc. are really great. Besides that, uh……. the Shadow Rifle is a fun gun to use since it kills most things in one hit, which is really cool, too bad it’s only available until you beat the game.

OHHHHH BOY NEGATIVES

I'm going to have a field day with this..... I'm going to boil my 3 major issues with Shadow into 3 different sections. The Controls, Level Design, and the Padding in this game.

Controls: So, lemme put in this perspective. The Classics generally controlled well with no problems I have whatsoever, then comes the Sonic Adventure Games and these control near perfectly, if not perfectly (btw, if I ever mention SA1/2 it’s mostly gonna be about the Speed Stages, not the other styles), then comes Sonic Heroes, and you may expect me to say that Heroes Controls like crap, but you’d be wrong. I personally think Heroes Controls fine with the Speed Characters, of course it’s not say SA1/2 Good in terms of Controls, but Heroes Controls fine regardless, and even if you don’t like how the Speed Characters Control, you literally have two other options that control better for platforming sake. Now we get to Shadow The Hedgehog, and what the hell happened here. Shadow The Hedgehog controls like a mess, and has some of the worst controls I’ve ever used in a Sonic Game. Shadow controls as if he has Slices of Butter on his Shoes and runs around on Ice barefoot, and it feels awful. Unlike Heroes, you have no better options to do when platforming, and I don’t know what it is, but I swear to god that Shadow controls miles worse than Heroes Speed Characters ever could. Platforming in Shadow, isn’t badly designed, most of the time it's okay, but it feels terrible to do given Shadow’s Controls, and again, unlike Heroes, there’s no Flight or Power Character to fall back on to make platforming go more smoothly, so you’re stuck with these awful controls that make the bare minimum task of platforming a complete and utter chore like no other in the Sonic Series before or even after. The acceleration is beyond screwed and feels really hard to handle sometimes. However, I can get used to controls over time and they can feel fun to use, however even after Collecting all the Keys, Getting all the A Ranks, and especially doing 326 Routes, I still don’t feel like this game controls well at all, I did get used to it, but it never felt “fun” to control and traverse through the levels. Now onto my next issue with the game, the Level Design

Level Design: Level Design in Shadow The Hedgehog ranges from mediocrity at its very best to downright atrocious and shockingly bad at its very worst. The thing is; Shadow’s Level Design isn’t really anything special, and a lot of the Missions feel like scavenger hunt bore-fests that blend together so much, it feels like you’re playing the same damn thing over and over and over again, it’s simply not fun. This wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for how the Level Design was paced. I would've actually liked these missions if it weren't for the pacing, that's what kills Shadow The Hedgehog for me personally. However, I’m gonna go over what I believe are the very worst Missions in Shadow The Hedgehog with those being: Cosmic Fall Hero, The Doom Dark, Lost Impact Hero, and Mad Matrix Dark.
Cosmic Fall Hero: There isn’t anything necessarily wrong with the objective, finding the Computer Room is like getting to the goal, so that’s the least of my concerns, my problem with this Mission mostly lies in how Cosmic Fall is designed, the Level constantly forces you to wait on falling platforms, and you can NOT fuck up even once, if so, you’re dead and have to restart over and over and over again, it’s really frustrating, this is a problem I have with Cosmic Fall as a whole, but the reason I chose the Hero Mission over the Dark Mission is because the Hero Mission is longer and more monotonous. Now, onto The Doom Dark

The Doom Dark: This level’s objective like many in Shadow is a scavenger hunt where you have to either kill a specific number of GUN Soldiers/Aliens or something that requires destroying a specific number of said thing, which like I said earlier, these type of Missions blend in together so easily. The Doom Dark has you killing 60 GUN Soldiers, the number in itself is pretty damn high. The Level Design for The Doom is pretty maze like and annoying, and this Mission is extremely stop and go, you kill a GUN Soldier or Mech, then go, kill a GUN Soldier or Mech, go, stop and go, stop and go, it’s extremely repetitive and insanely inconsistent in the level’s pacing. However, there’s one thing in The Doom’s Dark Mission that boils my anger, this level is flat out glitched, in the Final Room, there’s a GUN Robot who won’t appear unless you either kill yourself or teleport between Checkpoints, which is dumb. I’ve heard this is an NA Exclusive Issue, but, quite frankly, I don’t care if it’s NA Exclusive, it’s an issue in the game no matter what and is plain inexcusable. Also, in The Doom, it’s possible to go really fast to the point you clip through the floor. Good Game. This was something that happened to me a couple times, which was annoying, although, this doesn’t happen to me much anymore. Apparently there does exist a map in this level…. which is useless, this Map is here to help, but it barely can be seen in the first place, so why even bother with it, and it’s something you’ll only notice if you look very carefully, I just find this pointless. Now, onto Lost Impact Hero

Lost Impact Hero: This is probably the most infamous mission in the entire game and for good reason. One of this Mission’s biggest problems is simply how Lost Impact is designed, everything blends together in the aesthetic, where you have to go on a scavenger hunt in a giant and unorganized maze, and also, this Mission is by far the most stop and go Mission in the game, I can describe what this level is like without any exaggeration to it:
Kill some Artificial Chaos, Go on a slow as hell elevator with Artificial Chaos to kill, get on a Turret, get on another Turret, kill Artificial Chaos that are up an elevator, kill an Artificial Chaos on the Right Door, then go onto the Left Door, travel there to kill Artificial Chaos, before going onto another Turret, kill an Artificial Chaos on another Right Door, then go another Turret, etc. Do you realize something? Do you realize just how much this Mission blends in together, and how extremely stop and go it is? At least with something like the Chaotix Mission in Grand Metropolis in Heroes, it was nowhere near as stop and go, and had much better level design than Lost Impact ever could, and had a much better pacing to it. Similar to The Doom, this level has a fucking map to it. Again, like The Doom, it’s one of my lesser complaints, however I feel the need to mention this, what pisses me off about Lost Impact Hero and The Doom Dark is that they have Maps to guide you, but they're pretty small and also useless that there's basically no reason for them to be there in the first place, it's kinda like the map for Hazy Maze Cave in Mario 64, except the fact Hazy Maze Cave wasn't a confusing mess like these 2 dumpster fires. However, these levels PALE in comparison to the ABSOLUTE DUMPSTER FIRE that is Mad Matrix Dark.

Mad Matrix Dark: This Mission is plain and simple one of the worst things I’ve experienced in a Sonic Game, the objective is to destroy 30 Bombs, but you do this task in a giant maze that’s a complete mess. The Draw Distance in this level is a huge problem, considering this Mission has you going around a huge area that requires you to destroy a certain amount of objects, in an extremely wide area. The camera also sometimes has awful angles that give you atrocious views of where to go, and can flat out be the cause of why you go in the wrong direction, which is terrible design full stop. It's like the game is going AGAINST you, instead of FOR YOU, which is like blatant sabotage. Even on repeat playthroughs, this level takes so long to complete, which just makes it a nightmare to replay.

Lastly, the Padding

Another huge problem I have with this game is the amount of padding in it. Mid-Late 2000s Sonic Games are so obsessed with padding the game out. Whether this be; 06, Secret Rings, Unleashed on the Wii/PS2, etc. Shadow The Hedgehog however? Easily takes the cake with the worst padding in the entire series. In order to even finish the goddamn game, you need to do 10 Different Routes of it, which means you have to do 10 Different Playthroughs of the game in order to get to the Last Story, you thought getting to play Sonic Heroes 4 times was bad? HA, this is leagues worse, and unlike Sonic Heroes, which is a fun game, this game is completely void of any fun to be had at all.

Bonus: Extra Things


Here’s some things that really annoyed me in Shadow The Hedgehog, but I didn't really think we’re bad enough to be in My 3 Biggest Issues of the game.

When Rail Grinding, switching Rails in Shadow is fine, and is the least of my concerns, the velocity you get from the Rails is awfully butchered and beyond screwed as you go way too fast sometimes, this is a minor thing, and I swear, I feel like the only person who mentions this, but if I ever go fast in Shadow while interacting with stage geometry I’ll be sent flinging across in a direction, with like no control whatsoever, which basically discourages you from going fast, in a franchise that puts an emphasis on Speed mind you. As if the level design was even designed to go fast in the first place, due to how stop and go it is. This issue also applies with the Light Speed Dash, the velocity is beyond screwed and again, you can be sent flinging across a specific direction with little to no control whatsoever, WHICH IS REALLY ANNOYING BY THE WAY.

Method of Attacking: The method of attacking in this game is so annoying, the Homing Attack in this game is so inconsistent, it’ll either perfectly target on what you want to hit, or it goes in whatever direction it feels like and sometimes I’ll overshoot, which will result in me dying, and again, it’s really annoying. Not to mention its animation is very slow, which causes the attack to be very slow, and it just feels unreliable. Shadow’s Punches and Kicks are completely worthless against enemies as they have awfully small hitboxes that unless you get extremely close to them, which will probably result in you getting hit from them, will not attack, and even then, they do the most minimal amount of damage humanly possible, so you’re better off Homing Attacking or using a weapon to defeat enemies, however, like I said with the Homing Attack, it’s kind of unreliable seeing how it can be sometimes given its inconsistencies, so your bet is to just shoot enemies, which is…… okay I guess, I suppose its this games form of Combat that a lot of 2000s Sonic Games attempted to do such as; SA2 with the Mechs, Heroes, this game, 06, the Werehog in Unleashed, and Black Knight.

Camera: I absolutely hate the Camera in this game, but like the other bonuses, it wasn’t bad enough to put on the list, although it was dangerously close to coming into the Top 3. It’s difficult to describe the Camera, unless you’ve played Shadow. Now this game is actually the first Sonic Game as far as I know to use full Analog Camera Control, which sounds great on paper, but in execution it’s very wanting. The camera can get stuck on everything all the time, which is really frustrating when you’re trying to look around your surroundings in the Missions like killing all the enemies, which need I remind you, REQUIRE TO LOOK AROUND YOUR SURROUNDINGS in Scavenger Hunt esc. Missions, so the Camera basically goes against you.

Not being able to jump after getting hit: Remember in SA1, SA2, and Heroes where you could jump after being hit? Can’t do that in Shadow, and so many of my deaths in this game are due to this, and I can’t stand it.

Final Verdict: I hate this game a lot. There’s so many issues with this game that holds it back from me liking it; from the Awful Controls, The Extremely Stop and Go Level Design, The Absurd Amount of Padding, etc. If you like this game and consider it one of your favorite Sonic Games, that’s fine, but for me personally, it’s very hard for me to enjoy this game in terms of its gameplay, when I find it mediocre at best, or downright awful at worst. I don’t recommend you play this game, if you were to ask me. However, if you were really curious and wanting to try out this game like I was, I guess go ahead.

Thanks for reading this very long review, have a good day.