Lo Wang... shantay, you stay.
Duke Nukem has sashayed away.

Honestly, if you asked me back in the day which one of the three BIG build engine FPS (Duke Nukem 3D, Blood and Shadow Warrior) would still have staying power 20 years later, I would have never guessed it would be Shadow Warrior. An absolute product of it's time, the original one was definetely the weaker of the build trifecta, noticeably more clunky than the other two, those weapons are barely balanced and for some god forsaken reason it has platforming, and with a less direct aesthetic that barely pays attention to if we are honest (it's supposed to be martial arts/asian action movie themed).

15 years later, Blood has been fucking dead for 13 years, Duke Nukem has finally commited ritualistic suicide via Forever, and somehow Shadow Warrior managed to get...a pretty good comeback. Released during The Great FPS Drought of the early 10's, it stood out pretty well against the likes of Called Duties, BeetleFields, and Hey Lous with a more arcade approach to the formula and a more prominent focus on melee (the sword in one is really good, really wish I could play the game melee only) with a story that didn't take itself seriously, racistly at all. Afterwards came 2 which is a looter shooter and focuses more on the ure7i9mvwhpoi07shnm< ´w`ztndt7uff€fsnevbrnchuyrchinvestigatethemoonlandinguunuuuuszjuikn fgkujsijbn fsjk<iñuszybghcsurfip´ñcws8y.

And then there was 3, a honest surprise for me considering how utterly no bueno 2 was compared to the first release. Gone is the soulless attempt at being a Borderlandslike (El Diablo en el Juego), leaving us with a pretty good FPS with quite a bit of platforming. You can say that part is kinda mediocre tho, but considering it's 5 hours long I'd say it thankfully doesn't overstay it's welcome, being a good palette cleanser in between arena fights with pretty colorful enemies and a combat system sweating profusely hoping you don't notice it's Doom Eternal but clunkier. What that entrails is basically: You run around an arena on an open field, managing your resources (lead and health) while you stunt on them hoes, which in turn gives you rewards. Its addition to the formula comes in the form of chaning the gore kills to instead of refreshing your pool of resources giving you a temporary power up in the form of a weapon or an AoE tool, to which it adds up more components as the game progress up to nearly the end. Your own tools, that is to say the weapons, or the rooty tooty point and shooties, are the standard FPS package, with the caveat that the shotgun is replaced by dual SMGs as the work horse. They can also be customized to add some pretty neat effects and customize your flow in the arenas. Pretty sax IT fart Toriel, if you ask me.

My one main gripe with the game is how utterly (excuse my french) cringe the whole ordeal is. Lo Wang never, ever shuts the fuck up about every fucking thought he has about the current affairs, sounding like what I imagine Deadpool talks like in the MCU movies. Be it references, jokes about how the thing that he killed is dead or just thought farts, you will be sure to wish the sweet release of death got you. And don't get me started on the cutscenes, with the vomit inducing camera work they have, moving constantly even when the most inane shit is happening on screen. Hoji and Lo Wang are totally lovers, I don't need to get the sexual tension they both display onscreen shattered by the breakneck speed of the cinematics.

All in all, a pretty good experience if you like FPS that rely heavily on movement or can name 10 MCU movies, although if you don't like spending I'd suggest waiting for a sale, since it's on the short site. Or get it by totally legal methods. But I can't do that with FPS, since my brain has been hardwired to want to have them all. If anyone from Frlying Wild Hog is reading this, I'll gladly accept a key for Evil West, which considering the following I have here will result in a decrease on sales. That I assure you.

Reviewed on May 22, 2023


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