Shadow of the Beast does nothing but fascinate me in pretty much every way.
The cover art is incredible and makes it stand out from so many other games it had to share a rack with back in the early 90s, and the art design in general is simply outstanding. There are so many different enemies in this game it'll blow your mind, many of them only show up once in the entire playthrough! My favorite is the dude that just hangs out in a statue of himself who comes out and ambushes you after you destroy it. Who the fuck would do that? It's the most insane tactic I've ever heard of.
The gigantic bosses are absolutely insane, everything here is just "wow, holy fuck this is goddamn cool".
Then you get killed in one hit from the colossal demon sled in the tree level.
That's another thing that baffles me about this, the fact that it's so impenetrable that many Famicom games would be shocked into cardiac arrest at the sheer sadistic cruelty this game will force upon the player. One false step and it's a free one-way trip to the title screen. No lives, no continues, no diddly dick, you know the drill. Fail to grab a key in the tree level at the beginning? Guess you can't complete a stage later in the game! Sucks to be you!
I love this game, but Jesus Mary and fuckin' Joseph is it badly designed. There are many times where you'll be instantly attacked from all angles, you can accidentally softlock if you fail to pick up a wrench earlier in the castle stage, it also later temporarily turns into a shmup with your hitbox being so big that it makes Silver Surfer jealous. The castle stage dims when you first enter it, and you need a torch, but the torch is right next to the door! What was the point?! Why do you need the luck and timing of Buddha to hit things with your punch without taking a hit?! Why is the Psygnosis logo an enemy?! Why did they accidentally make the game faster when putting this on North American hardware?! Why?!
TELL ME THE ANSWER TO THIS RIDDLE GOD DAMMIT.
The cover art is incredible and makes it stand out from so many other games it had to share a rack with back in the early 90s, and the art design in general is simply outstanding. There are so many different enemies in this game it'll blow your mind, many of them only show up once in the entire playthrough! My favorite is the dude that just hangs out in a statue of himself who comes out and ambushes you after you destroy it. Who the fuck would do that? It's the most insane tactic I've ever heard of.
The gigantic bosses are absolutely insane, everything here is just "wow, holy fuck this is goddamn cool".
Then you get killed in one hit from the colossal demon sled in the tree level.
That's another thing that baffles me about this, the fact that it's so impenetrable that many Famicom games would be shocked into cardiac arrest at the sheer sadistic cruelty this game will force upon the player. One false step and it's a free one-way trip to the title screen. No lives, no continues, no diddly dick, you know the drill. Fail to grab a key in the tree level at the beginning? Guess you can't complete a stage later in the game! Sucks to be you!
I love this game, but Jesus Mary and fuckin' Joseph is it badly designed. There are many times where you'll be instantly attacked from all angles, you can accidentally softlock if you fail to pick up a wrench earlier in the castle stage, it also later temporarily turns into a shmup with your hitbox being so big that it makes Silver Surfer jealous. The castle stage dims when you first enter it, and you need a torch, but the torch is right next to the door! What was the point?! Why do you need the luck and timing of Buddha to hit things with your punch without taking a hit?! Why is the Psygnosis logo an enemy?! Why did they accidentally make the game faster when putting this on North American hardware?! Why?!
TELL ME THE ANSWER TO THIS RIDDLE GOD DAMMIT.
2 Comments
The logos of dead UK publishers, the ultimate signal of one's own demise.
MagneticBurn
1 year ago