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.

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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.