Game sequels
generally are produced just as frequently or even more
than particular movies. Unlike movie sequels, game
sequels usually have more of a success rate at times and
improve the state of the previous installments. Third
person action games have a solid success with the likes
of Tomb raider, Soul Reaver established qualities
titles of this particular genre.
The PS2, known for more adult themed games have
several titles that are stamped with the M rating that
are quality games and recent entry is the virtual
overlooked sequel to Shadowman. Despite the interesting
Voodoo end of the world theme, Shadowman 2: The
second coming looks and feels exactly like a first
generation PS2 game that contains dull gameplay, sub par
visual appeal and awkward controls that keep everything
at a constant undead tone.
-STORY-
------------------------------
The game centers around Mike LeRoi, the man who
lives the tortured existence in two distinct separate
lives: Mike is a regular human by the light hours among
the living and by night is cursed to become an undead
being who possesses strong voodoo powers that he
received from a spell cast by a rather old priestess. Shadowman’s
purpose is to use his powerful skills to protect the
living world against any evil threat that crosses over
from the realm of soulless creatures called the Deadside.
The time has come when Shadowman must stop and
evil demon race known as the Grigori who plan to
unleash their master Asmodeus upon the living that would
eventually trigger a fire apocalypse on earth that would
end everything. The book of the codex is the only thing
that can destroy the demons and prevent the destruction.
Shadowman 2 is essentially a mixture of Soul
Reaver, Tomb Raider with a touch of Blade
that all rolled into one game. What we have here is
basically a straight up action game with survival horror
like settings that lightly brushes in puzzle situations
but in reality is nothing more than your find the garden
variety switch. Shadowman 2 starts off with narrated
story in a low quality FMV as Mike/Shadowman begins his
journey in on the Deadside. To aid Mike in his quest to
save the world, he is given the ability to automatically
change into Shadowman when the light of the day turns
into night.
The game constantly shifts from day, dusk and eventually
into darkness itself and when that happens the human
form of Mike gives way into the skeletal glowing decay
form of Shadowman with all of his Voodoo powers along
with it along with some weaknesses. Despite having
strong unnatural powers, Shadowman lacks the physical
strength of Mike to move large objects out of the way
thus having to wait until the sun rises to progress pass
this point.
The first part of Shadowman feels like you keep
running into a brick wall since it takes some time for
things to go into motion and investigate each area. Once
the story was established the game just strictly becomes
the straight up action destroy anything in your way that
moves. To fight all the creatures Shadowman is given a
wide array of weapons from the most basic and primitive
such as the crowbar, axe and machete to the more gun power
based sub machine gun and rocket launcher.
During the being of the game Mike/Shadowman will
have to use his bare hands to fight off enemies which
slows your progress in the beginning but seem effective
enough since for some reason after you beat down the
enemy they blow up in several pieces of blood and skull.
You are able to equip one weapon in each hand with the
ability to load two more without having to access the
painfully cumbersome menu system. Certain weapon also
act as tools to break down wooden planks on door to
access rooms and break wooden boxes that contain health,
ammo items as well as better weapons.
There are also a few voodoo weapons that are enhanced
with the special that can only be used with Shadowman.
Most of these weapons are cursed with Voodoo magic that
use the element of fire to infect damage at your enemy
that literary turns them into a crispy critter.
The rather common aspect that is unfortunately shared in
third person action games is the cumbersome control
scheme used and Shadowman 2 is no different. The
configuration is setup in the typical FPS shooter
setup that literary used every surface on the PS2
controller. The left analog stick moves you forward,
right is used rotate around and look up and down with.
The first left and right trigger buttons are used to
control both arms separately, attacking with any one you
prefer and the second trigger button are reserved to
switch out and load the other two weapons that are
stored on the main screen. Shadowman has the ability
along with his basic moves to duck and crawl around
areas as well as climbing up ropes and ladders.
Shadowman 2 uses a rather complex 3D interface menu
system to adjust everything that contained in the game.
When selected the circular menu rotates around
highlights each category in the inventory and zooms in
to each endless submenu that corresponds to the area
chosen. Everything appears organized in a way but the
problem is that everything is so buried with multiple
submenus, finding a particular item is easier said then
done.
Half of the time is spend navigating back and forth
trying to find the particular item that your looking
for, memorization is really the only alternative in
trying to find anything in the menu. Usually any game
that possesses any large world to explore has some sort
of map that can be quickly accessed via one button press
but common sense in throw out the window with Shadowman,
it requires about a five step process
The visual aspect of Shadowman includes a variety of
different features, some areas with good detail and
other that are just rather neglected and downright
horrible at times. The environmental effects are
definitely best quality that Shadowman 2 that
really intensifies the dark and ominous tone needed for
the game. Environmental fog and mist rolls in during the
early hours around the ground level that takes on a life
of it’s own. There was an decent amount of effort
applied to the lighting effects that shows the gradual
changes in the atmosphere from early morning to the
darkness of night.
Problem is that the games lack of lighting makes
everything hard to see in places and would be downright
impossible to make anything out at night if it wasn’t
for Shadowman’s natural glowing orb growing from his
insides to light the path. The textures applied to the
actual structures and objects reflect a detailed gritty
state the parallels the story mood but it’s safe to
say that the natural environment lacks a considerable
amount of attention especially when you look on how dull
and bland Deadside appears.
-SOUND: 7/10-
----------------------------
The audio elements present here are rather less than
desired but the background orchestral type score puts in
an above average grade in setting the constant creep
dark tone to match the story. The audible effects on the
other hand portray a rather entry-level stale quality
that seems excessive at times.
Your constantly hearing bells ringing in the background
with the occasional creepy thumps and splashes that
never seem to end and some that don’t even match up
with the action at hand, whenever Shadowman travels
through water and stops, the water sound effect keeps
going even though nothing is moving.
-PROBLEMS-
---------------------------------
-Load Times-- Enough time to wash the car
====================
This is probably the longest wait your ever going to
have to experience to simply load any game. The problem
is that this is rather shocking since the much of the
graphics are particularly that impressive but just plain
dull. Shadowman clocks in at about just under one min
just to start the game and everything else that loads
takes about half as long.
-Visual limitations-putting the best graphic
card in an Emachine
====================
The animation qualities are definitely below average at
best as the framerate seems to travel the lower end of
the spectrum quite erratically and collision problems
plague much of the gameplay. Shadowman’s actions seem
slow to respond at times and there is a particular point
in the game when you have to dispatch a pack of demon
dogs, when two actually ran into each other and stayed
that way despite attempts to attack them but only
hitting empty air. The FMV quality is around the level
contain in the on PSone, try not to stare too hard
-Movement procedureseasy as watching Cspan2
=========================
Shadowman just makes everything more complicated that it
every should be but I guess simple isn’t in
Acclaim’s vocabulary. The controls are stiff and
unresponsive as a rock and are unnecessary complex that
you always seem to hit the wrong button constantly,
everything is a ten step procedure
-Replay value/difficulty-killing with both
hand tied behind you
===========================
Shadowman in the short run is about as pointless and
challenging as Spyro on crack and it just painfully
obvious in the first 5 min. Dispatching any enemy takes
only a couple of fist throws or some simple gunfire due
to the lack of intelligence of the AI and if you happen
to die everything comes back that same way it was
without losing any items or weapons- please someone
detach my sweat induced palms from the control pad,
it’s too intense. Much of the game suffers from such a
lack of direction that you begin to wonder what exactly
your suppose to be doing.
While Shadowman 2 has an interesting theme and
story but much of the visual and gameplay aspects are
really nothing that we haven’t seen before. Supposing
you can get passed the dull visuals, your guaranteed to
run into boredom and confusion once everything is
explored which is a hard pill to swallow trying to find
what to do next.
Shadowman provides solid hours of gameplay but
getting there seems like more effort than it’s worth
that fun factor seem rather non existent. To consider
this even a rental is a stretch even if the dark theme
interests anyone. Shadowman is nothing more than a
computer with all the hardware removed and like it’s
theme will just sit in the dark collecting dust
4.8
