My Month In Games: August 2011

This game pretty much sucks. I know that as a reviewer I'm supposed to do a better job of drawing my readers in before I render my judgment, but yeah, this game is pretty stupid. Lured to play it by above average reviews, the pedigree of its designers, and the promise of a game that was 'like Resident Evil 5 in Hell', Shadows simply fails to deliver on any of these fronts. Alright, so maybe it looks and plays a lot like an RE title (usually a good thing for me), but there's really nothing that this game does that RE doesn't do better.

See? Looks like Resident Evil.

So let's break it down a bit, shall we? First, the story is garbage. It's meant to come off like a Rodriguez/Trarantino-esque expliotation/road movie, but it ends up being a mish-mash of gaming and film cliches weighed down by WAY too many dick jokes. Seriously, if you're over 15 years old you're gonna get real tired of this game's lame attempts at humor and copious amounts of foul language.

Anti-hero Garcia Hotspur and his flaming-skull-pal Johnson. Johnson turns into a gun called the Boner. Get it?

Second, the game really isn't all that fun to play. I mean, it's not BROKEN, but it doesn't really innovate or take the survival horror genre to any new or interesting places. Games don't always have to innovate in order to be fun, but if you're gonna use an existing game (Resident Evil) as a template, you should at least try to maintain the status quo. With shallow combat mechanics and no new game+ or other bonus modes, Shadows just falls short.

The third-person action is broken up by a few of these side scrolling shooter sequences. They're kinda silly.

Finally, I expected more from a game designed by Shinji Mikami (creator of the Resident Evil series) and Goichi Suda (aka Suda 51). Actually, I should say that I expected more from Shinji Mikami; Suda 51 is...how can I put this delicately....kind of a hack.

So screw this game. Get yourself a 'greatest hits' copy of Resident Evil 5 if you don't already have one, and be wary of games designed by Suda 51 and his company Grasshopper Manufacture. Style over substance...kinda weak.

A joke about head.