Hello Ladies and Gentlemen of the internet. Welcome to Re:View. Today we shall be looking at 'Shadows of the Damned' 'A Suda 51 Trip!'
If you are looking for an in-depth story, following a character's development, as they face challenges of both the body and mind, culminating in a crescendo of self-realization which would have developers around the world hailing it as the greatest thing since disposable hand grenades then you might need to keep on searching.
Shadows of the Damned is a third person shooter, with horror and comedy elements, brought to us by a powerhouse of developers. Goichi 'Suda 51', the Director of 'No More Heroes' and 'killer7' takes the lead vocalist role of this raucous performance. Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami gently thumbs out a gracious pattern on the rhythm section, occasionally jumping in front of Suda for a solo, with Akira Yamaoka (Sound Director for Silent Hill) plucking along on his banjo, briefly looking up at the other two, as Suda slowly ambles offstage.
As this poorly worded metaphor suggests, I found the influences of both directors complimented each other, but with Shinji Mikami holding most of the focus. Suda's influence seems gimmicky, as if he was only put in there to stop Mikami from making another Resident Evil. By adding a 'punk rock' air to the game, the 'comedy' aspect of Shadows of the Damned should have been realised. Unfortunately, it seemed more of hollow laugh than a standing ovation.
So from the offset, I was sceptical. Though I do admit that most of the third person shooters I've experienced make for more hospitable bedfellows than a fat man spooning a pastry, this experience didn't feel like it was worth the twenty-five pound price tag. Described as a 'Psychological Horror-Comedy', the horror was akin to that of someone jumping out of a cupboard and yelling boo...about 5 minutes after you've left the room. The game itself never scared me. It felt as if it was going for more of a 'slasher effect', grossing out the viewer, rather than scaring them. The comedy was akin to that of toilet humour. Fun for the first few one liners, but it began to grate after Garcia made the 45th dick joke.
Speaking of which, what about the characters?
Introducing Garcia F. Hotspur, Mexican Demon Hunter. A debonair badass, Hotspur loves nothing more than killing demons, having sex with beautiful women and cracking wise whenever the wind changes direction. His sidekick is the aptly named Johnson, a demon skull, who can transform into a myriad of items to help Garcia, such as a fire stick (which acts as your melee weapon) your regular weapons (of which there are only three) and a bike (Only used once)
He's as witty as Garcia, just lacking in the husky accent department, opting for a classic, no nonsense British accent. Still, he's always game for knob jokes,demonstrated by the fact your starting pistol is delightfully called 'The Boner'. Lastly, there is the classic damsel figure, Paula, Garcia's lingerie-clad girlfriend and Fleming, the Lord of the Damned, acting as the token villain. Nothing new to report here.
Throughout the game, you level up your weapons and find new ones. A pistol, a machine gun and a shotgun. These are the only three weapons you will get, with many of the gun upgrades turning them into variants of classic weapons, such as the shotgun being able to lob grenades or the pistol firing sticky mines. All the weapons can, and will be upgraded to be more effective. The game literally makes it so you have to get the Blue Gems needed in order to upgrade the weapons.
Linearity: The only way is up...then to the right a bit and down...follow the big glowing arrow...No, the other one...Oh, just let me do it...
Tweaking, however, will need a lot more effort on your part, requiring you to search high and low for Red Gems. These elusive gems are needed to upgrade each weapon's damage, firing speed, ammo and reloading time. They can also be used to increase your maximum health, melee bash time reduction and 'Light Shot' cool-down/effectiveness. Though it can be tedious at times, it does bring in a sense of challenge to the game which the easy and normal difficulty settings do not. My advice: play this one of hard from the start. You'll not regret it. This brings us to something I quite like about the game: The Light Shot.
In Hell, there's a lot of darkness. It's the fuel of all evil. And sometimes, you have to journey inside it. Most of the time, you'll be moving fast, collecting hearts, so you don't get consumed by the darkness. However, sometimes, darkness is needed to solve puzzles, which are simple enough, but the added pressure of the time limit causes some mad dashes to any patches of light, just so you don't meet a premature death. In darkness, the levels change, allowing you to use your light shot, a non-damaging blast that stuns enemies, to activate certain switches.
The light shot also helps to kill certain enemies, who have taken a dip in the darkness, rendering them immune from normal attacks.By shooting the darkness covered enemies with the light shot, you render them 'mortal' once more. This turns combat into a pseudo- tower defense game, making you target the darkness infested creatures first, before worrying about their 'mortal' counterparts.
Now that the mechanics have been explained, its time to move onto the one thing that I personally think separates the wheat from the chaff in gaming: Story. And what's there to say? It's your typical hero sequence, with Garcia rescuing his girlfriend from the bowels of Hell, taken by the Lord of the Damned.
You know, the classic 'insert red plumber here, scaly, green dinosaur thingy here'
Though it does have a twist at the ending, I'd already grown tired of the escapades of Señor Hotspur to care. As a character, he was bland, one dimensional and, at times cringe-worthy. Johnson gave the adventure a little injection of spirit and Paula was pretty much just sex appeal taken to a gory extreme, like someone had a fetish for lingerie and offal. Fleming was your average villain build, strong, but cocky. Evil, but not in that good way that makes you love to hate him, like Joffrey from Game of Thrones.
To be honest, the time I was engaged with the story the most was when they introduced meta-stories within the story. Normally before a boss battle, these stories detailed how they came to rest in hell, normally with a very Grimm's Fairy Tale-esque charm, with books and everything! Hell, even three of the bosses are called 'The Sisters Grim'. Coincidence? I think not.
All in all, the highlight of the game was the boss battles. It felt like everything in between was just a segway to these interesting and awesome battles. One is even fought in a side-scroller level, with a drastically changed art style, much like the side-scroller level in 'No More Heroes'
In conclusion, Shadows of the Damned isn't a bad game. But it's not an excellent game either. It was an okay game. An average game. The characters, general plot and gameplay were lacking any punch to really set them apart from any other third-person shooter, or any generic shooter, for that matter. The bosses were excellent and the settings and backdrops were quite breathtaking, resembling a sort of gothic town under a red night sky. So, all in all, it wasn't really a trip, but more of a stumble.
Though, mind you, 'A Suda 51 Stumble' doesn't sound as good on paper
This is HoboToben. Stay Frosty!