Resurrected in 2013 with a nice and rich remake / boot followed, three years later, by a second opus oriented “crazy cooperation”, Shadow Warrior returns with a completely crazy third batch in the hope of making a place for itself among the greats. fast FPS. Except that in the meantime, there have been two episodes of The Slayer. No luck.
Trololol
We saw it throughout the promotional phase of the title, Shadow Warrior 3 bets absolutely everything on excessive gore and degenerate grotesque. And it’s a fact, once the game between the legs we can see that it emancipates itself from anything that could, directly or indirectly, be attached to any coherent dramaturgy. Not here, the script fits on half a postage stamp and is shipped during the 6 to 8 hours it will take you to finish the software at full speed. We find this good old Lo Wang sequestered at the top of a mountain by a titanic dragon. We don’t understand exactly what’s going on, but it’s not a big deal. By blathering nonsense in his underpants and flashbacks, Wang explains to us what brought him so far before finally giving us THE ultimate goal of our quest: to save the world. Obviously.
In truth, the introduction is just a pretext to camouflage a segmented tutorial there and start dropping good fat valves, like a redneck. It’s funny and Lo Wang multiplies pop culture references as quickly as he dissects demons, but we feel from the start that the frame will take us nowhere, which will prove to be the case. Afterwards, we’re not going to lie to each other, we clearly don’t expect deep writing in this type of game, but, at the very least, to feel integrated into it, which isn’t really the case, even for a guy who has bled his previous works.
We will however delight in the ubiquitous humor, and often really funny, during these few hours of intensive shooting as well as a rather well done staging overall, which fits in well with the gunfights without suffering from transitions to the axe. Shadow Warrior 3 is just a bloody train swinging at full speed on the rails of tripaille and schoolboy humor, but from this point of view, it ticks all the boxes of the specifications.
Shadow Warrior 3 is neither good nor bad. It’s an honest game.
Lo Wang vacationed on Mars or is it me?
Si Lo Wang has greatly expanded his humorous horizons when it comes to hitting below the belt, he also tried to spice up his gameplay with “lots of stuff that works elsewhere”, except that there was breakage on the way. The mechanics are largely based on what we already knew: guns, katanas and Ki powers. Basically, it’s the same grub as the previous games. We do dashes in all directions, we spit overloads of Ki on the enemies and we demolish all these beautiful people with grapeshot or we butcher them with katanas, it’s according to everyone’s desires. There will obviously be the possibility of improving our guns and skills (or learning a handful of new ones), but also unlocking improvement points via challenges, or more simply by finding them on our way directly in the game. ‘environment.
Everything is very classic therefore, almost regressive compared to the second opus which offered far more variety of weapons and powers, but however, we will note a real gain in mobility and an accentuated general nervousness which provides a more pleasant feeling than before. We can now hit double jumps, wallrides, leaps of several meters and even use a grappling hook to swing around or interact with the scenery. The thing is that the soft sucks everything that is done elsewhere, like many productions, but does it here without finesse and leaves feathers there. If I talk to you about bloody finishes, arena fights, old school power-ups to pick up everywhere and platform phases, does that remind you of anything? For those who don’t have the riddle ref, I’m talking about DOOM Eternal and if I quote it here without a cover, it’s because Shadow Warrior 3 is greatly inspired by iteven too much, especially since he apes it rather than effectively miming it.
We find a similar structure, platform phases using all our abilities and/or available gadgets, punctuated by intense clashes in arenas from which it is impossible to extricate yourself before having cleared the area of the threat. Very often, these combat squares are lined with power-ups (life points, ammunition, explosive canisters, etc.) and the enemies will also drop some. Like his Martian counterpart, Wang will also be able to destroy demons in melee by executing them. Generally, these finishes are particularly gory, but not always fun to do since they are sorely lacking in potato. Where the Slayer bursts, slices, grinds with almost bestial ferocity, Wang seems to him to be doing the same thing, but in slow motion. It is sorely lacking in impact and punch in addition to slowing down the action. However, these executions are also an opportunity to recover weapons, whether it is a demon’s heart or even his arm for example, and to use it temporarily for cleaning. It’s often very useful, and above all we’re not going to lie to each other, it’s rather funny. Fortunately, moreover, since, apart from that and its caustic humor, Shadow Warrior unfortunately does not have much original to offer.
It’s really funny. Very naughty and very bloody
Neither good nor bad.
Because when you capitalize as much as possible on mechanics that have already proven themselves with the competition, you are supposed to try to do everything else flawlessly to stand out. And this is not the case with Shadow Warrior 3. As we have seen, everything this episode picks up here and there, it applies it in a very/too academic way and it lacks finishing so that we can have an effective rendering. Moreover, where we could have seen him mark the spirits with a foolproof technique, he is finally satisfied with the bare minimum.
Even pushing the graphics settings to their limits on PC (4K and all that stuff), it doesn’t break three legs to a duck. It’s not ugly, but it’s not beautiful either.
Fortunately, it is partly caught up by the artistic direction which is able to send artistically successful panoramas composed of a mixture of Japanese culture and shimmering colors. However, there too it lacks scope and risk-taking while the whole first part sends dreams. Nevertheless, it’s still very pleasant to slash demons in the depths of Japanese mythology, especially since the bestiary is relatively extensive and offers an armada of colorful and sometimes wacky monstrosities. Well, to be completely transparent, we won’t really have time to stop to look at them since in general, we dismember them quite quickly. Finally, we can note an OST that sounds right and does the job perfectly as well as a more than honest dubbing with actors who really seem to be having fun and convey it to us well. It’s a pleasure that way.
