Developer: Flying Wild Hog
Publisher: Devolver Digital
Steam Deck Compatibility?: Verified
Rrp: £34.99 (Gog.com, Humblebundle and Steam)
Released: 13th October 2016
Available on: Gog.com, Humblebundle and Steam
Played Using: Mouse and keyboard
Approximate game length: 10 Hours
“Who wants some Wang!”
May as well start with that, if you can’t handle a dick joke or twenty you may not get on with this game, of course there are other reasons too but I’ll get into those in due course.
Despite how that opening paragraph might sound I actually don’t dislike this game. It’s immature and stupid and… it was exactly what I wanted, or rather in part it was. There are aspects of this game where I feel the developers tried to expand on some features that appeared in the last game and then WAY over shot the mark. You play as Lo Wang (I told you there are a lot of dick jokes) a mercenary for hire who also is a master martial artist and apparently chi user who has had things go horribly wrong while on a job.
When you go to start the game you are given the choice of four difficulty levels, though that’s not actually true. The ‘Insane’ difficulty starts at one and goes up to seven. I played the game on the normal difficulty setting since I tend to think of that as the default, though on further playthroughs I did go for harder difficulties. The difference between these difficulties isn’t merely that your enemies have more health but they also hit harder and that more enemies have elemental resistances. On top of that the higher the difficulty is the harsher the penalty for dying gets.
When you die you get instantly respawned back the last checkpoint you passed but as I just mentioned there is penalty that is incurred. Part of this penalty (regardless of difficulty) is that all your enemies are restored to full health but you also lose some money and all the karma you had gained since your last level up.
“What is karma?” You may be asking, karma is what you gain when you kill enemies and complete missions, after a while this karma will cause you to increase in level and grant you a skill point to spend in the skills window.
Along with providing karma enemies you kill will sometimes drop gems that can be used to improve your weapons or in some cases equipped by Lo Wang himself on the upgrade screen.
Now, this is where I hit upon my major criticism for the game, as much as I love being able to customise my playstyle I think this game takes it too far. The sheer amount of stats and upgrades available really slows this game down, the Shadow Warrior games have always been about running and gunning and having to dive into menus and spend a lot of time comparing upgrade stats is kind of the opposite of that. Sure, in the last game you also could upgrade your weapons but that was a linear progression, you didn’t have to consider the DPS and damage vulnerability etc etc etc. Here’s the thing, I know it sounds like I hate that kind of system but I really don’t, I just don’t feel it works in this game.
Between missions you will return to Dragon Mountain which is a central hub where you can pick up other missions (such as side missions and bounties), improve your weapons, buy ammo and sell unused gems. Later in the game a set of trails will become available in Dragon Mountain that will allow you to infuse a weapon, this means to improve it by increasing certain stats. You can also embed another gem slot or improve a gem. Doing all of these costs orbs of masmune which are gained by defeating bosses or can be attained in new game plus where you would be awarded a power or new weapon.
Due to some free content updates there’s a bevvy of additional missions to play. However, what I found was that these additions caused the game to feel like it over stayed its welcome somewhat.
Levels randomly generated, using pre-created sections of map, this allows each playthrough to have a unique map while keeping the theming consistent and allows the maps to make sense.
Exploration of these maps is often rewarded with more ammo, an upgrade, lore or in some cases a hidden boss enemy that will net you an achievement if you kill it.
Throughout each of the maps there are various shrines that you will find each of which serve one of three functions dependant on the colour. Blue refills your chi, green regenerates health and purple refills ammunition. Simply walking close to a shrine will activate it and once used it becomes drained for the rest of the mission.
I’ve mentioned chi a few times now so I really should explain what it is and does. Chi is a resource that you can use to regenerate your health or perform special attacks. Certain skills will cause your chi to slowly regenerate but sometimes enemies will drop chi in a crystalised form, and of course you could always try and find an appropriate shrine to replenish it.
Combat in this game is hectic, fast paced and now with the addition of elemental strengths and weakness, somewhat tactical. Some creatures are even just immune to a specific type of damage, forcing you to change weapons and tactics. To me this was when the game really shone, there are few things more satisfying than bisecting a demon that is several times larger than you.
All in all, this game is pretty good but is bogged down by the sheer amount of upgrades and weapons available to you. Personally I tended to do all my gem swapping and weapon comparisons between missions at Dragon Mountain. But if your up for some fun ultra violence you really can’t go wrong with this game.
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