Shadow Warrior Review (P_R_A_E_T_O_R_I_A_N)
18 H - Game beaten on "Insane" difficulty.
A piece of advice if you're planning to pick up the game:
"When *he* starts to heal, do not stop slashing, you will think you are doing something wrong - You aren't, you just have to keep slashing with your sword until the cutscene starts to play" - Trust me, you'll thank me later.
I gotta say, coming from the SW 2, this obviously does seem like a downgrade. Like, yeah its understandable too - the devs learned from this one. SW is rougher, more experimental, many of the QOL improvements of the sequel are not from here and while SW 2 made my brain go full on "catharsis" mode, the strongest reaction the first SW got out of me is "Yeah I am having fun here."
So, if you are like me and had the second game as your first experience, just be warned, this one is 200% more jank, but the story is good and combat is mostly decent.
My biggest gripes with the game were the weapons:
On insane difficulty, the weapons feel underpowered, even with upgrades. Almost every game that I have played on hard has the "you are a glass cannon now" moment near the half of the game, where the player's knowledge of the systems and the acquired upgrades combine to give you the feel of power, but not without the brittleness of glass. SW 2013 kinda never does that. Almost every weapon feels like a peashooter, especially the starting pistol and the dual MP7s, which when coupled with bullet spongy enemies confounds the problem. Only the crossbow, the shotgun and the Katana feel like truly powerful pieces of the arsenal, with the rest ranging from terrible to somewhat lackluster. And then come the berserkers.... jesus christ, the moment these "you can only shoot their back to damage them" types of enemies appear, all the fun potential of an encounter gets pumelled into the oblivion. The bottom line is - If you pick insane difficulty, be ready for insane difficulty spikes that will make you feel like you are actively being nerfed from the start to the very bloody finish.
Again, the story is mostly alright, has some intrigue, some good revelations - All in all, it is actually quite fun, though I actually prefer the story of SW2 (moreso due to a surprising amount of subtle character foreshadowing that many people do not seem to talk about at all.)
The visuals, for a 2013 game are good, with varied locales, some destructible environments and such. And when the combat clicks (which does happen quite a lot) the entire presentation becomes a recipe for a great deal of fun. Though some assets do seem to be quite copy pasty-though, but again, this is an AA game with approximately 18ish hours worth of content from nearly a decade and a half ago.
All in all, even if you do not choose to ignore the higher difficulty, some bullsh!t moments and questionable boss designs, I would recommend picking this game up on a sale. It will provide you with enough entertainment to justify the price.