Игрок 6269·Рекомендует·3 ч в игре

Shadows: Awakening to solidny izometryczny RPG akcji, który wyróżnia się na tle wielu podobnych produkcji kilkoma naprawdę ciekawymi pomysłami. Najważniejszym z nich jest możliwość przełączania się pomiędzy światem materialnym a Krainą Cieni, co ma znaczenie zarówno podczas walki, eksploracji, jak i rozwiązywania zagadek. Ciekawie wypada również system drużyny. Kierujemy demonem zwanym Devourerem, który pochłania dusze kolejnych bohaterów i może przyjmować ich formę. Każda postać posiada własne umiejętności i styl walki, dzięki czemu można dostosowywać drużynę do konkretnej sytuacji. Na plus wypada mroczny klimat fantasy, sporo wyposażenia, rozwój bohaterów oraz całkiem interesująca historia. Walka nie dorównuje najlepszym przedstawicielom gatunku i momentami pojawia się trochę powtarzalności, ale mechanika dwóch światów skutecznie urozmaica eksplorację. Nie jest to poziom największych klasyków action RPG, ale Shadows: Awakening ma własny charakter i kilka naprawdę dobrze zrealizowanych pomysłów. Solidna, trochę niedoceniana produkcja. Polecam.

Игрок 8862·Рекомендует·31 ч в игре

I find this game somewhat difficult to review, and really wish there was a ‘meh’ thumbs sideways option on Steam. Part of this is caused by my own biases and issues with the genre, and I don’t want to hold that against the game. Since I use these reviews as a diary and to inform my framework for future games, I will go into these issues. I shall therefore break it down into 3 areas: how the game is in isolation, how it functions as a sequel to Kult: Heretic Kingdoms, and my own issues with the genre. I came across Shadows: Awakening via a Click4Gameplay video on obscure and forgotten RPGs, covering Kult and this game, which functions as a remake of Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms and its sequel/second half. I really enjoyed the dark fantasy story of Kult and had been looking forward to the sequel, so grabbed it in the summer sale. In isolation, this is a fine enough game. If you are an isometric action RPG fan who has never played a Heretic Kingdoms game, this is a decent purchase, particularly on sale. You’ve got 30 hours plus of content just on the main story and some side stuff, over 40 hours if you do all the side content, and far more if you use the different puppets/characters. The game seems pretty competent as an action RPG and plays well enough, with an interesting mechanic where you only control one character at a time but can have 4 ‘puppets’, including the demon that is the main character, and seamlessly switch between them. If you switch to the demon you also enter the Shadow Realm, another realm with different enemies, loot and hidden paths. The story is pretty interesting, at least to begin with, with lots of lore. Many characters are decently developed and well voice acted, and the character writing is quite good. Towards the end it goes downhill and turns into generic save-the-world slop, or, if you want the ‘true’ ending, convoluted nonsense that doesn’t really explain certain characters’ motivations, which drove some of the mystery. Graphically it’s pretty nice, with good variety and detail despite being isometric. Quest design is mostly go places and kill things or find something, but the variety keeps it somewhat interesting, and there are plenty of characters to interact with and flesh out the world. The game ran very well for me, unsurprisingly for a 2018 title. Overall, it’s a competent and somewhat obscure action RPG from a small team. Because of this I decided to give it a thumbs up. There are issues, however. These may be things most buyers do not care about, but I do. As a sequel to Kult, it’s rubbish. It seems like they wanted to reboot the universe, but sort of chickened out halfway through. The events and lore from Kult help flesh out the Heretic Kingdoms, with the Godslayer-breaking ending being canon and explaining why more demons have entered the world. It also uses many of the same characters and locations, but barely acknowledges Kult’s main character Alita, changes the art style drastically, and pretty much ignores the themes of Kult. I really enjoyed Kult in no small part due to its dark fantasy art style. The Frank Frazetta-style art drew me in and immersed me in the world, such as the central city of Corwenth, Kyallisar. For some reason, Corwenth and Kyallisar now have an East Asian art style, as do its characters. There’s some lore about the city being sacked and rebuilt, but no real explanation as to why, only 20 years later, there has been a complete cultural change. This isn’t clear initially, as the first half is in locations not in Kult, but becomes very clear in the second half. It spoiled things for me. I loved the atmosphere in the first game and looked forward to seeing places like Kyallisar in better graphics, so it was disappointing to find it had nothing in common beyond ‘city on top of mountain peaks.’ The art style overall is much more stylised and fine in isolation, but doesn’t have the same charm as Kult’s art. More crucially, the game almost goes out of its way to ignore Alita. It is set only 20 years later, and the canon ending of Kult has her becoming High Inquisitor, so you would have thought she would have merited more impact on the world. Games like Dragon Age at least attempted to explain where the Warden had gone in subsequent games. Here there isn’t even a reference to her being killed by the villains, who she surely would have tried to stop, or to her leaving for whatever reason. She just gets a few fairly obscure references in lore books, sometimes not by name. This changes near the end when she gets referenced more, but there’s still nothing definitive. The themes of Kult are also largely gone. The discussion of whether religion has a place, the grim brutality of an Inquisition to stamp it out, and the fact it largely exists as a facade for mages to gain more power are paid only lip service. They aren’t retconned, and there are occasional references, especially towards the end, but this still harms the atmosphere. While technically the world is a grim place full of demons, it lacks the thematic atmosphere that Kult piled on. The Inquisition and the mages behind it, the Penta Nera, are reduced to cartoon baddies who use demons to amass more power, with none of the ideology or deeper meaning of the first game. It’s like the developers wanted to reboot the series but couldn’t commit, leaving the events and themes of Kult occasionally acknowledged but mostly ignored as the game does its own thing. This leads me onto my final area: my own issues with the game, which feed into it being a poor sequel to Kult. Kult was also described as an isometric action RPG, yet in many ways I was able to treat it as a little CRPG, just one where you controlled a single character. Yes, the combat was action RPG style, but much of the focus was on character interaction rather than combat. As noted in my review for Kult, I was able to cheese my way through the combat and focus on the story and lore, which I loved. It’s not really possible in Shadows: Awakening. While it has lots of character interaction, it has a much stronger focus on combat, with long stretches where there is little to no character interaction. This is an issue for me because, on reflection, I’m not really a fan of isometric action RPGs. It just feels like disconnected clicking, lacking the feeling of direct control that a 3rd- or 1st-person game has, or the feeling of tactics that a turn-based, party-based or strategy game has. That’s personal preference, and I know there is more to these games. I was getting bored even at higher difficulties. It wouldn’t be so much of an issue if there was more story meat, but this is a much longer game than Kult with a lot more combat. I don’t think it’s just this game either: I bounced off Grim Dawn after around 18 hours because the combat was repetitive clicking and there was far less story to hold it together. Overall then, this has been a rather disappointing experience for me. I quite enjoyed the first half when the flaws with the story and atmosphere weren’t so apparent and I was getting sucked into the story. As my issues became clear I switched to Easy to cheese through the game, avoided a lot of side dungeons, and stayed intrigued by the story, only to get a fairly dissatisfying ending regardless of choices. I don’t want to thumbs down the game though, because I feel a lot of this is due to my own biases, and as a game made by a small dev team it’s pretty competent and doesn’t deserve tearing down. At least it has been a useful exercise in refining my tastes, and made clear that for isometric action RPGs there needs to be some real story and atmosphere to hook me in, otherwise I’m likely to tolerate the combat at best and bounce off it.

Игрок 1049·Рекомендует·5 ч в игре

Вот это ничего себе! Вот это я понимаю Hack and Slash! Много лет не видел такой игры в жанре, чтобы зацепила прям за первые же пару минут. Сыграл всего полчаса пока, но просто в восторге, потому что уже показали всё: челендж, билды, эксплоринг, секреты, пазлы. Немного непривычное управление, но это дело времени. Тот редчайший случай, когда в игре настолько идеально подобраны углы камеры, что ей не нужен ни зум, ни ротация. Палитра так же идеальна и вообще картина восьмилетней давности выглядит куда приятнее, чётче и лучше, чем современная инди-паpаша в жанре. Чувствую, что придётся сразу и все дополнения купить :) Короче говоря, Shadows: Awakening - внезапное доказательство того, что никакой игровой импотенции не существует даже после 45-ти лет. Существует лишь творческая импотенция недоразработчиков в паре с ИИ.

Игрок 5653·Рекомендует·12 ч в игре

started it and played 6 hours straight - its fun give it a try. especially on sale its a gem to collect!

Игрок 0900·Рекомендует·10 ч в игре

Fun old school playing style. Old RPG meets ARPG. Also a cool instant switching system for playing with essentially 4 characters at once and a mortal and shadow realm transfer system for puzzles and making each zone feel more full. Worth a buy if you like old school RPGs and ARPGs.

Игрок 9973·Не рекомендует·29 ч в игре

纯纯的垃圾骗子游戏，都特么选最简单难度了，还能卡关。前面多试几下还能过，稍后面点就恶心人了，才7级就给我卡那了，刚了半天过不去，策划脑子进水了，简单什么意思不懂？

Игрок 1532·Рекомендует·22 ч в игре

This one should be a mixed. It's not a bad game, bad it doesn't do anything particularly good. The combat is clunky, your character will hit but the enemy is too far, and instead of your character walking, it stops in place and starts to hit. The story is meh, it gets better middle way through, but I was already not interested at that point. There isn't a real sense of progression, you level up, put points on your skills, and the same enemy that in the begging of the game would take 3 hits, continues to take 3 hits. There are some light choice and consequence, but I did no bother to reply. The big difference is that you can play with all classes instead of sticking with only one, but none of them fells any good. The items are weird, the "rarity" is based on essence, that you find through out the game, so every item can be a legendary one, making every item you find kind of whatever. For an ARPG, it lack gameplay. For a CRPG, it lack story. Again, not a bad game, but not a good one either. Probably best if you play something else.

Игрок 4506·Не рекомендует·4 ч в игре

Очень смешанные чувства от игры. Опыт, определенно, уникальный. Приятный? 50/50. Начать стоит с того, о чем вы могли не узнать, если не стали смотреть интервью разработчиков - у нас есть предзаданный персонаж. Это демон, который будет подбирать других персонажей и монстров в качестве своих "марионеток". История строится вокруг этого демона, так что готовьтесь, что это самовлюбленное и туповатое существо будет вашим протагонистом. Далее нам дается на выбор три стартовых персонажа - первых марионеток, вокруг которых во многом будет строиться история. Они возрождаются из мертвых, сохраняют разум и свободу воли. Вообще, на фоне игрового процесса непонятно, в каких отношениях они находятся с демоном. Они сами ходят, разговаривают, хамят, занимаются своими делами, и не выражают дискомфорта по поводу того, что их телом руководит демон. А если не руководит - откуда такая синхронность? В общем, в ролевом отношении игра проседает на этом моменте особенно сильно. Я успел поиграть только за чародейку и посмотреть персонажей первых актов. Ну что сказать... персонажи не карикатурные, но шаржевые точно. Кто-то тупой, кто-то надменный, кто-то самовлюбленный. Если вам нормально с гротеском, это выносимо, в противном случае - подбешивает. Игровой процесс оригинален. Нам предстоит шифтаться между нашими персонажами, чтобы крутить разнообразные комбы. Для любителей бегать по клавишам - наверное, будет интересно. Обратной стороной этого оказалось отсутствие дерева скилов. Просто с уровнями открывается некоторое количество навыков у каждого персонажа, и можно их улучшать. Каждый персонаж тащит на себе три навыка и все. Очень неудобный инвентарь. Также стоит отметить обилие паззлов, многие из которых необходимы при прохождении. Они вполне подъемны, но сбивают темп игры. Если вы хотите слэшер, а не решать головоломки - это не ваша игра. Постоянное заигрывание с переходами между обычным миром и миром теней очень скоро приедается и начинает утомлять.