Shadow Warrior 3

Listen to this post:

Would you have ever considered that in 2022 you’d be playing the third entry in a reboot of the Shadow Warrior series? Yeah, Shadow Warrior, the Duke Nukem 3D-alike also from 3D Realms released back in 1997, we’re talking about that one. Well, after a highly successful 2013 reboot and a similarly successful 2016 sequel to that reboot, badass ninja assassin Lo Wang is back yet again in Shadow Warrior 3.

via YouTube

Lo Wang’s the kind of guy who’d really like to save the world, but, well…he’s not great at it. He’s great at parts of it. The killing? Yeah, he can do that. Running around collecting magical McGuffins? Sure, he’s got that on lock. When it comes down to the wire, though, Wang’s goofy bravado can get in his way, which is why most of the world has been annihilated by an all-powerful spirit dragon. Everything seems lost, but one other thing about Lo Wang is that you can’t keep him down for long. Wang teams up with his former adversary Orochi Zilla to get rid of that dragon and bring things back to something approaching normal.

Shadow Warrior 3 departs from the looter-shooter aspects of its predecessor and returns to a format that’s got a little more in common with the first Shadow Warrior remake from 2013. Lo Wang’s still got a wide variety of weapons and gear that he’ll use to kick demons to the curb, but they aren’t quite as customizable as they used to be…and that might be for the best. Shadow Warrior 2 was a solid enough game, but futzing about with tiny percentages has never been especially satisfying, particularly when that means sorting through dozens of trinkets that don’t do much else.

Nah, I’ll take 3’s system any day of the week. You’re got some solid weapon options – classics like a pistol, dual SMGs and a rocket launcher, just to name a few – that start strong and just get better as you upgrade them, as well as boosts for Wang himself, weapon combos and so on. It’s a decent system that allows for growth without feeling overwhelming or like you’re making tiny, intangible changes. Upgrade points are readily available and while not every boost is huge (there’s a lot of “hold more of this type of ammo” going on here) it’s a great feeling when you’re able to shoot a guy’s head so hard that it explodes and kills other enemies. That’s the kind of action-movie nonsense we signed up for with Shadow Warrior, not math. Math is hard, let’s go shooting.

You’ve also got more standard level design here compared to the second game, which had this sort of pseudo-open-world thing going on where you’d traverse levels in all sorts of directions based on the mission you were doing, looking for loot and goodies along the way. Here, levels are more straightforward, full of scripted set pieces and combat arenas that better suit the tighter combat mechanics that result from a more selective arsenal. Wang, naturally, has a grappling hook he can use to swing around and do all kinds of wild stuff both in and out of combat. Remember when bows were the big thing in FPS games? Now it’s grappling hooks. Oh, how the times change.

If Shadow Warrior 2 was aping Borderlands, 3 is aping DOOM Eternal, with parkour segments between battles and a big focus on mobility once you’re in the fray. Much like Eternal, choosing the right toy for the right situation is key, and you’ll rapidly learn the right answer when it comes to dealing with the ice guys, the jack-in-the-box guys, the floating guys and more. You can even use enemy body parts as makeshift weapons once you’ve weakened them for a DOOM 2016-style fatality, which is a cute touch that can augment your arsenal a bit.

We’re not throwing together giant open areas anymore, so Shadow Warrior 3’s got a little more space to work on its presentation and by golly it shows. This environment design is top notch, packed with gorgeous vistas all over the place. You might even feel a little bad about covering the combat arenas in gore. Not bad enough that you won’t do it, of course, but a little bad. Further, the sound and voice acting are as great as they’ve ever been, which means Lo Wang dropping one-liners all over the place as he usually does. Feels like he’s a little off his game this time around, but hey, the world-ending because of your mistakes will do that.

Shadow Warrior 3 discards the more experimental trappings of its predecessor and returns to a tighter, more focused take on the modern FPS. Shooter fans are probably going to appreciate the change thanks to the improvements it brings to gameplay and level design. While it feels like a more compact experience on account of not trying to do quite so much, Shadow Warrior 3’s solid fundamentals bode well for a potential Shadow Warrior 4. Let’s hope we see more of Lo Wang in the future.

About the Author: Cory Galliher