Shadow Warrior 2013 FREE for a day (Humble store, steam key)

[Dancso]

Tell a friend!
https://www.humblebundle.com/store/shad ... al-edition

[Viscra Maelstrom]

for the record, this isn't the original 3D Realms Shadow Warrior that's free, but the reboot from 2013. in any case, it's free, so there's no excuse not to get it, and it's actually a pretty good reboot of a game that had been left dead in the water previously.

[LkMax]

in any case, it's free, so there's no excuse not to get it, and it's actually a pretty good reboot of a game that had been left dead in the water previously.

Umm... that's debatable, it has much more linear level design and enemies are too bullet sponge-y. It's much closer to Hard Reset than Shadow Warrior itself, not surprising since it was made by the same devs.

[Kinsie]

for the record, this isn't the original 3D Realms Shadow Warrior that's free, but the reboot from 2013.

The 1997 game has been free on Steam ever since shortly before the 2013 game came out, if that's what you were hoping for.

It also has a bunch of prototypes packed in, for funsies, with a couple more coming in a week or two...

[Viscra Maelstrom]

in any case, it's free, so there's no excuse not to get it, and it's actually a pretty good reboot of a game that had been left dead in the water previously.

Umm... that's debatable, it has much more linear level design and enemies are too bullet sponge-y. It's much closer to Hard Reset than Shadow Warrior itself, not surprising since it was made by the same devs.

it's much better than Hard Reset was. Hard Reset was, quite frankly, terrible. none of the design-choices in that game clicked, it was way too easy to die because of how slow you were, the guns weren't very fun to use because they were just the same two guns retrofitted for different purposes, some of the enemies were really annoying to deal with, the story didn't really invest me, and it's only a 6 hour game. WITH the DLC.

i dunno if Hard Reset Redux makes the game anymore tolerable, but the original game is terrible, and i am glad that Flying Wild Hog completely redeemed themselves with the Shadow Warrior reboot.

i will admit that i didn't care much for the first Shadow Warrior reboot when i first played it back then, but after playing the sequel, i've started to appreciate it more. if not for the gameplay, then because it lead into the rather fantastic Shadow Warrior 2, and showed that the IP was far from dead and buried. contrast to Duke Nukem, whose legacy has been tarnished by Gearbox in recent years.

it's not the same game as the original, admittedly... but the original Shadow Warrior had its own share of design issues, and to me, i thought it played and controlled pretty horribly, so i more than welcome the reboot.

[LkMax]

Shadow Warrior 2 at least seems to be less linear and allows for more 'maneuverability' in battle, but I'm not sure how I will feel about the borderland-esque number of randomness of stats and guns when (and if) I play it, and it seems to have kept the bullet sponge enemies from the reboot, I'm not a big fan on bullet sponges when in big numbers (doom did it more moderately).

but the original Shadow Warrior had its own share of design issues, and to me, i thought it played and controlled pretty horribly

Them are fightin' words, matey! 1v1 me on deathmatch.

[Rachael]

I mainly wish that the Build games had better source ports.

I really would not mind a ZDuke.

[NeuralStunner]

Unfortunately, I can't use the key to upgrade from standard to special edition. I'm not sure if this key would still work for anyone else, if it did I could work out an exchange later.

(I just like having access to lossless OSTs, that's all. )

but the original Shadow Warrior had its own share of design issues, and to me, i thought it played and controlled pretty horribly

DOS Build had some odd handling, to be sure. As for SW's gameplay... The first level of the game features an invisible enemy that will wreck you on sight with rockets. Not insurmountable, but it's definitely a high-damage design.

I have to appreciate the scale and detail of the maps, though. They really explored every feature of the engine and the results are interesting, rather than a mess.

I mainly wish that the Build games had better source ports.

I really would not mind a ZDuke.

Especially if such a project were able to abandon CON. (Bleh! Gag! Hack!)

... As long as it doesn't get swapped for lua. Even Garry Newman fell out of love with that after building an entire game on it. JavaScript seems to be gaining traction these days...

[LkMax]

I mainly wish that the Build games had better source ports.
I really would not mind a ZDuke.

I'm grateful for EDuke32 existing since it's the best option we have for Build, but I have to agree about that.
I feel like zdoom and derivatives (like gzdoom) are better structured and organized than EDuke, and it's easier to combine mods without breaking something.

[Viscra Maelstrom]

Shadow Warrior 2 at least seems to be less linear and allows for more 'maneuverability' in battle, but I'm not sure how I will feel about the borderland-esque number of randomness of stats and guns when (and if) I play it, and it seems to have kept the bullet sponge enemies from the reboot, I'm not a big fan on bullet sponges when in big numbers (doom did it more moderately).

but the original Shadow Warrior had its own share of design issues, and to me, i thought it played and controlled pretty horribly

Them are fightin' words, matey! 1v1 me on deathmatch.

Shadow Warrior 2 doesn't really have that many bullet-sponge enemies, i felt. it's only when you start meeting Superior and Elite versions of enemies, which, on the lower difficulty levels, doesn't appear all too often, and die pretty easily anyway (immunities doesn't appear until you play something really high. and since you have a MUCH higher range of movement (infinite dashing, infinite spring, double jumping, no stamina bar...), it's suddenly a lot easier dodging their attacks and strike in at the right time. it does get very bullet spongey on the extreme end of the difficulty level, but that's only if you REALLY want to extend your playtime on the game (i've played 173 hours of the game. it's not worth it, trust me.)

NS pretty much put on-point why i don't like how the original SW played. the enemies are much more dangerous to encounter, which makes the game all the more annoying to play. there's a reason that Doom restricts these powerful attacks to high-tier monsters, and doesn't put them everywhere (Cyberdemons, Arch-Viles, Spider Masterminds). because it would've made the game more frustrating, and less fun, to play.

and furthermore, i just didn't find the guns all that interesting to use, and the feedback of killing enemies wasn't that satisfying. doesn't help that the Riot Gun, Uzis etc. have been used in so many Doom mods at this point, it's tiresome to see them in the original game from which it came from. Doom's guns just sounded and felt better to use, compare the shotgun to the riot gun really.

the music and level-design is excellent, though. Build engine games always excelled in those parts.

[Dancso]

Personally I never got to experience the original shadow warrior, which is not much of a shocker given how it was overshadowed by other games of the time, at least that is my perception of it.
...That being said, I saw Jesse Cox play the reboot for a while and the it looked hella fun (the multiplayer in the second one even more so), so I'm actually kind of excited about the new take on the IP.
I plan to play both the original and the reboot from start to finish but I just haven't gotten around to them.

-

the music and level-design is excellent, though. Build engine games always excelled in those parts.

That includes Witchaven?

[NeuralStunner]

This was a while back, but I was talking to someone (Dynamo?) who was playing Witchaven. While it has its share of problems, it's not all that bad. Capstone has made worse - the sequel's pretty terrible, apparently.

[Kinsie]

I mainly wish that the Build games had better source ports.

I really would not mind a ZDuke.

The source code release to the original Shadow Warrior is a frankenstein's monster, patched together from various different source dumps from the beta stage of development (which is why pretty much all source ports of the game lack multiplayer functionality, incidentally), with some bits of Duke stitched on to fill in the gaps.

One of the EDuke32 devs is working on a source port project called VoidSW that apparently aims to bring things up to EDuke32 feature parity, but it's probably gonna take quite a while to reach a playable state, let alone a releasable one, so don't hold your breath.