Shadow Master is made by HammerHead and published by Psygnosis in 1997.
Great visuals but something went wrong
Shadow Master wasn’t well received back in the days. And didn’t become a cult classic long after. Game received mostly negative reviews. Some reviews even scored the game 1 out of 5.
It might even sound like Shadow Master is a bad game, but how it’s even possible considering the game’s visuals?
Game simply looks great for its era.
There are not so many PS1 games that combine so many light effects, particles, open and closed spaces and enemies on the screen while being a first person shooter – the most challenging genre of games to make. Especially for hardware as old as beloved first PlayStation.
If direction of the game was able to pull out such stunning visuals, how then the game was able to get such low scores?
Well, gameplay, the answer is obvious.
There is one major problem. Game combines both frustrating control of your character and high level of difficulty.
Difficulty
Difficulty is simply unfair at times by the wrong reasons. Game is punishing when you enjoy playing it in the wrong way.
Shadow Master spawns traps on you in a way you need to learn the level before you will be able to complete it. So you will replay the level just for the sack of learning how to pass different situations correctly.
It would be okay for Tomb Raider to force player to be careful. But Shadow Master is an action shooter with completely different vibes and gameplay style.
In addition to this game doesn’t allow you to save your progress often. Save points happen per episode. While each episode consists from one to three levels.
Imagine you complete two levels and finally reach a local boss. Some bosses are fairly simple but some that are placed in the end of episodes are notoriously hard. You need time to learn their patters and how game wants you to avoid damage. And if you lose to such boss – welcome to the start of the episode. And you will lose.
I completed this game several times and I still lose to some bosses.
Shadow Master is basically a survival FPS. You have limitless charges of plasma rockets and lasers but there are also additional weapons that consume ammo, like a minigun. Those weapons are more powerful than main ones, but you really need to be careful with ammunition.
Or you may come to a difficult situation empty handed.
On the bright side – it’s easy to learn buttons you use to switch to certain weapons because game is using kind of radial menu before it was even invented in FPS genre.
In many situations for certain enemies you will need to switch weapons fast and prey that you still have some ammo.
And with all of this we’re still not done on discussing difficulty.
Even if you learn well on how to play the game – you will still lose. Because unlike shooters with well designed levels in some situations you have no room for maneuvers. Because level design of Shadow Master sometimes is notoriously bad.
Powerful enemy may stand behind a closed door and to open this door you will need to stay close to it. You open a door and get a rocket barrage into your face before you even able to do something.
And for a door to stay open you need to stay near it. There is no delay before it gets closed – you simply unable to keep safe distance from an enemy. How developers didn’t notice it when this delay was already introduced in older games such as Doom?
So you need to learn the positions of such enemies and switch to rockets upfront entering those rooms. The only option here is to destroy the enemy before it attacks you
Shadow Master is one of those games that feel much better on emulator. Purely because of “save state” button.
Story
Main plot feels generic nowadays and probably felt generic already back at release. It’s a classic story where you stand against a powerful, abstract evil and it feels nostalgic. And even today it strums the strings of players’ souls.
Shadow Master is a powerful creature with a space army that is trying to enslave the whole galaxy for hundreds of years. At some point his army reached your homeworld.
And now you and a few others are trying to postpone the progress of the shadow army. By the plot it’s more a coincidence you face Shadow Master in person after your spaceship crashes at one of his planets.
The story creates overall mood pretty well.
Visuals
Shadow Master impresses you with visuals and technical implementation. Despite the looks game works well on original hardware. Compare it for example with Hybrid that was barely playable or Infestation – Shadow Master is a very smooth game.
Hits of your lasers light up the surfaces they hit. Plasma cannon projectiles light surrounding area. Enemies explode into a fountains of polygons. Big enemies erupt massive explosions that push you into walls.
Animations and behavior of enemies are on a high level as well. They react on your strikes. Their behavior changes from calm to irritated with your painful hits. They don’t just stand receiving damage – they try to leave your crosshair.
Levels consist of different sections, alien symbols and simple riddles.
Enemies are presented with variety of types and they switch to the new ones often.
Alien worlds with strange architectures feel alien and surrealistic. Limitations of Playstation hardware leave room for player’s imagination of vast surfaces of alien planets and how these creatures live around in these constructions.
In addition to visuals Shadow Master has an excellent soundtrack that perfectly represents the mood.
In my opinion this game is a visual gem of PSX era.
Gameplay
There is an excuse for bad controls. You literally drive a tank on four wheels. It’s still uncertain how this tank is able to move sideways, but, well, it’s an alien tank after all.
So be prepared to stuck in the level geometry a lot. Honestly I’m not sure how QA (the list of QA specialists is presented in end credits) decided to greenlight such frustrating handling of the tank.
Sometimes you just stop pressing buttons and give it time to release your tank from a wall’s polygon. Because pressing buttons simply doesn’t help the process.
You try to cross a narrow bridge and a corner of it may stop you even if you feel that you stand right in front of the passage.
Even more frustrating is to meet a powerful enemy that clearly needs a good room for a fight but in a corridor. You have only a few options and the first one is to receive a lot of damage. The second one is just to quickly switch to a more powerful weapon and kill the enemy as fast as possible.
What if you have no ammo? Well. Welcome to the start of the episode. In later levels you meet so many powerful enemies in corridors it’s simply impossible to pass the level with just pure skill and regular weapons. And they are so big you can’t even squeeze yourself around without a fight.
And it’s probably the most frustrating part. No matter your skill – there are lot of places where skill is simply inapplicable.
Also there is the second level of the second episode where you are statically placed on a some kind of a ship with a sail on wheels and the game becomes a shooter on rails. You can’t move – you can only turn your crosshair and target enemies. To pass this level you need to literally learn the placement of some enemies to avoid damage because it’s very easy to miss them on the sides.
Thankfully it happens only once.
In addition to this your main weapons have a really close range of fire. You start to shoot at the same time with some enemies and eventually take damage no matter how good you are. And again if you have ammo for minigun it makes your life much easier. Simply because the minigun and the railgun are the only weapons without slow projectiles.
When you fire plasma – enemy can simply walk away of the line of fire. When you fire a rocket – enemy can slowly avoid the shot by walking without even noticing you.
There is one weapon that is even more frustrating. Mortar. You never know will it hit an enemy or ricochet back into you. There is no shadows so you can’t visually process the real position of a projectile in the world. When you get a triple mortar you can easily one shot yourself with your own grenades.
And I understand that you survive difficult times of your civilization. But it’s still a game with a lot of abstractions that are made for people to enjoy. Not to get frustrated.
Especially when HammerHead nailed the basic part of the shooting done right. It’s fun to destroy enemies. It’s fun to avoid projectiles and win the battles. Then they just break what they did well.
Bosses are another topic. Only after several completions I realized that circular arenas are made for you just to move fast around until the opening when boss is vulnerable. There are no other ways to avoid their attack patterns.
Not to move sideways – but move diagonally because you need to move fast. This strategy actually works for many bosses but without realizing it bosses are extremely frustrating.
It’s funny, but Shadow Master himself is a relatively easy boss with a simple attack you crack fast.
Traps
Shadow Master is a game where you move fast, destroy hordes of enemies, find your own rhythm and enjoy the process. How would you feel if you will get punished for this enjoyment by traps? Well, this game enjoys breaking your joy. Probably the biggest sin any game can commit.
For example in the last corridor of the second level of first episode you’re being locked by a door with a swarm of nasty exploding spiders that move at you. If you entered this corridor at full speed, door closed behind and you didn’t react in time – well, have a new start.
When you know about this trap – you won’t let the door close and let the spiders to destroy themselves by collision with a wall. In other words – take it slowly in certain moments that you must learn upfront, move fast otherwise. And there are a lot of such places.
With heavy enemies appearing from nowhere you have at least some room to react. You don’t need to immediately stop and move back considering tank’s inertia you just need to switch the weapon and shoot.
Besides when you hit an enemy they lose the first strike and panic a bit. It gives you even more time.
But hordes of exploding creatures with suicide attacks are just something else. At full speed you simply have no time to react at all.
Conclusion
Shadow Master is a unique game. There are not many games where you play arcade FPS game on a futuristic tank. Infestation comes to mind but it’s a third person shooter and more a simulator than an action shooter.
Visual style of Shadow Master is something that was widely admitted in reviews. Levels are different, enemies are different, you see a lot of variety overall.
And yes, shooters of this era didn’t have a lot of variety overall in terms of gameplay, but at least they handled basics well. Successful ones.
Lesson is – never do a difficult game with frustrating controls of your character. Don’t let polygons trap the player. Let players shine with their skills and help them with good level design.
Shadow Master is hardly a must play but quite enjoyable on emulator.