Shadow Complex Hands-On
What's it like on the fourth playthrough?
July 17, 2009 - I am a busy man. I have a couple of employees to manage, a site to publish every night, games to preview and review, events to attend and, from time to time, a personal life. And yet, I am now on my fifth playthrough of Shadow Complex. As full disclosure, I've had to start from scratch twice now due to changing builds, so all of my experience levels (which normally carry into each successive playthrough) were wiped. But still, I am indeed playing Shadow Complex yet again.
You've no doubt heard good things about Shadow Complex from its debut at E3. All of it is true. It's very reminiscent of Super Metroid. Believe the hype. Believe what you've seen in our videos. I don't want to go too in-depth here, because each week we are breaking down Shadow Complex piece by piece. Instead, I just want to let you know what to expect the fourth time through.
Of course, every story has a beginning, so perhaps I should discuss my first time. My initial playthrough of Shadow Complex took me a little over ten hours. All but the first few minutes of the game take place in the Restoration's massive compound, and hidden throughout are more than 100 items and upgrades to discover. For those who love exploration, there's a lot to be found. If you don't want to backtrack and hunt for items, then you can have fun with the combat. Though the difficulty is on the easy side, if you attempt to rush through without searching for health and armor upgrades, you'll have a bit of a challenge as you progress. Shadow Complex is half adventure game, half action game, so it services both crowds.
Though the first time through is lengthy, it's much quicker on replay. For one, your experience carries over as do your upgradable stats. Though all your items and weapons must be found again, the benefits of your experience level (and knowledge of the compound) help a lot. I can burn through Shadow Complex in under two hours if I run straight through and in about 5-6 hours if I attempt to find everything.
You might be wondering why the heck I'd still be playing this game. Good question. As I said, your experience points roll over into your next playthrough. Often gaining a new level gives a bonus to one of your three attributes: Accuracy, Precision, and Stamina. Accuracy decreases the spread of your gunfire (helpful with automatic weapons and the uber-shotgun). Precision increases your chance at a headshot. Stamina adds damage resistance (on top of the armor upgrades you can find in the compound).
While these are the majority of your level-based upgrades, there are a few special bonuses. At level 20, for example, you unlock a full map of the game world with the general location for all items. And you want these items. There are some special things earned for finding all gold bars (trust me, you need this) and all twelve passkey cards.
The ultimate goal is to hit Level 50. I can't tell you the reward, since I'm still working my way up the experience ladder, but I promise that I will get there.
The truth is, I'm still playing Shadow Complex because it's a lot of fun. Even though I know the map backwards and forwards at this point, I still get pleasure from kicking in super speed with the Friction Dampener, running up walls and blasting through a dozen unsuspecting enemies. Mostly, I spend a lot of time seeing if I can break the game by getting into places earlier than I should be able to or using the Foam Gun to create a ladder into the stratosphere. I've yet to find a situation where I get trapped and have to restart the game. That's a credit to developer Chair Entertainment. This is a complex open-world game that had to be meticulously planned.
The things I had issues with early on (shooting enemies in the background, using the hook shot effectively) no longer bother me. I've figured them out and now I run through Shadow Complex like a mad bull. It's a good time.
On your fourth playthrough of Shadow Complex, you can expect the combat to be so easy that it's almost an afterthought. By play four, the difficulty is in finding faster ways to access areas, unlocking all of the Achievements and beating the four Master Challenges.
Maybe at this point you're wondering, will I go for a fifth playthrough? Yes. Once Shadow Complex hits Xbox Live Marketplace, I'll certainly give it another go, if for no other reason than to dominate the leaderboards the first day.
http://xboxlive.ign.com/articles/100/1005179p1.html
