Shadowrun

"C'mon, it's not all that bad"

Let me preface this review by stating that I was a huge fan of the original action-RPG, Shadowrun videogames on the SNES & Genesis, which were based on the rich role-playing universe of the Shadowrun tabletop RPG. So when it was first announced that acclaimed developer FASA studios (of Crimson Skies & MechAssault fame) were working on the 360/PC version of Shadowrun, I was ecstatic. Then, when it was later announced that this was going to be a multiplayer only FPS with no storyline campaign whatsoever, I felt like I just got hit in the face with a frying pan. Yes, Shadowrun is still a pretty decent game, but it just doesn't feel like a Shadowrun game.

There is somewhat of a backstory to this game even though it is multiplayer only, it is set in an alternate part of the Shadowrun universe. In the future, in what we know of today as Brazil, the RNA Corporation was sent to investigate a mysterious artifact that brought back the return of magic to the world. However, RNA's intrusive investigating upset the locals, who bound together to form “The Lineage” that eventually went to war with RNA over the artifact.

Shadowrun is a class-based multiplayer game that plays almost exactly like Counterstrike, but with magic and tech aiding to the gunplay. Just like in Counterstrike, teams are awarded money for kills, and use that hard-earned dough to buy weapons and magic and tech between each round. There are four classes, the balanced Human, the fast and stealthy Elf, the big and powerful Troll, and the small yet tricky Dwarves.

The gameplay is very accessible, especially after going through the tutorials at the beginning. At first I thought it was going to be a bit overwhelming managing all the tech and magic, but everything is handled very conveniently with a user-friendly hud and menu system. Gunplay is solid, all the FPS staples are here such as a katana, shotgun, assault rifle, rocket launcher and a mini-gun. Now the gunplay is very standard fare, but mixing it up with the magic and tech capabilities is what makes Shadowrun stands out from other FPS games.

Tech includes a glider which allows players to temporarily be airborne and get a height advantage over opponents and magic abilities that allow players to teleport through walls and resurrect other opponents who stay alive as long as the person who resurrected them stays alive. Some other interesting magic abilities include the ability to cast a Tree of Life that has a limited life source that heals players in the midst of battle and the Strangle spell which casts a wall of crystals as a form of defense. Incorporating these spells and Tech with each class is vital to gameplay, and completely changes the way to play each class.

There are a few different modes of play to Shadowrun. If you are mostly a deathmatch-only guy like me, than you'll be spending all your time in the team-based mode Attrition. It is too bad FASA didn't include a free for all variant of deathmatch, but after playing many hour of Shadowrun it is readily apparent that it caters towards team play where if you find yourself going out guns ablazin' on your own, you are totally going to get owned out there. There are two other multiplayer variants that include Extraction, which can be summed up as a one-flag CTF option, and Raid, which is a attack/defend CTF option (with the artifact replacing the flag). There is also offline play against bots, which is awesome for honing your skills, though I found it baffling there is no split-screen play. I spent many hours with friends teaming up to take out bots or bringing them online as guests in Perfect Dark Zero and would have loved that option here.

Online play is handled through matchmaking which is almost similar to the kind of matchmaking found in Halo 2 & 3, which is a big sigh of relief as it makes hopping into match a pleasant experience. Shadowrun is the first game that incorporates cross platform play with Windows Vista and 360 players. When hearing this I thought that this may bring a lot of lag, but fortunately I didn't run into much latency problems thusfar.

Now while the online play handles well, I was disappointed to find a complete lack of online stat tracking, I figured since Microsoft hooked Bungie up with some nice online stat tracking at Bungie.net that FASA would have done the same thing, but that just isn't the case. Also some kind of reward system would have been cool as I was expecting there to be perhaps different costumes or weapon types unlocked as you ranked up, but again, it didn't end up happening.

The other complaint I have is with this initially being a $60 game, there just doesn't seem to be that much content, now nine maps may seem like a decent amount, but for a multiplayer-only focused game I was hoping for just a smidgen more, along with a few more gameplay modes and weapons. Obviously, downloadable content would remedy this problem, but recently FASA-owner Microsoft shut them down and now downloadable content seems very unlikely.

Visually, Shadowrun looks pretty good, but nothing amazing by any means. The levels and characters are well drawn and detailed, but look a couple years behind the times. Luckily, that means the game runs at an exceptionally well framerate, with brief loading times between rounds. The audio is also mainly standard fare, with all the gunfire, explosions, and magic effects sounding as I would expect them. I would have liked to see some kind of techno/electric soundtrack though to help intensify the mood though, this game would have seemed perfect for it, as it is I just jam out to some metal from my custom soundtrack which gets me in the right mood for play.

Shadowrun is a good online FPS. I really wanted a single player campaign like the 16-bit games, but the developers let it be known for awhile that wasn't going to be the case. I would rank this up there in the upper-echelon of the 360 multiplayer FPS's, but the 360 has a lot of those. While the game isn't jam packed with content, it is a definite nice change of pace from the many other standard FPS's that dominate the 360. It sucks that there probably won't be any downloadable content coming out, and with Halo 3 and Team Fortress 2 now out with Call of Duty 4 right around the corner, I have no idea if the online community for Shadowrun will stay as strong as it was a couple months back. With that said, Shadowrun can now be found for around $40 new as of this writing, and I would recommend to give it a try for that price.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 10/26/07

Game Release: Shadowrun (US, 05/29/07)