What exactly is this game? What Shadowgate is it a sequel to? Well, it appears to be a sequel to the remake, but things have taken a different turn here. Shadowgate II is not exactly the adventure game you would expect, but rather a dungeon crawler RPG that uses adventure game elements.
This would not be a bad idea necessarily, and the trailer looked interesting enough, such as having unique combat elements and puzzle interaction, so I was curious and reached out to the developer, Forever Entertainment.After all, Shadowgate has delved into first person exploration games before like with Shadowgate 64, which had dungeon crawling elements, so maybe this would be good as well. What I experienced though, was not something I think Shadowgate fans have been asking for.
The game started off fine, and has characters and other ties connecting it to previous games in the series, such as the aforementioned Shadowgate 64. The combat and spells were a little awkward at first, but once it clicked how they work with the adventure game formula, it made more sense. No, the issues were something else, something much worse that needs to be addressed.
Simply put, Shadowgate II should never have been released in the state it is in. There are numerous glitches and bugs that make the process frustrating and saps your will to go on in the game, and these are the minor bugs. The major bugs are downright gamebreaking and prevent any progress after certain points.
I wanted to make this a full review of the game, but quite frankly, the game is broken and I simply cannot play the full game. Even with the early bugs and glitches I encountered, I was getting into this take on Shadowgate as a dungeon crawling RPG and there was involvement from the original creator, and after about ten minutes it seemed very promising and a new direction for the series. Then the bugs and glitches got worse and began hampering every single aspect of the game, from the visuals to the music to the gameplay.
The kicker though, came with the Dijin bug, which as stated, renders the game completely impossible to complete. I can overlook many issues with a buggy game, especially if the developers work to fix the issues. But Shadowgate II is such a mess that this is not a matter of the developers needing to fix issues after release. the game should never have been released in this state, and the fact that it was speaks poorly of Forever Entertainment.
I have tried to be patient with Forever Entertainment games in the past, since the studio tends to work to fix mistakes once fans find them in the games. They did an admirable job fixing up Night Slashers: Remake after a less than stellar launch after all, and did some great work fixing up the Panzer Dragoon Remake. But Shadowgate II is a whole different level of buggy game design and I cannot forgive the studio this time or overlook it.
It is possible that Forever Entertainment will eventually fix the issues with Shadowgate II, but for them to have released the product as is, devalues what was such a classic brand among the adventure game genre, Shadowgate has always been a niche series, compared to others, so a situation like this just hurts everyone. My advice, skip this game and play Beyond Shadowgate for a good Shadowgate experience.
Disclaimer: A review key was provided
