If you’ve ever felt like playing a game of Counterstrike or Quake online using magical spells, technological equipment and fairytale characters, Shadowrun may be the game for you. This first person shooter title is the first game to cross Windows Vista users and Xbox Live users and have them battle with or against each other. Now you can enjoy your love of fragging with people who just don’t see the point in console systems. The origins of Shadowrun come from an old tabletop RPG but be warned, this video game is nothing like that of the same name.

Shadowrun is a solely online FPS (first person shooter) set in a futuristic time with magical spells, gadgets and fabled creatures. The central story to this game pits the RNA, a corporation bent on controlling a newly discovered set of artifacts and its magic against the Lineage, a renegade group of miscreants driven to protect the secrets held in these artifacts. The main objectives in the three modes of play are to either steal or protect the generic artifact stick or wipe out the opposing faction. The game starts off with a menu of options, your first choice is ‘start here’ which brings up a list of 6 chapters, each with a number of tutorials to teach you how to play the game and use the mechanics effectively. Such techniques as the ‘gust and smoke’ relationship and how to be the best soldier you can are taught in these lesson stages. Getting back to the menu, you can choose to play solo matches against a number of AI bots; up to 15 to be exact, making the maximum number of players in any game 16. The bots are generic and of questionable AI but if you don’t have Xbox Live this is the only way to play Shadowrun-no single player story mode, no split screen options. You can change the settings to select the number of bots, their difficulty, race, etc, but in the end, you’re still only playing with yourself.

If you do have Xbox Live and wish to play online then next come the private and public matches, you may play over a LAN line with other Xbox or Windows Vista users on the same network, or with your online friends, again both on Xbox or Vista. Here’s where the fun begins. To start off if you are the one creating the game you have the option to select one of nine different maps, which may seem like a small selection, but for a round by round type game, you will probably only play three or four maps at most anyways. You also get the option of selecting how many players can play, if handicapping is on or off, and if you wish to play by your personal preferences or not including game type. These options are certainly welcome but more would be nice. The three game types available are: Extraction, where both teams try to steal the artifact and bring it back their base, Raid, in which the Lineage tries to steal the artifact while RNA defends and attempts to kill the Lineage, or Attrition, where its an all out team battle.

If you are joining a game, via Xbox live or Vista, you enter the game search mode, much like that of Warhawk or Halo 2, except, slower… and not as nice, as many times while playing I was put into games just ending or the same slow game over and over. Once you do finally get in a game you’re usually bombarded with a large amount of smack talk, and thanks to headset chat compatibility, you can also be a part of the vocal community. Next you pick one of four races to play, each with their advantages and disadvantages: Humans begin with more money than the rest and can use technology equipment without a big negative effect on their essence (like a magic reserve) level, but they are not particularly strong or fast. Trolls are big hulking monsters who are slow to begin with, but have little to no slow down when carrying big weapons like mini-guns, they are naturally tough but have less magical essence than the rest, but they also have the added benefit of a natural defense spell that as you take damage, (and as long as you have essence left) your skin hardens and makes you tougher, but you also will move slower. Dwarves are shorter thus, harder to shoot in the head, and start off with the most magical essence in the game, but they do not regenerate their essence nearly as fast as the other race. For the dwarves to get their essence levels back up, they use their natural skill to drain the essence from other players (both friend and foe) and magical objects throughout the game. Finally, Elves are faster than the other races, but also slow down a lot more when carrying heavy weapons and cannot take as much damage as the rest. They do have the ability to regenerate their health as long as they are not taking damage and have essence in their reserves.

Levels are selected, races are chosen, it’s time to begin the game! Your first step is to buy weapons (shotgun, machine gun, mini-gun for example), magic (revive, teleport, summon monster for example), and tech (laser sight, radar sight and glider pack for example) and begin the game. Shadowrun also gives you the nice little option of being able to give teammates gifts of money if they play exceptionally well or just need it for a new spell. The game runs surprisingly smoothly for a console FPS and the battles can get really heated, especially with the addition of a resurrection spell in which if the person casting the spell dies, the player that was revived will slowly ‘bleed out’ and lose their health until death unless they can be re-revived by somebody else at that point. The different weapon fire rates, damage and weight work out quite well for a balanced battle of damage, plus the addition of spells that work exceptionally well against one type of war and become ineffective in another leads to another choice of the right skill set for the right battle. Shadowrun gives players 4 spots for easy access preset spells and weaponry, one for each shoulder button with the right trigger being used for weapons, leaving 3 quick buttons for whatever spells or techs you prefer to use, with the option of being able to switch those spots in and out for others through an easy to maneuver middle-of-game menu. There are also different layouts and options to customize the controls however you see fit.

Now, I know what you may be thinking: how is it fair that a PC user can have precision aiming with a mouse and keyboard while the Xbox users are stuck with 2 analog sticks? Shadowrun corrects this problem by giving the weapons a little leeway in terms of accuracy to help even the playing field across platforms, as well as a tech that increases auto accuracy and stops players from shooting people on their own team (with the drawback of having a laser sight on their guns giving away their position) this tech helps slightly. The downside to this inaccuracy is that it feels as though headshots occur at random unless using a weapon with a scope on it.

As far as graphics go, the detail in the map layouts are quite nice and of the nine to play on, each varies differently and takes into consideration teleportation and gliding abilities. The particle effects from spells, like summon or trees of life, as well as gunfire and blood are all very pretty to watch but some aspects seem to be missed. When a player jumps or climbs a ladder, they have the same animation as if they are just standing or walking. As the rag doll effects of lifeless bodies being thrown around looks nice, it can lead to awkward moments of death and in rare cases, makes it nearly impossible to find a dead body to resurrect. While still on this topic, some form of player customization would have been nice: every elf on the Lineage side looks exactly the same (which gets boring as most players pick elves anyways) and every dwarf on the RNA side looks the same. Facial, costume or any other kind of model skin adjustment would have been appreciated. Otherwise, presented in 1080p, the game looks very nice and crisp with no visible jagged edges or bad spots.

The sound consists of mostly prepubescent boys yelling and complaining about ‘noobs’ not being ‘l33t’ enough and in menus, ambient music and sound is offered, but during the actual game it’s mostly voice chat and the sound of guns, spells and blood splatter. For players without headset capabilities, the D-pad acts as a quick command centre with different directions giving different messages about what the player sees in the vicinity, requesting backup, etc. Provided in Dolby Digital, the sound is great for what it is; it could be better, but it could also be a lot worse.

With FPS round based online games, there really isn’t a problem with lasting appeal, there is no story to beat, no plot twists or anything of the sort-the only real reason to stop playing a title such as this, is by getting bored of the same things over and over again or if all other players get bored and there is no one left to play with online. As well, for the Xbox Live player, there are 1000 gamer points to unlock by achieving such feats as reviving 10 players in battle, playing as a race 100 times, using weapons 100 times and more.

For such a game, as long as you’re not hung up on the fact that the name has nothing to do with the RPG and you have an online connection, I recommend this game at least to be rented as it is quite the fun title to pick up and play online at any given time. However, with some aspects of the game feeling unfinished, I would think this would be an amazing title to give away with Windows Vista or as a budget title. If you can find this game used or heavily discounted, pick it up, otherwise your money may be better spent on bigger releases that offer more than just online play like Halo 3.

Graphics: 3.5 / 5.0
Gameplay 3.5 / 5.0
Sound 2.0 / 5.0
Replay value 3.0 / 5.0






Related Stories: