Shadows: Awakening

 PC
Shadows: Awakening Image
Metascore
77

Generally favorable reviews - based on 10 Critic Reviews What's this?

User Score
6.9

Mixed or average reviews- based on 51 Ratings

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  • Summary: Shadows: Awakening is a unique, isometric single-player RPG with real-time tactical combat. You embark on an epic adventure with challenging gameplay, a gripping storyline and enchanting graphics.
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Shadows: Awakening - Dungeon Crawling Gameplay

Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 5 out of 10
  2. Mixed: 5 out of 10
  3. Negative: 0 out of 10
  1. Digital Chumps
    Sep 10, 2018
    90
    I have been, and continue to enjoy S:A enough that it’s hard to find much fault with it. That said, for some genre veterans looking for a stout challenge, the default difficult setting is likely much too easy. Additionally, some quest and puzzle design could be considered a bit repetetive, but for me, these concerns were greatly overshadowed by the positives of the experience.
  2. Areajugones
    Sep 3, 2018
    87
    It might lack the decision making aspect of the RPG genre but, beyond that, Shadows: Awakening is an amazing game. The great mechanic of having multiple protagonists in one avatar makes every combat tactical in a distinguishable way, which is tied to an addictive playable structure , an interesting history and a dense amount of content to create a epic adventure.
  3. GamingTrend
    Aug 31, 2018
    85
    Shadows: Awakening is a damn good action-RPG. The combat is quick and varied while the characters are interesting. While the story lacks originality, it is still well written and allows the different characters to shine. There are a lot of different elements at play, and they all work together to create a fantastic experience.
  4. GameStar
    Sep 23, 2018
    74
    Clever gameplay with changing worlds drives the action role-playing game, but long-term motivation fails to appear.
  5. Impulsegamer
    Sep 17, 2018
    72
    Shadows Awakening is a solid ARPG with a deep lore and engaging story. Tragically, a few outdated elements bog down its fun and unique combat system.
  6. COGconnected
    Aug 31, 2018
    72
    To be a successful fantasy RPG, even one that goes for the nostalgia crowd, one doesn’t have to emulate the old right down to the endless grinding and watered-down story (and some pretty cringeworthy gender stereotypes included in a quest that feels like it’s goading me to enjoy killing a bratty teenage girl). It’s okay to combine the old with the new. Shadows: Awakening’s Devourer and his small army of devoured souls are the new part of the equation, but it doesn’t tip the balance. Instead, by the time I finished playing, I was just grateful I’d never have to fight another wolf.
  7. Merlin'in Kazanı (Turkey)
    Sep 5, 2018
    70
    Different worlds, different enemies, tactical combat and puzzles. A little Diablo a little bit Legacy of Kain...

See all 10 Critic Reviews

User Reviews

Write a Review
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 3 out of 7
  2. Mixed: 2 out of 7
  3. Negative: 2 out of 7
  1. Saphorelle
    Jul 28, 2019
    9
    Très agréablement surprise par ce RPG en vue isométrique que je recommande vivement! Tout d'abord, graphiquement, c'est vraiment très joli :Très agréablement surprise par ce RPG en vue isométrique que je recommande vivement! Tout d'abord, graphiquement, c'est vraiment très joli : le monde matériel et le monde immatériel sont très bien rendus. Les personnages sont très bien modélisés et on sent bien qu'une attention toute particulière a été apportée à leurs animations. Le gameplay, nécessitant de jongler continuellement entre le dévoreur et les personnages qu'il contrôle, est vraiment très bien pensé car il permet de combiner leurs capacités. Chacun des personnages a son propre inventaire, ses armes et armures spécifiques à sa classe, ses compétences et son histoire personnelle. Le lore n'est pas en reste, avec une histoire très captivante et que l'on sent plus profonde qu'il n'y parait: on embarque pour une aventure longue et épique. Mention spéciale à la BO SUBLIME avec ses musiques envoûtantes qui bénéficient même d'une variante lorsque l'on passe dans le monde immatériel.
    Encore un jeu qui n'a pas bénéficié de la promotion qu'il aurait mérité! Une vraie perle!

    p.s. contrairement à ce que j'ai pu lire dans d'autres évaluations, j'y joue avec une manette XboX et les contrôles et la maniabilité sont au top! Pas d'inquiétude par rapport à ça ;)    … Expand
  2. supahlupah
    Nov 2, 2018
    9
    It´s the perfect mix between Divinity Original Sin and Diablo, but it could be a little more polished with the hub and graphics options.
    You    It´s the perfect mix between Divinity Original Sin and Diablo, but it could be a little more polished with the hub and graphics options.
    You will have a really good time with this game    … Expand
  4. Deadking
    Nov 6, 2018
    8
    Very good game with a interesting twist of usual ARPG style. Instant switch between demon and his puppets mid combat gives you some seriousVery good game with a interesting twist of usual ARPG style. Instant switch between demon and his puppets mid combat gives you some serious tactical opportunities and interesting possibilities in story.
    Just mind that when you start, you will have to choose one of three possible puppets - this one will be "bound" to you. You will be able to play his/her quest line and won't be able to leave this puppet out of your roster of active puppets, so choose accordingly.    … Expand
  5. MR67
    Apr 12, 2019
    6
    The best way to describe this game is that it plays like a cross between Trine and Diablo. You play as a demon who has the ability to absorbThe best way to describe this game is that it plays like a cross between Trine and Diablo. You play as a demon who has the ability to absorb the souls of others and this then gives you the ability to switch between the demon and up to 3 other characters at will (typically an archer, warrior and mage class character), though you only actually control one character at a time. Each character (including the demon) has up to 8 unique abilities (with up to 3 skill ranks in each) which they can learn, though only 3 of these can be mapped for use in combat at any given time.

    You begin play as the demon (known as the devourer) and then explore this strange mausoleum where you get to choose your first soul from one of three tombs nearby. Depending on your play style, you may opt for Kalig (a warrior), Jasker (an archer) or Evia (a mage). Once you have chosen one of them, the other two can never be recruited in your current game. The demon and your chosen character can then never be removed from your group and can later be joined by up to two other companions, who you may come across in your travels. I'm nearing the end of the game playing as Evia, and I kind of regret choosing her as her abilities seem quite underpowered compared to those of her companions.

    Combat is quite fun and plays out in a similar way to this studio's earlier title, Vikings: Wolves of Midgard, with the two main differences; firstly, you can switch between any of your 4 characters on the fly to make use of their abilities or to remove a character who has taken a severe beating. Secondly, as the devourer does not exist in the material world, you immediately find yourself in the shadow world when switching to him. This means you have additional enemies to fight who are native to that world, though some enemies exist in both. You also gain the ability to see certain things, like clues to puzzles, that would not be visible in the material world, and you may also be able to travel through areas that would be otherwise restricted. This makes combat a bit more interesting and adds more of tactical element as you switch between your active characters to combine their abilities. Boss fights can be a bit frustrating though, as you will often be forced to kite them just to survive.

    The game's weakest points are its story, its puzzles and the camera. The story is a bit vague, even right at the start, and I still don't understand it completely or my characters' motivations for travelling together as a collective group of souls owned by the devourer. Some mysterious mage who summons the devourer at the beginning of the game wants to overthrow some order known as the Inquisition, who have taken over the known world and banned the worship of any gods. Apparently your job is to defeat them and prevent the end of the world, but it never seems clear as to why or how this is going to happen until near the end of the game. The lore which gets presented to you in the game, in the form of books and notes you come across, is somewhat unintuitive and does almost nothing to pique your interest, sadly. There are seem to be numerous spelling and grammatical errors in the game's tooltips, particularly when compared to their earlier Vikings game.

    The puzzles are my second gripe. It seems the developers put these in to extend the length of the game, unlike Vikings which was almost purely a hack-and-slash title. These puzzles typically involve flicking some levers in a certain order, or walking across a series of tiles in a certain order to open a locked door or gate. In some cases, switching to the devourer lets you see some runes in the shadow world which indicate the sequence of tiles etc to follow, but in a lot of other cases, you will have to use trial and error to figure out some of the puzzles, which can be time consuming and irritating. It would have been better if more of the puzzles involved logical thinking, or if there were just fewer of them instead.

    My third gripe is that, just like Vikings, you also still cannot rotate the in-game camera, nor can you zoom it. This means you may still have your character partially obscured by a wall during a frantic boss fight, and you won't be able to zoom in close to admire your character's nifty new set of armour except from their character sheet.

    Summary:
    - A Diablo/Trine type game with some nice level design, a decent soundtrack, acceptable voice acting and a combat system that is made more interesting by the ability to switch between 4 different characters on the fly. Sadly, it's let down a bit by a somewhat short length, vague story, numerous spelling and grammatical errors, irritating puzzles and a horribly limited in-game camera.

    Would normally be worth 7/10, but subtracting 1 for the gripes above. Definitely worth picking up on sale if you like games like Diablo or Grim Dawn though.    … Expand
  6. bxrxsxtx
    Mar 28, 2022
    5
    This game has good graphics, holding up well over time, average or above sound effects, music, backgrounds, GUI etc. Animations are prettyThis game has good graphics, holding up well over time, average or above sound effects, music, backgrounds, GUI etc. Animations are pretty complex. It pushes some innovations into the normal RPG formula, you can have a fair number of characters and switch between them instantly. It's a good idea, more games could use some of the features it has. You can set some characters to use spells quickly and some to be DPS oriented and tank damage. I like the artstyle and a lot of the character designs.

    On the other hand, the positives almost seem like they are superficial, trying to garner good reviews rather than be solid or balanced as a game. The gameplay isn't terrible, but fighting is mostly a drag, characters are super slow and I don't like the mouse oriented auto attacks. Swinging axes have no trail effects so I have no idea where they hit and there's no clear AOE. Sometimes spells and such make fighting better, but they tend on the overpowered side anyway, kill everything on screen kind of spells. Skills and combat feel like they went through minimal playtesting and rebalancing.

    There are many puzzles and things you have to figure out to progress. I feel like these also really fall short and you're better off just looking up solutions. For example you have to auto attack a door with a particular character only to progress, how are you supposed to know that, normally auto attacks are universal.

    The story is bad but most fantasy games are. In this case nothing is very relatable, it's about a cliché demon or ancient wizards or boring mercenaries. I guess the godlike serpent was interesting. You can choose good or evil to some degree and there are many dialog options to ask questions of NPCs. Too many actually, and there are tons of random dialog lines during quests for all your characters. They should have put some of that budget into fixing combat or something else useful.

    So really it's a game where you tire of it and beg it to do anything interesting after a while. But if you love RPGs this is a worthy addition to your collection, and there are many characters and skills and little secrets in the world and such. It's not bad it just fails to live up to standards set by classic RPGs and fails to set it's self apart from the plethora of fantasy games with similar worlds and monsters and themes. Hopefully something like this will come again with better world building and gameplay. Ciao gamers.    … Expand
  7. Bertram_Kerwin
    Oct 24, 2018
    4
    Anyone wants to have fun in this game, don't choose highest difficulty.
    Melee protagonist like Kalig will be destroyed in a heartbeat in any    Anyone wants to have fun in this game, don't choose highest difficulty.
    Melee protagonist like Kalig will be destroyed in a heartbeat in any boss fight.
    Its mechanism is very poorly balanced, unfortunately only range character has higher chance to survive.
    Combat seems pretty weak and boring, most of the time is nothing but hit-and-run.
    Overall, it turns out being too bland and a shame to toss it away.    … Expand
  8. night4
    Apr 4, 2019
    4
    Not good.

    First, it plays like a console game so if you're not using a controller, it feels terrible. Even with a controller, it still    Not good.

    First, it plays like a console game so if you're not using a controller, it feels terrible. Even with a controller, it still feels awkward due to constantly switching between characters.

    Second, and more importantly, the "puzzles" are absolutely terrible and not fun. I actually stopped playing the game because of these horrible, dumb time wasters.

    There are other problems too, like ability cooldowns being too long and such, but they pale in comparison to the first two.    … Expand

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Awards & Rankings

94
#94 Best PC Game of 2018

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