Shadow Master
Shadow Master, developed by Hammerhead and published by Psygnosis in 1997.
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Player's Review
"Take on a marauding metallic battalion of mechanized death machines in this first person blast-fest. An evil overlord has used up all his planet's natural resources and now he needs yours. Totally out of your control, he will stop at nothing less than total genocide of anything organic. Your job is to stop him and make scrap metal of his lethal robotic creatures."
This is almost a cross between Tunnel B1 and Blast Radius. You play in first person and are in control of a super tank with multiple weapons. Although its shown on wheels, to play it feels like a hovercraft as the controls are very sensitive and twitchy. The game feels to fast for its own good and I wonder if that's just down to the game not being adapted for ntsc and just runs as fast as it can go. The game is a rainbow light effects show, pretty much as expected from Psygnosis releases at this time.
The game difficulty is as easy or hard as you make it it. Due to the way the game works, you could just drive through most areas without shooting anything and the enemies will de-spawn behind you and not chase you down making the game ripe for a speedrun. On the other hand, killing enemies gives a high chance of a health or ammo drop which will help on the more guard like enemies which block entry ways. Weapon upgrades can also be dropped or found. Most of the time the Photon torpedo is used as you don't need to collect ammo but you get bombs, rockets and flamethrower for situations that require them. A special note should be made for the bombs as they are so powerful and will pretty much destroy you unless you are moving backwards at the time of deploying. Another issue is that the bombs have a very short range and need to land right on the enemy to be effective. Also, some of the bigger enemies can go off with a big Blast Radius which will hurt if too close or knock you around if outside it.
I play through the game in a normal way killing anything and everything while trying to show as much of the levels as I can as well as any special rooms with weapon drops. Some levels have multiple paths which you do not need to follow. Sometimes taking the other path will lead to weapon upgrades or sometimes its a trap with lots of enemies trying to kill you. Its also a game of its time predating checkpoints so you have to finish each level in one life and you can only save after each planet which can be two or three levels. There is no scoring to worry about so ideally you take the fastest route though each level avoiding any enemies that are not in your way.
00:00:00 Intro
00:05:55 Silvan 1
00:14:35 Silvan 2
00:24:40 Halyos 1
00:31:45 Halyos 2
00:34:35 Ocella 1
00:48:05 Ocella 2
00:59:15 Ocella 3
00:01:10 Glasys 1
01:07:00 Glasys 2
01:14:25 Titan 1
01:30:20 Titan 2
01:40 10 Titan 3
01:44:15 Dreadnought
01:54:55 Shadow Master planet 1
02:06:40 Shadow Master Planet 2
02:17:50 Shadow Master Planet 3
This is almost a cross between Tunnel B1 and Blast Radius. You play in first person and are in control of a super tank with multiple weapons. Although its shown on wheels, to play it feels like a hovercraft as the controls are very sensitive and twitchy. The game feels to fast for its own good and I wonder if that's just down to the game not being adapted for ntsc and just runs as fast as it can go. The game is a rainbow light effects show, pretty much as expected from Psygnosis releases at this time.
The game difficulty is as easy or hard as you make it it. Due to the way the game works, you could just drive through most areas without shooting anything and the enemies will de-spawn behind you and not chase you down making the game ripe for a speedrun. On the other hand, killing enemies gives a high chance of a health or ammo drop which will help on the more guard like enemies which block entry ways. Weapon upgrades can also be dropped or found. Most of the time the Photon torpedo is used as you don't need to collect ammo but you get bombs, rockets and flamethrower for situations that require them. A special note should be made for the bombs as they are so powerful and will pretty much destroy you unless you are moving backwards at the time of deploying. Another issue is that the bombs have a very short range and need to land right on the enemy to be effective. Also, some of the bigger enemies can go off with a big Blast Radius which will hurt if too close or knock you around if outside it.
I play through the game in a normal way killing anything and everything while trying to show as much of the levels as I can as well as any special rooms with weapon drops. Some levels have multiple paths which you do not need to follow. Sometimes taking the other path will lead to weapon upgrades or sometimes its a trap with lots of enemies trying to kill you. Its also a game of its time predating checkpoints so you have to finish each level in one life and you can only save after each planet which can be two or three levels. There is no scoring to worry about so ideally you take the fastest route though each level avoiding any enemies that are not in your way.
00:00:00 Intro
00:05:55 Silvan 1
00:14:35 Silvan 2
00:24:40 Halyos 1
00:31:45 Halyos 2
00:34:35 Ocella 1
00:48:05 Ocella 2
00:59:15 Ocella 3
00:01:10 Glasys 1
01:07:00 Glasys 2
01:14:25 Titan 1
01:30:20 Titan 2
01:40 10 Titan 3
01:44:15 Dreadnought
01:54:55 Shadow Master planet 1
02:06:40 Shadow Master Planet 2
02:17:50 Shadow Master Planet 3
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