![]() This by itself makes how good the game is even more impressive. It cannot be stated enough though, that it is mostly a one man effort. On it’s own, Cyber Shadow is a damn impressive game, beautifully crafted to recreate games that so many harbor nostalgia for. That isn’t a flaw or a downside though, not in the least. If I had one not so shining opinion, I’d say there was one song that felt maybe a bit too chipper for the darker look and feel the game had. Skill is making earworms regardless of the tools. From a modern standpoint they’re still great. From an “On the NES” standpoint is phenomenal. Nothing sounds particularly out of what the NES could handle, which is always a plus if you’re trying to get as close to the source as possible. And the music in Cyber Shadow is is good. People can be sick of chiptunes all they want, but if they’re good, they’re good. The music by composer Enrique Martin (pentadrangle) is all fantastic. These include a big mech suit, which allows you to completely shoot through everything with ease and an autoscrolling bike segment. ![]() During these levels however, the game decides to try out new styles of gameplay. Some chapters forgo that and there was three chapters where this wasn’t a thing and it felt like one large run. Stages at the end have the teleporters to quickly get between levels you’ve played, to get things missed if need be. Levels start short, and progressively become longer and longer, with the checkpoints being further and further away. With the checkpoints in front of bosses taking my priority. Where if I wanted to fill a checkpoint, I either had to grind for more currency, or just pass. Such is not the case near the end of the game. By the end of the game, it was a legitimately hard game that took to me several attempts to beat certain areas.Įarly on the checkpoints that held healing spots and powerups were constantly getting filled. The game started quite easy, as I went through the first level taking almost zero damage before the boss. I won’t say it’s NES hard as the game goes out of it’s way to remove those issues. So how exactly does Cyber Shadow play? Level to level, challenging platforming and bosses. You could say that Cyber Shadow wears it’s inspirations on it’s sleeve, but nothing seems derivative or like a ripoff. However, with much of the included lore in the game, it’s almost as if his reasons aren’t so evil… You’ll search in stages to find health and power extenders, much like Mega Man. This is contextualized by the story being a quest to save members of your Ninja Clan, who’s powers are being harvested by an evil professor. In Zero’s case they were more versatility orientated or physical moves. After bosses, you’re often granted a new ability, much like Mega Man. This being with it’s mostly black backgrounds. The artstyle, with it’s dark colors reminds me less of Ninja Gaiden’s bright palette and more of Batman. Along with that game’s robot helper for attacks, which a handful of powerups in Cyber Shadow come as drones. This almost seems reminiscent of Shatterhand, which has you get powerups or healing items at certain platforms. There’s checkpoints where for the currency you find can be used to heal or get powerups. The game is more of a futuristic affair, cyborgs, giant robots, virtual areas. Sure, you play as a Ninja, so it must be like Ninja Gaiden, right? It has the speed of a Ninja Gaiden game, but I feel it ends there. I find it more like an amalgamation of Sunsoft’s NES Batman, Shatterhand, Ninja Gaiden, and then a Zero playthrough of a Mega Man X game. There’s many a comparison to Ninja Gaiden with other critics or on a skin deep analysis. It sweeps up the terrors that plagued games like lives, continues, slowdown and flickering. And much like a game I reviewed last year, Panzer Paladin, it takes knowledge of over 20 years since the time of NES games, and builds a better game around that. Despite this, Cyber Shadow still gets everything just right about a NES game. Only assisting in developing this game from what I understand is a one man team. Yacht Club took a step back and published this game. ![]() For example, the efforts of Inti Creates, Tribute Games, and Yacht Club. Sounding like a broken record at this point, but there’s no length that I couldn’t go on about how much I appreciate retro inspired games that actually get the feel they’re trying to replicate right. Developed By: Mechanical Head Studios/Aarne Hunziker
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