While obviously the game is going to revolve around taking out enemies (or just distracting them if you choose to go a non-violent route), the guards’ arrangement is far too similar level to level. Every single stage is essentially the same: eliminate area after area of guards so Lily can sneak past them unharmed. While the physics-based jank is almost to be expected from such a game, and sometimes the bugs are weirdly charming, the biggest issue in Shadwen is the level design. This lessens the overall frustration, but the game’s rough gameplay doesn’t eliminate the trial-and-error like it’s supposed to. Did a dead body just freak out on a ledge and fall right on top of a guard below thus alerting him? Just rewind and try to drag the lifeless corpse again. If there’s one nice thing about the game’s rewind mechanic, and this is something players will use frequently as being spotted is an immediate failure, it’s that players are almost instantly given a second chance. When trying to get on top of a ledge Shadwen has the habit of not grabbing onto it, and instead forcing the player to awkwardly jump up and around to get on top of it. This also happens a lot when trying to use the game’s grappling hook, which only worked as intended about 50% of the time. That’s awesome in theory, but everything from wooden crates to dead bodies have the habit of freaking out from time to time.

Just like the Trine series, a lot of Shadwen deals with manipulating the game’s physics. Which is why it’s frustrating that the grappling mechanic is typically more awkward to use than fun. It’s incredibly freeing to be able to swing from balconies and jump across rooftops unnoticed. She can quickly climb to the top of any wooden structure and only needs to get behind guards in order to permanently end their night. Shadwen, who is armed with a knife and a grappling hook, is very mobile. Unlike Lily, the titular assassin doesn’t mind getting her hands dirty, and controlling Shadwen, whose goal is to kill the King, opens up a lot of different mechanics. It’s a great concept, and one that’s immediately appealing. After a brief introductory stage that’s all about non-violently sneaking around, which is done by distracting guards by pushing objects around, players are introduced to Shadwen, who is the game’s primary protagonist. Going a step further, Frozenbyte has also given players the ability to rewind time, which eliminates a lot of the trial and error frustration that has plagued stealth games in the past.

While Lily may not be a veteran thief, she does have one thing on her side: time. What makes Shadwen unique is that players are allowed to plan every move as action is paused when you’re not moving (although the player can press R1 to make time pass while standing still).

Shadwen‘s promising journey begins by placing players in the shoes of Lily, a starving orphan child who is looking to sneak past guards in order to get an apple. Now Trine developer Frozenbyte is attempting to basically do the same thing within the confines of the stealth genre with Shadwen. This added a new layer of strategy to the familiar action, and created something truly special. The developer, appropriately named the SUPERHOT Team, were able to do this by making time progress whenever the player moved, and seemingly made the world pause when standing still. Earlier this year SUPERHOT wowed the gaming world with its innovative take on the increasingly tired first-person shooter genre.

Shadwen ps4