Shadwen

Shadwen
53
Metacritic
76
Steam
69.051
xDR
Our rating is calculated based on the reviews and popularity of the game.
Price
$4.24
Release date
17 May 2016
Developers
Publishers
Steam reviews score
Total
76 (961 votes)

Shadwen is a 3rd person stealth-action game where the only rule is to remain unseen. Stay hidden - or the ruthless guards will kill you on sight!

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Shadwen system requirements

Minimum:

  • OS: (64 bit / 32 bit *) Windows 10 / 8 / 7 / Vista
  • Processor: Intel Core i3/i5/i7 1.8 GHz CPU dual-core. AMD 2.0 GHz dual-core.
  • Memory: 4 GB RAM
  • Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 260 / Radeon HD 4000 Series / Intel HD Graphics 4000
  • DirectX: Version 10
  • Storage: 6 GB available space
  • Additional Notes: * Highest graphics detail levels are only available in 64 bit OS
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lintjosh
lintjosh

Despite some reviews, I found the controls to be precise. Plus, I loved swinging from beam to beam above the guards heads

Hubal
Hubal

I decided to try this game, as it came up on the "experiment" as similar to the Dishonored. Unfortunately, I was rather disappointed. You can't really compare these two products. Yea, the stealth element is the key in both cases, and that's it.

The biggest disappointment was the plot/story or rather lack of it. Basically the ingame storytelling is non-existant. (End chapter dialogues which simpl burn down to: - "You are Evil" . - "Shut up, kid"). You can help a rather dull game (which i found Shadwen to be) if you bring engaging story right from the start.

Other thing that I cannot get over is how incredibly silly is the actual premise:
So, you are the badass assasin, on a mission to infiltrate a castle and possibly assasinate the king. Of course as a professional you come and just bring the sword with you.

So to continue first you need to find blueprint and parts for your grappling hook in some random peasants decaying hut. Obviously, where else assassins get their equipment. Then you find this little girl on your way.

You force the girl to follow you, because you are afraid she will tell the guards about you. No matter that the majority of the time the girl is hiding in some bushes, literally few inches from the guards, while you run around the map. I mean seriously, if the girl had it in mind to rat you out, all it would take would be to come out of the bush and poke Mr. random guard.

And it's a hilarious concept, that your badass assassin would be completely defeated by the first door - without a presence of little girl to pull a lever.

Olczykovsky
Olczykovsky

About 6 hours of gameplay if you go the killing route. Simple game with easy guards and cool rewind time if you make a mistake, no need to reload. If you're looking for something simple or want to get some easy achivs this is it.

Frinelli
Frinelli

Way too repetitive, boring stealth, and the tools barely add anything. On top of that add brain dead AI. This was a chore to finish.

chadmccain
chadmccain

It had the Apple symbol so I bought it thinking it would work. Found AFTER purchasing that it is not working for 64 bit.

Smelly Fart Denier
Smelly Fart Denier

Here's Admiral Naked's Top 2 Tips for enjoying the game more:

1) Go to keyboard settings and bind a key to "Toggle Time" to turn off the God awful freeze time mechanic
2) Go to Difficulty and set the little girl to not automatically follow you so you're coolest murder moments don't get ruined by her childhood innocence (which is a game function I actually found neat as far as narrative functions go)

Fun as f*ck game, though. The grapple hook really plays off the verticality of the surprisingly d*mn good level design really well. You're basically murder-y Spider-Man.

Story kinda sucks I guess but it's barely there so, oh well.

And the soldiers have all been drinking paint and have horrendously stupid AI but it never messed up my fun so I don't care. I'm stupid too. I'm drinking paint as I write this.

Help me

Mergatroid
Mergatroid

So I've just bought this game in the specials and from the description I believed it would be something like Assassins Creed. I was very wrong. You have the ability to rewind time. The graphics are nicely polished too, but you can REWIND TIME!!

Again:
... REWIND TIME!!

Basically you can rewind time. That's as far as I have got in this game (the first few minutes), but that made me write this and I can rewind time. And it's only for £3.24 in the Specials.

BARGAIN!!!

TheDude363
TheDude363

great game story gameplay great but was a little disappointed with the ending and im not a fan of the reversed levels thought the devs might of added new levels or put a new dlc on.

Lim1nal
Lim1nal

A mediocre stealth game at best. Get it only on sale if you already played superior titles like Splinter Cell, Styx, Thief, Mark of the Ninja etc.

kotsabasis
kotsabasis

Boring and pretty repetitive, mediocre overall. Maybe worth buying on extreme sale, otherwise wouldn't recommend it

Willinator
Willinator

This game feels empty. The first five minutes are fine until you realize that there is never going to be more game than this. Each level is just a repeat of the last. Nothing new is ever added to mechanics or story that make it feel like a new challenge. Speaking of story, you're there to kill the king and there's an annoying little girl tagging along.-That's it. All of the characterization between you and the girl happens in loading screens.

TLDR; just buy Dishonored or Thief if you have a stealth itch.

ziggytipper
ziggytipper

Not a bad game, great and challenging in terms of stealth, very cool mechanic of rewinding to fix mistakes. Personally wish I could've done without the girl following you and witnessing deaths but that's an integral part of the story and gameplay/challenge which turns this into an unlikely pseudo rpg with choice based outcome. Basically its Assassins Creed style platforming with Dishonored style stealth in a game where the kid can't be seen by the guards but you can. And a rewind button, which is LOADS better than having a load screen / last checkpoint to sit through.

BlacknestZ
BlacknestZ

I really enjoyed with the time stopping in the first place. Unfortunately, the game has disappointed me since the first 30 minutes. I dislike the method which game forces player to hold button for letting the time run naturally, so I felt uncomfortable every time that time stops itself. Moreover, our girl "Lily" is major problem of the game. Because she does not even stay on the place we guide her to go and there were many times that she roamed without listening player's order. Moreover, she always ran to me even while I was trying to hide the body and found the corpse which was being hiding. With this reason, it impacts to the ending of this game (it is likely to be in the negative way).

In the other hands, I am happy with how Shadwen uses her blade to kill foes. Well... stopping time is a good concept but it would be great if we could just press button to stop time and let the time run by itself. Oh...and our girl Lily!! Maybe she should does correctly as we order her.

Jinx
Jinx

I love how much freedom this game gives you. You can move objects to force guards to take another path, use physics to kill and distract. When you master that, you won't even need your gadgets.

When the dev says you can use objects to kill, they are not pre positioned like in some games (I agree there's a few very conveniently placed boxes) but here you can be creative, like go to a higher spot, use your grappling hook to lift any box or barrel that you find laying around, and wait for someone to pass under it. It's just incredible how much freedom you have.
I also liked the fact that all the ropes in game (not just your grappling hook) will not magically clip through stuff, it will go around the terrain, structures and even movable objects, allowing you to do some interesting things.

The gameplay is different from other Stealth games I played. In this one you need to guide a little girl through all the scenarios, clearing the path and distracting guards for her to pass from cover to cover. This slows you down depending on what playstyle you're adopting, but at the same time gives you an interesting challenge.

About the story, you need to play both sides to see the it all. Letting Lily know you're a killer from start results in different dialogs on the loading screens, allowing you to know why Shadwen is after the King for example. But if a little girl's judgement matters to you, keep everyone alive. :)

musicinme57
musicinme57

This is an amazing game! I loved the puzzle-like aspect of trying to make your way past all the guards. I liked it so much, I played it through twice to get all of the achievements, first by making all through the game and killing no one and then going through the game killing everyone.

One of the things I really loved about it was the ability to manipulate time. When you stop moving, time stops in the game, which allows you to choose how to move and when in order to time your movements with the guards. It also allows you to immediately recover from a mistake as there's also a button to rewind time.

I loved playing through this game, twice, and I would highly recommend it!

Kunovega
Kunovega

"Babies first stealth game."

You have total control of time. If you aren't moving or actively progressing time, the game is paused. If you screw up, you can control with precision how much you rewind time and play those seconds again. It makes everything essentially fail-proof, it's like baby proofing the game with soft cushions to protect you from failure.

On the other end some of the "puzzles" end up being tedious, not because they are hard to solve, but because the game knows you can rewind time if you screw up. So, rather than being well thought out or having a complex solution, they just require extreme precision, do it over until you get through it.

Much of the game is also highly repetitive with the same art assets reused endlessly from level to level until most of it blurs together. You'll avoid (or kill) the same guards in the same environments down the same streets a dozen times over again. Also the crafting system adds absolutely nothing to the value of the game, it's a tedious and pointless add-on. Instead of finding a grappling hook (which is essential for progressing the game) you'll wander through an empty zone for 10 minutes looting random chests to find the pieces and assemble it. This brings nothing of value to the game play and then you do it again for pretty much every new item you encounter. Collect random bits along your path and assemble them at the end. That works in larger open world games with more context and depth. But this is a linear corridor stealth game and simply having a crafting system for the sake of having a crafting system did not encourage exploration or enhance any other aspect of the game, it's just there.

On the plus side the voice acting is decent, the game sets a dark tone well, the sounds and music are well done and functionally it plays smooth without any major issues.

So, having said all of that I'm very tempted to thumbs down the game... but... It's still kinda fun and the story is oddly compelling. There's a narrative driving the game that makes you want to see it through, maybe even a few times (there's 3 endings, plus if you choose to kill instead of full-stealth you change some of the dialogue between you and your "partner")

The game overall isn't terribly long either, but replaying for the different endings or for achievements could take you beyond the once-through campaign. In the end I did enjoy the game and it's an enjoyable experience. It could have been better, but still worth considering if you can pick it up on sale. Particularly if you enjoy stealth games or an interesting narrative.
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Serenity
Serenity

Shadwen isn't exactly a bad game, its just a boring game. Its an incredibly standard stealth game with the only interesting mechanics being copied from other games. The time reversal from Sand of Time means that nothing you do has any meaning or consequence as you can just reverse it. The swinging mechanic from Spiderman is fiddly and always makes you look like you are having a seizure at the end of a rope. The little girl you escort does nothing for the gameplay except judge you when you kill people and if you don't kill people and go for a "good" run you will be so bored you will likely chew your lips off for something to do. The "crafting" mechanic is only here because crafting is cool right now, and it because it lengthens the game with fetch quests. I changed my mind, Shadwen is a bad game full of bland ideas, Frozenbyte should probably stick to side scrollers, Trine was good.

PhilBerto
PhilBerto

Even on a super laggy computer, this game is really fun! :D I love the story and the gameplay is absolutely amazing!!! XD I absolutely love it! ^_^ However, I do have one complaint. I do not like how time literally stops every single time that I stop. I wish time would continue to move UNTIL I click Q, and Q would pause time but until then everything would move smoothly. I just feel like I need a small weight for the Q button just to keep the game moving as fluidly as possible :/ But it is a super fantastic game and I do love the game mechanics! :D I do wish there were a whole lot more less kill options though, that would be nice. But this is a good game and I do enjoy it immensely.

EXOSKELETON
EXOSKELETON

A very decent game. You get what you pay for. I can even buy this game in whole price.
The only sad part is there's no sequel or prequel.

GREYSTARR
GREYSTARR

5/10. super easy. can be finished in one sitting. sneak up on enemy ,kill enemy rinse repeat. good game for those who want to play a stealth game but don't want to play a stealth game because right off the bat you can annihilate everything & everyone as long as they don't see you. game has different endings based on whether or not you kill the enemies but all is bland with each chapter.

De_faulty
De_faulty

I really like this game, I really do. It's a nice stealth game where you can swing yourself, spiderman style, across the ceiling and sneak pass guards. Would be really fun

Would be, if you didn't have to escort a little girl. She's completely invisible to guards, making you wonder why you even bother and she's absolutely necessary for progress, meaning if the AI buggers up and decides staring at the wall is more important than following you, you're stuck where you are.

And I don't know why they make time stop when you stop moving. It's annoying as hell when you're waiting for the guard to patrol somewhere else only to realise you've been sitting there for 5 minutes only to realise the game was paused.

In short, there is a good game in there, but its soured by a stupid escort mission and a stupid game mechanic.

Uriel
Uriel

Recommended, but not whole heartedly. It's a nice little game, but it has a few major flaws :

- The physics is wonky. Barrels, crates, even loading cranes, everything is paper-light, but the slightest touch from a falling object will insta-kill any guard...

- ...And you should make sure this NEVER happens. The game screams at you every 2 steps "this can be used to make some clever trap". But if a body is found, guards are alarmed and you need to rewind time, because game over. While "body found, game over" would be normal in case of a suspicious body lying around, it's alot less normal when a crate "accidentally" falls from a crane, and suddenly every guard is yelling they are under attack.

- Guards are incredibly stupid. Three are talking at a campfire, some suspicious noise draws them away, only one returns... Everything normal, nothing to worry about. A stark contrast with the extreme over-reaction they exhibit when an apparent accident kill their friends. "Dark Spirits" pick them one by one ? That's cool. A rope broke and somebody died ? WE'RE UNDER ATTACK !!! Last I've seen guards this dumb was in Thief 3, and Thief 3 is 12 years older than Shadwen.

- There are 3 endings (minor spoilers) : Shadwen and Lily part ways, and Lily hates your guts ; Shadwen and Lily part ways, and you're still in good terms ; Shadwen and Lily take the road together. First one, she knows you're a killer and killed the king before her eyes, she thinks you're evil, normal stuff. Second one, Shadwen abandons a child to her own device in a world ruined by war and famine, and THIS IS CONSIDERED THE GOOD ENDING !!. Third one, Lily knows you're a killer, but you spared the king so you're not THAT evil, and well, you offer to care for her... Intermediate ending. The killer who redeem herself by adopting an orphan instead of leaving her to die of starvation or worse is NOT the good ending. Come on !

If you can make do with that, though, the game itself is fun. Just, lure guards, kill them, hide the bodies (or don't kill anyyone !), rather than creating clever taps that will get you in trouble. There are lots of places to climb to drop on guards, lots of traps to craft, and once the story is done, you can play the game again in "escape" mode : the entrance becomes the exit, the exit becomes the entrance, and you play from last level to first. Makes no sense if you killed everyone... But generally speaking, sense is non-existant in that game. You play that game for the gameplay itself, nothing else.

theromulans
theromulans

This is not a great game. I picked this up on the back of the Trine series, which I did enjoy. Stealth mechanics are also something I generally enjoy in my games.

Clunky controls is the real deal breaker here for me, the awkward implementation of time stopping, but also the individual puzzles are shallow and highly repetitive.

How slow do these guards move? A fast forward option seems incredibly lacking. "The dark spirits!" Feels like a shell of a game that needed another few months of work. Not worth your time.

Not recommended.

The Wesker Fan™
The Wesker Fan™

Shadwen is an ok stealth game, really, and I like it, but I can't recommend it, sadly.

Visuals and sounds are ok, good, sometimes even great, but they are not the main forte of the game. Despite this, they are not too distracting. The game's music is also mostly ok.

The story is not something I'll get into because I couldn't care less about it. It's boring as all hell and you shouldn't really bother with it.

The gameplay is the main issue. As a stealth game, you usually have some moments where you have to wait for guards to finish up speaking to start their patrol, right? Well, the game has a time-stop mechanic much like SUPERHOT. The issue is, there is no FF button. This leaves you with the ''Pass Time'' option, which is Q, which is NOT a toggle-on, so you're left with this dilemma.

The guards move so slowly that an FF button would be a great implementation into the game. OH WAIT WE DON'T HAVE IT. I don't know how the devs did not think about adding one. The only reason I don't mind it as much is because of Styx: Master of BS, which has taught me that patience can easily run thin.

Worst of all? Lily. Invisible to guards, you must protect her from them by either distracting them or killing them. Oh btw if she sees a body the story will change or something idk. It doesn't take you long before figuring out that the game is an escort game 99% of the time with stealth mechanics shoved into it. You can press T to tell her to move to your position, but the AI is too clunky sometimes.

there are also some gadgets you can use but you have to craft them with scarce resources so yeah they are kinda lame ngl.

On the bright side, the hook rope thing you attach yourself to platforms with works ok and is fun to use.

Verdict: 4/10. The hugest obstacle, Lily, hinders the game from growing into more than an escort game with stealth aspects in it. At least if they implemented a ''No Lily'' mode, it would've been great. As it stands, though, the game is NOT worth 17 euros. Go buy Styx: Shards of Darkness for yourself and maybe a friend with that money, it's much better spent.

KOVEIRA
KOVEIRA

An unique stealth game that can be quite fun to play if you can look past its flaws.

Pros:

1) The time-pause and rewind mechanic are both unique and interesting, especially since this is a stealth game. The only other game I have played of this sort is Superhot, but that is more action oriented.

2) Shadwen as a character has a cool character design. Her really long hair is well animated with minimum clipping and adds a sense of motion even during the moments when time is frozen.

Cons:

1) There is a strong lack of variety in assets in the world (I understand that this is a small budget game of course). It would have been nice to see more variety in objects.

2) Level design is quite bland, partly due to a lack of variety in assets and partly due to level layout.

Personal Note:

Dear developers (In case you read this): If there is ever a Shadwen 2, I would love to see the protagonist (Shadwen) retain the same design. A richer, more immersive world and Lily being part of the stealth mechanics would be great too!

McBritches
McBritches

Fun game, went the killing route. Like people have already said the killing route is very simple, but still fun. I lost interest in the story and didnt pay much attention to it but not a bad game just not the best. 6.5/10

Tinem
Tinem

A great first game for the world of "stealh games". The IA it's not big deal, it's easy to go through the levels, but give the fact that you can rewind your actions during the gameplays, it's cool

Silenthero
Silenthero

This game has the basis of a really strong stealth experience. Its just missing so much! Just a little bit of detail in the mechanics could go a long way. Like, crouching just making you totally silent too simple. Certain surfaces that create more noise, light and dark, AI that will actually search hiding places, a more complex alert system, etc. These kinds of things would take this admittedly fun but very shallow and overly easy stealth system to a genuinely great stealth experience on a level with the likes of Styx and possibly even Splinter Cell if they really nail a good sound system.

Missa Zane
Missa Zane

Fun stealth game. Not much story to it and always felt like the rest of the game was juuuust about to start, but never did. I still enjoyed it, though, and thought it was worth the price :) 7/10 would brutally kill then hide the body to prevent a little girl from hating me.

Creamy Goodness
Creamy Goodness

Pretty shit. The starting, stopping and rewind features are just a pain in the arse. Game has so much potential but just lacks the balls like other similar stealth games

VanSven73
VanSven73

Geat Idea, but the controls are a pain in the neck!
I never thougt that controls could be worse then in "Never alone", but here it is.

I read some reviews, mentioning the exact same thing and I didn´t believe them. And here I am telling you.
So, don´t be me an I suggest to give this a pass.

Irish Firepot
Irish Firepot

As far as stealth games go, it's not bad but it's not going to get any big awards either. On the hand, the game-play was smooth and the most entertaining mechanic was that fact you could rewind time at any moment and go back as far as desired, so if you screwed up, you don't need to reload a save, just go back a bit until you're no longer screwed. Only other thing to mention is upon completing the main story, you have the option to play all the levels in reverse.

a miserable arabesque lover
a miserable ar…

4 different endings, 2 different playthroughs. Little Lilly can be a problem if you try to finish the game without killing anyone. Sometimes, she doesn't follow orders or doesn't move even if there is no threat around her. If you wanna kill everyone or most of the guards, Lilly won't be a problem since there won't be many guards around her.

Pros:
+ It has a nice companion story.
+You can climb almost everywhere, that makes you feel free.
+Different killing options(e.g. posion dart, mine, etc.)
+Easy to access, it's worth its price

Cons:
-Terrible AI, can't tell you now, you just need to see it yourself.
-Hard to play as a ghost(thanks to Little Lilly)
-The game has some glitches. Guards doesn't even see you while you walk in front of them(sometimes)
-Not fully optimized, can be a problematic game for low spec pcs

essen
essen

Very mixed feelings about this game. But considering the genre, if you want a great stealth game, just play Styx. This game doesn't even compare.

There are two ways to play this game: spare everyone, or kill everyone. When you spare everyone, you have to guide the little girl accompanying you by making noise to distract the guards to let her go through unnoticed. It's very tedious and you don't get to use most items in the game, because getting materials to craft them is even more tedious and you don't win much doing that anyway. It's possible to have a "no kill" run and still kill guards, as long as the little girl doesn't see you, but feels like cheating.

The other way to play the game is to kill people. All people, if you want to get a certain achievement. This changes the dialogue to focus more on the killer than the little girl, and you get some better background about the game's story (because otherwise it's abysmal). You can use more items that you craft. It's more fun. But it's still repetitive and mostly about making noise and then jumping or slashing guards without being seen, or hiding fast enough to not alert the guards.

The game will not move unless you do (or decide to make time move) and there's a rewind function. This makes the gameplay fairly slow for one, and very trial-and-error for another. Sometimes you can rewind and do the same as before and this time you'll manage to do it. Rewind isn't as precise as it'd be in a 2D game.

Crafting in this game is useless. Lots of chests to find, and you'll barely need the items anyway. What's the point?

Finally there's a very annoying issue when doing a no-kill run where the guards can commit suicide in a number of ways. And sometimes even when they're not in range so you'll miss being notified about it. Had to repeat a level 3 times because of this.

The game features a "reverse" version of the levels that seems to have been added after release. Apparently you unlock another item blueprint on completion. I didn't bother.

The story could have benefited from being expanded upon. Especially when you do a no-kill run. It's too weak to stay interested for 15 levels.

BLUESTORM2112
BLUESTORM2112

Conceptually interesting. But the execution is poor. Cumbersome and awkward stealth based game play with horrendous AI.

Ch0nToS
Ch0nToS

I enjoyed this game as did my son watching me play. I very much liked the challenge of not letting lilly seeing bodies and or shadwen kill. now i might achievement hunt.

Craft4
Craft4

I got it in the sale for 4€ - so i would say it´s worth the money.
I would not recommend to buy it at full pric - 17€.

What i found outstanding in this game is:
- The movement and actions of the player are not smooth and appear a bit shaky and you´ll make accidentally mistakes that are fatal.
- They found a very unique way to deal with this issue - it´s one of the best things and mechanics that are outstanding there: You can rewind your current game back, correct mistakes, avoid being detected, plan differently, make a different choice, experiment with the situations and challenges. This is a very big positive point.
- The AI of the guards is well meant, some concepts i understand but often it´s just frustrating and idiotic (i.e. guards that kill themselves and cause me to be a 'Killer'
- The animations of the guards are like wooden mannequins in slow motion
- It´s truly designed to be a 'sneak' game and can be challenging if not killing anyone and getting past.
- It´s very easy to just obliterate every enemy and progress, i did the 'kill-em-all' in my second run and was done in about 1 hour play-through (already knew how to swing, move and act - i felt like an unstoppable super assassin)
- If you sit in a corner and in some bushes, the 3rd person view truly fucks you, as it automatically zooms in and you see ... literally nothing.
- Oh it´s amusing to kill everyone, spare the king and watch the little girl that called you evil monster the whole game, suddenly forgive you and come with you as your child. Lets train her to be the next killer!

It´s a fun game that is not too long but it can be tedious if you do the silent non-killer approach. Overall i can recommend it as a game for a weekend if there is nothing else to do.

Sep
Sep

Babysitter Simulator

To be honest, you can just finish the game without using anything apart from pulling or pushing a barrel. It might be hard but doable..

mercenaryai
mercenaryai

Got Shadwen on sale and it turned out a pleasant surprise.
An indie / double-A stealth game, built around time-bending mechanic. The world only moves when you do, and you can rewind time back. This solve the trial & error - you just rewind instead of reloading, and feels very nice.

The gameplay is repetitive, rules somewhat abstract. Guards never see though bushes, and getting seen is an instant failure (rewind). There are very limited ways to interact with the world - rope arrow, physics (to distract or kill guards), backstab, few traps. But there is enough variety in level design and situations, the difficulty scales up nicely.
The voice over (guard dialogues) is repetitive, but done very well, suits the location, and delivers some lore bits about the game world.

The game is short (it took ~6 hours to complete, and that's because I took extra time to clear all guards for an achievement).

Overall, this can't compete with AA games in the genre. But as a distraction for a day, it's good.

Leafault
Leafault

É um stealth bonitinho, com uma mecanica de sempre de avançar e voltar o tempo, mas não tem história e a IA da menininha é porca, ela só te atrapalha.

Ajantis
Ajantis

Very good stealth game. Reminds me of the Assasin's Creed series.
I enjoyed everything: the graphics, the music and the smooth game-play.
The story is a bit simplistic, we don't know why the protagonist is on such an ambitious quest, what are her motives. The ending is vague.
In short, I surely recommend this game, but in order to be excellent, this game lacks some depth.
I would have added some more things to do like diplomacy or bribe as a way to deal with guards.

trenchmarian
trenchmarian

Playing through the game once not worrying about achievements was great!

The game has fun mechanics and cool sneak/puzzle elements, even kind of well laid-out characters.

The achievements however get tedious fast. I recommend just playing through the game not worrying about them.

I'd say you get 4 to 5 hours of good to great content, and many more of challenging content.

Hasekbowstome
Hasekbowstome

6/10

Shadwen is a stealth adventure game in which you navigate your way across a fantasy town, docks, and eventually castle to gain an "audience" with the king. Early on, you run into a little girl (Lily) and bring her along for the ride, having to create safe passage for her to move from hiding place to hiding place across the level. This is primarily done through one of two methods - distracting guards and not killing them, or just murdering every guard in sight so she can pass by safely. Which one you choose has an impact on the game's story, in addition to being relevant to a series of achievements for clearing the game without kills or killing everyone. I played through as a pacifist on my first run, and found this to be generally enjoyable.

The methods for making this run work did start to get a bit repetitive and at times even fairly tedious through the back portion of the game, though I did enjoy the harder difficulty of the last level. This wasn't helped as the later (and longer) levels have further gaps between cover, causing Lily's movement to became more and more finicky and she frequently would not move easily to the next spot, or would very obviously be in a position where she was obviously seen. While this doesn't cause any sort of game over (the game is very generous with allowing you to "rewind" and try something different without losing significant progress), it is somewhat obnoxious and it kind of shows off the seams of the game, as ratings systems don't allow kids to be killed in most games, so the guards simply don't react to her and she will run back to her previous hiding place. The graphics were solid and the sound design and the world itself was quite immersive (outside of those issues with Lily). The story itself wasn't particularly impressive to me, as I would've liked a more clear understanding of Shadwen's motivations for her actions and for taking Lily along - there are certainly hints that could've formed a much more compelling story.

After playing through the first time without killing anyone, I tried going through a second playthrough to pick up the achievement chain for killing everyone, and I found this to be much faster of a playthrough and a much more fun playthrough as well, as this allowed for much more creativity than the pascifist playthrough. Sneak up on someone, drag a barrel down on top of their head, blow up a nearby gunpowder barrel, or simply distract them into an isolated area where you can drop down from above and get the kill. This second playthrough actually reminded me a lot of the early fun in the Assassin's Creed games, finding more and more creative ways to kill your target. Shadwen is a solid game that has some flaws that keep it from being a great game, but it's still worth your time and makes a really good entry point to the stealth genre.

Serieus
Serieus

Fun stealth game made by Frozenbyte, the developers who brought us the Trine series. In Shadwen, you play as the title character and you must find the king as you have been wronged and seek revenge. On your adventure, you quickly meet up with a young orphaned girl, Lily, who tags along. You must help either distract the guards or kill the guards so she can navigate through the levels of the game safely.

It is your choice whether or not to kill, either way, you must use stealth as alerting the guards will end the level. Since stealth is such a huge part of the game and since there can be many guards all at once, the devs have decided that if you stop moving your character, then the world around you pauses so you can think of your next move. At first I found this quite distracting and killing the immersion, but eventually I got used to it and used it to my advantage immensely. Also, there's a button you can press for real time to move forward even if your character does not move.

The graphics are decent, nothing to truly brag about, and since it's a stealth game, it really pushes the dark palettes as the story is based on you sneaking through the night until dawn. The sounds are good, but again nothing innovative or spectacular. There are 15 levels to go through with some taking maybe 45 minutes. The little girl's AI is not the best. Sometimes she'll go to places you didn't expect her to go, and other times she seems to ignore guards entirely and runs right by them going to the next hiding spot.

Hiding spots are found all around the levels such as hay stacks or bushes. You and the young girl can hide in there, and if you kill any guards you can drag them to the hiding spots so that other guards patrolling the map do not see them. Throughout the game you will find chests filled with miscellaneous objects. In some you will find blueprints for items that can help you distract or kill the guards. You also have a grappling hook of sorts to help access objects, platforms, and more. Moving objects can get the attention of the guards. The grappling hook is a strange mechanic that could have been made so much easier to use as it never seems smooth since you must pause the game's movement in order to truly aim correctly for where you want to go next.

I did enjoy the game, and definitely recommend it as it is a fun game, albeit a bit repetitive in the latter levels. However, what I found interesting is that this game seems to have been copied in a newer game called A Plague's Tale. It takes heavy influences from Shadwen. A medieval time period, a female protagonist who helps to navigate a young orphaned child through the dangerous landscape. I would suggest that A Plague's Tale does a better job in most departments, however, that's unfair to Shadwen since it did come quite a few years earlier.

Either way, I recommend this game and hope you get to enjoy it as well. Frozenbyte is an amazing developer and I was happy to see them venture off into new territory with this stealth game.

art.vandelay
art.vandelay

Shadwen is a cool sneaky game with hook and rope more useful and amazing that Indiana Jones' whip, creative climbing & pulling physics and a generous pausing system. Its developer/publisher Frozenbyte also made the acclaimed physics puzzler adventure series named Trine. Shadwen is an interesting and novel take on stealth games. It offers plenty of challenging tight spots to clear, but also opportunities for free physics-based experimenting and creative goofing around.

The plot is okay. As fate crosses your own path with that of a small orphan girl, you can choose which type of makeshift-guardian you'll be; a shadow passing through an area without anyone knowing - or a deadly shadow passing through an area without anyone alive to tell. How you deal with the enemies will affect the way the story between yourself and the little girl unfolds, or at least its ending. (For achievement hunters and completionists, I'd suggest you play the game first without killing a soul, then do a second, swifter playthrough in the now-familiar environments where you leave none alive.)

Shadwen has an interesting set of base-mechanics. Your rope allows you to climb, hang and swing quite instinctively. Your character is also agile and swift. Your companion, the orphained little girl, less so. She is controlled by AI, but you can also point her to move into places whenever you want. Timing is the key - clear an area of enemies or use a decoy to lure them away and then tell the girl to sneak from one hiding spot to another. The objective is to guide her through each area unnoticed.

It sounds potentially very annoying and spells out "Escort Mission - the game", right? Actually, no. Shadwen turned out to be that rare escort mission made well and its mechanics work alright most of the time. The amount of ways to lure away or deceive the guards are aplenty. Simply snapping your hook and rope at a box and dragging or staggering it just a bit creates confusion from a nearby guard. Finding the right combination of deception and movement is like solving a lively puzzle in an interesting environment. Pausing (freezing the moment in place), ordering the girl around and moving yourself in position for either a silent kill or staying unnoticed is enjoyable. Succesfull passages of play in tight spots made me smile as the tables had suddenly turned and I, the outnumbered, hunted underdog, was outwitting the guards, playing tricks on them (for my own amusement) and leaving them utterly confused.

All in all, Shadwen is a good stealth game with lots of originality in its story and mechanics. This here is one escort mission I wouldn't want to give a pass.

Krosis
Krosis

The medieval atmosphere is one of the best I ever saw, with beautiful designed scenarios, vistas and soundtrack. The gameplay is very linear and has nothing else to make you want explore besides some chests. The storyline is good but lacks context. It's not an unfinished game by any means, but it a bit more development wouldn't had hurt. It's a great game and I do recomment it.

denzer.juan
denzer.juan

takes a little getting use to with the time moves forward and back concept. Once you get the hang of it. It is quite fun

Xelos
Xelos

My main concern before buying Shadwen was that the escort aspect of the game is going to be annoying. Bu it turns out the system is almost entirely automated, and you can't be found or fail the level because of the girl. That's great! But then my heart sank when I learned that to get the "good" ending, you couldn't kill any enemies. Why do games do that? And then they ALWAYS give you a bunch of cool lethal toys and no non-lethal ones? This is going to be annoying...

But wait. The game doesn't say that I can't kill enemies. It says that my protegee CAN'T SEE ME killing anybody.

That changed the game into a benny-hill like dark comedy, with boxes crushing guards just out of her sight, her strolling happily between bushes chock-full of bodies, and me constructing makeshift box fences to shield her from the sights of carnage. It was a truly unique experience. I don't know if it was the developers intend (although I suspect it was) but it works very well.

Other than that, Shadwen has a couple of cool ideas. The grapling hook mechanics are taken whole cloth from the Trine games (you can pull object, swing on the line and pull yourself up) where it was a lot of fun, and that fun carried over. The other gimmick is that the time doesn't move unless you move or you hold a button to let it pass -it's a great mechanic for a stealth game, which is more about planning than fast reflexes. The fact that you can rewind the last 20 or so seconds of gameplay also prevents any cock-up cascades, which can be a huge fun drain in stealth-em-ups.

It's kinda janky, and quite limited, but if you're a fan of the genre there's some geniuenly cool ideas here, well worth a try.

Inno
Inno

Shadwen is not Styx: Shards of Darkness but it doesn’t have to be. It is still a fun stealth based adventure game with charming characters and nice graphics. I especially like that it has different endings depending on how you have played the game (Did you kill anyone or did you sneak your way across each level). There are lots of ways to make your way through a level and the game even gives you the opportunity to rewind time to correct mistakes.

The levels could use some variety (the main part of the game plays in the same city) and the AI is really dumb at times.

Mattved
Mattved

It's fairly well playable once you set the rope controls to any keys, the mouse wheel just feels weird to use.

In terms of graphics, it is mediocre with limitations in flexibility of character models - when pulling up the rope, Shadwen can look really awkward. Regardless, the aim for half-realistic medieval themed graphics instead of the lazy approach we get to see nowadays does pay off - it doesn't offend. I appreciate the attention event to elements player rarely comes to contact with such as the water and explosions.

Audio design is fine, music is diverse and does react to tension, event sounds are recognisable, there were only few repetitive lines. Fun bit is when far into the castle, guard tells another off blaming suspicious noise on the crows.

The story is simple yet captivating. Audio-only dialogues running over loading screens are a fantastic touch, other than them, most of the narrative comes from the guards that player overhears. Most of the guards are portrayed as humble town folk who only lack one thing Shadwen has - bravery.

Overall, bang for the buck, 5/7

TaLLa
TaLLa

Sometimes you don't want to give thumbs up or down but something in between. The game is not great but but still a solid game from an indie dev.

Shadwen looks like a Thief game at first maybe similar to A Plague Tale with your protégé but you have one major difference. I needed some moments to understand Lily's role. She is neither the usual damsel in distress nor a useful companion. But when she starts running from one brush into the next one I had my personal aha! moment. The game is a combination of a stealth game with genre-known physics features and a puzzle game where you have to open the way for Lily with distractions against the soldiers. At least that's one way of playing the game, you have also the freedom to slaughter yourself through the game.

Going silent without killing anyone, or killing everyone and let Lily witness the death changes the dialogue in the loading screens and the end cinematic of the game. Something A Plague Tale copied like several other things, It doesn't change anything for the gameplay though so you are free to do what you want but don't expect real side effects.

The game is clean overall, no crashes, no major bugs, good controls and an open environment. I really liked that the character moved freely most of the time without the sticky hands and feed of something like Assassin's Creed. One thing I didn't like was Lily's behavior in several moments. She leaves the brush when she has a free road to cross but struggles on longer runs. Also she has some kind of checkpoint when she enters another brush. Problem is that she also loves to leave out brushes on the way and when she crosses a soldier she runs back to the last checkpoint even if there are brushes on the way she didn't enter though cause the road was free. That's pretty annyoing sometimes and ends up in some annoying try and error. On the other side she also reacts pretty smart, crosses the soldiers fast using the smallest windows and angles to reach the next checkpoint. The system works though she needed a bit more refinement. I also didn't like that she only took the straight road forward where she could have gone around some chests etc. Sounds easy but I bet that's hard to compile but still Lily is taking a major part in the game and her behavior is struggling sometimes.

The artstyle of the game and world is really pretty but you can't go around the fact that it's repetitive like most parts of the gameplay. They change the features of the sections but it's always the same alley, with the same white houses and the same kegs and boxes lying around. While all enemies look the same. As you cross a whole city it would have been nice to visit different parts of it like you start in the slums and later enter the middle class districts and upper class district maybe some red light district or whatever. Variation.

The gadgets look really nice but as I played a pacifists playthrough I couldn't use most. Maybe they should have added more non leathal stuff instead of so many tools of death. The crafting looks really nice and artsy. I always love games which offer the hook to swing around like Batman. It was already nice in LAU Tomb Raider games etc.

Overall it's a solid game cause the gameplay is pretty clean and free to control. I liked the puzzle idea for Lily and the freedom to go around it if you need more action. Also funny how much A Plague Tale took from this game. It looks like a nice start for a first game with these features. But yeah, it's really repetitive and design and gameplay. It's the typical first game when a dev has a nice idea but they want to fill the whole game with this one idea with some different gadgets. I would love to see if Frozenbyte would go one step further in a successor. Sadly it seems that the reception wasn't well enough and that they went back to only making Trine games. I hope they didn't give up the stealth gaming world completely.

KoboldWorker
KoboldWorker

Shadwen is a gemstone right in front of your eyes :) If you like stealth games like Thief, Styx: Shards of Darkness then this will be a nice addition to the collection.I own those too and love the athmosphere very much. The timestop gameplay mechanic makes it a little bit jaggy sometimes in terms of movement dynamics, but in exchange, you can have sharp timing. Rewindind instead loading the whole game is great, too.
The art of the game has a nice indie vibe to it. I like to imagine that Shadwen is a halfling rogue assassin from a Dungeons&Dragons game!

SammuelMiranda
SammuelMiranda

Very interesting mechanics with the time "moving" only as you move (as surelly also the "rewind"), a good stealth like game, really worth it.

Weaver Ant
Weaver Ant

Alright, let's get something straight.
This game IS fun. Do I recommend it? YES but also NO. It honestly really depends on what you're expecting from this and the kind of player you are.

See, this game is advertised as a stealth game that allows you to be creative with your kills. And sure, it delivers that but it's also super incredibly easy as a game. Why? because you can rewind time... whenever you want... without consequence. It honestly removes any challenge at all to the game and I found myself trying my best to create at least some sense of challenge by trying to pull off super creative and succinct kills, and sure, it was pretty satisfying when I did, except I also had infinite tries... They also tried implementing a "superhot" type mechanic (except without the bullet dodging) where time only moves when you move and sure, it's pretty cool when you first start and it's pretty useful when trying to get precise grapple gun shots mid-air but it gets really annoying really quickly. Honestly, these two main mechanics are so poorly thought out it's kind of frustrating. They would have served a lot better had they maybe been some sort of gadget/power-up that maybe wasn't infinite and needed time or kills to recharge or something (also, a backstory would or reason for existing would have been nice though given how terrible the story-line is, it's not like it'd redeem it or anything).

Also, the stealth is not amazing, the ai is pretty dumb (quite funnily so at times) and Lilly (the little girl you have to escort through the entire game) is not the most responsive. And the story, well, the story isn't even worth mentioning. There's absolutely no nuance or depth to any of the characters and the story itself was quite haphazardly slapped on (and it's only ever being told during loading screens).

Alright, so I've been trashing this game a lot so far, so why am I still recommending it? Well, if you're looking for a challenging and well thought out stealth game, don't even bother with this title. HOWEVER, If you're a more casual player that likes some stealth and likes to get a little creative and spend time creating elaborate traps and ambushes or really just jumping and swinging around going on a stealthy murdering spree and feeling like a boss, well, you might have a good chunk of fun out this one.

Overall, there is a lot of fun to be had with this one but it's not anything amazing by any means.

7/10

wizcreations
wizcreations

A very forgivable Stealth game, great for people (like me) who love the Stealth genre but aren't very good at it. There's essentially no reason to be careful because you can always reverse time and try again without having to start the level over. This really allows for experimentation with all the different items and game physics, allowing you to enjoy everything the game has to offer without fear of punishment for making mistakes.

Your choice to play through the game murdering everyone or trying to remain unseen.

Despite the freedom the game offers, it really isn't fun. Several levels in I started to feel like I was merely doing the same thing over and over again.

buffjape
buffjape

This could have been a great game, apart from a few apparently untested "features"

Time stops unless you hold a key down:
- This makes swinging and moving around very difficult
- Holding a key down for long periods makes your hand ache. That's not fun.

The guards always behave the same way, so the solution to every level is the same:
- Hide in a haystack
- Use the grappling hook to move something, drawing the guards to you
- Wait until they give up searching, then kill them from behind and drag them into the haystack

Since i have to choose between yes or no, its a no.

Gene Wolfe
Gene Wolfe

About 6.5 hours worth of content here on one run. The hints at different endings aren't enough for me to replay it but the mechanics are fun. A great entry to the third-person stealth genre. Well worth it on sale, not sure if I'd say the same at full price (24 AUD).

Dan Niton
Dan Niton

This stealth game has one unique feature in particular. Imagine playing the superhot game but instead of an fps, its a stealth game and you will have an ai companion which you must babysit for the entire game. For those who are not familiar with superhot, its a game where time will only move when you're moving. That is what this game is about plus you can rewind time as well. But having this superhot mechanic in a stealth game is something I don't enjoy. Some of you may like it but I am not one of those who enjoyed it.

I don't like the fact that not pressing any button will freeze time in a stealth game as this is because it makes stealth a lot more inconvenient in terms of quality of life, for example:

1. When you fall and while you are falling, time freezes.

2. While waiting for your ai companion to reach her destination, through force of habit, you won't be pressing any button and thus time freezes.

3. Wait for an object to fall, also through force of habit you won't be pressing any button and thus time freezes.

To allow time to move again when you are not moving, you're gonna have to keep holding down a hotkey, this is the entirety of the game, hold down that one hotkey to keep playing, this is becoming an unnecessary chore and to me its annoying.


The main point is, this time freeze superhot feature is completely and utterly useless in this game, period!!!

This game could have at least been considered decent if it wasnt for the superhot mechanic.

S.T.A.R.S Leon S. K.
S.T.A.R.S Leon S. K.

CAREFUL SPOILER

Shadwen is an Indie or A+ Stealth Game from "TRINE" Frozenbyte

You play Shadwen. You assassinate the Former King & then you get betrayed by the new King whos your Ex Lover. He burn your Forest & Houses of Warden/ Soldier (They think the Former King did it). So you go for Revenge.

First you play Lilly whos starving & searching for food, because her Father is in the Quarry & died & Mother died after a rough Winter in the Spring..Level 1 is the Tutorial. You find an Apple on the Graveyard. But you get caught. Shadwen rescue you with Distraction or with Killing. Who can choose between (No Killing, Kill All, Kill Some, Kill the King or let him Alive at the End, so you have at least 4 different Endings & for all Achievements you need at least to play 2 times (No Killing, All Killing). Lilly will Remember you and after each of 15 short Level threat you good or bad.

+++ very good Gameplay (many Options to distract, many different Gadgets/ Special Weapon you can build if you find all 8 Distraction/Weapon Blue Prints and all (some very good hidden Treasure Chests, Time is only moving when you move (or press Q) like staying in Air for exact movements and Rewind to redo mistakes. Thanks to this you can do many different ways (sure if you need to rewind 1-2 Minutes it take a lot ot time to wait)

++ Game isnt to easy or to hard. 100 % makeable Achievements. I did it even without any Special Gadget/ Weapon use

+++ 5 Trading Cards (Perfect Number, not more needed)

++ Graphic is fine for Indie Game for 17 Euros

+ Sound is okay (sometimes good, sometimes could be better)

++ some good hidden Treasure Chests and rare Items

+ Shadwen & Lilly Happy End

+ You can replay the 15 Levels by Escaping (from the End to the Beginning, with different Enemy Positions and other Settings of the Environment

-- no big Challenge if you rush through "WITHOUT ALL KILLINGS/ NO KILLING" Achievement Challenge. Very short Levels & fast done if you know how to play

- many Potencial unused (like take out Lights with a Slingshot)

- A. I. Enemy if you move Boxes or Enemys are gone/ missing they dont care but fine for an Indie Game

If you like Stealth Games & Indie Games you should enjoy it when you dont expect to much.

Buy it with 50% -75 % Discount

I hope you enjoy it like me. I really would like a Shadwen & Lilly 2

⚡Thunderhead⚡
⚡Thunderhead⚡

First of all, I'm enjoying this game. It's addictive, in part, I think, because of the wise choice of making the game playable with different approaches to "stealth". I prefer to kill XD, and it feels satisfying to sneak, lure, stalk and stab the hell out of goons.
Game mechanics are original, at first I was a little unconfortable with the constant interruption of the game flow, but then mi mind kinda just clicked into the right place and I dont notice it anymore.

ON the down side:

Goons are lame. ON the first place they're morons. On the second place the're always the same, I think the worst part of the game is some degree of repetition.
Loot is scarce and a little frustrating. I mean, it kinda sucks when you see three guys guarding a chest, and you go and kill them all and then, when you reach the chest... it contains cord and a rat. Don't get me wrong, resources are useful for creating gadgets but... it feels like a very little reward.
About the gadgets, it's a little annoying not knowing exactly what a gadget do unless you try it, schematics are unclear about the real use.

To sum up, a nice game, with some innovation, and very addictive; however it's flaws and even it's mechanics can make it weird for some players. It's not for everyone.

Sunset.Sarsaparilla
Sunset.Sarsaparilla

Shadowen is a charming stealth game with an inventive time rewind mechanic, like visualizing your path and executing it. If you love sneaking around and a medieval setting, if you grew up playing Thief - definitely grab this gem!
I believe what sold me the most on it however was the setting. You don't need much to fully go with the intent of the game. It doesn't soak you in world lore, it doesn't feel like you miss any information either. It's an event happening during the time of one night and all you need to know is there. Truly charming if you just go with it!
I also believe the game is the right length to allow an enjoyable replabayility. Sneaking around unnoticed is really fun but so is taking care of the guards in inventive ways!

[BLK] Telu
[BLK] Telu

A mix between Prince of Persia & Assassin's creed. Like it was when both series started a couple of years before. You should really try it. The main character has charisma and the content is unique & great !

Toxic4Bulletz
Toxic4Bulletz

Really good game and story, if your looking for a good stealth game with really good story telling you need to try these game out

Ahnima
Ahnima

Shadwen is probably the weakest title from the team that brought us the Trine series. For an indie stealth title it does the job, but be warned, it is a budget title. Game length came in at ~10 hours for two full runs. AI is ridiculously dumb and the lack of interaction between Lily and Shadwen is a little disappointing.

The overall game play was pretty typical for the stealth genre although, very uninspired. I would only recommend this title to avid Frozenbyte/Stealth fans and at an extremely steep discount.

Derp Herpington
Derp Herpington

I wouldn't call this a good game, but it's good enough to warrant a play through. I found that it was super easy to beat the levels, and the story doesn't really develop much. The game play itself doesn't contribute to the story very much by way of discovery, the entire narration is done by the guards - Something that I thought was pretty cool. Game mechanics are extremely easy to understand.

I played the game without using any of the gadgets that become available throughout, I only used the grappling hook.

Probably won't play it again, but not disappointed that I played it either. So it's a thumbs up from me.

canaryinacoalmine
canaryinacoalmine

Another complete failure from the creators of Starbase. Unlike stealth games should be, it not only encourages, it forces you to kill every single enemy so the stupid little girl can come along and open doors for you. Not to mention the enemy AI are complete idiots, but the second they see you, they instantly kill you.
The time stop mechanic is terrible, and is antithetical to a stealth game. You don't need to think or plan, as you can just sit in stopped time or rewind time. It's also annoying. I wish I could turn it off, because I basically have to hold down Q the entire time to actually play the game.
The time control ability also seems completely unexplained, unless it's talked about in one of the poorly drawn cutscenes.
The art design and voice acting is also hot garbage. Guards have like 3 voice lines, there are only 2 kill animations, and Shadwen is vomit inducing.
I was going to try and speedrun it as a joke, but it's so bad I can't even do that.

Erbabudojo
Erbabudojo

The game has a very unique style and is quite cool. Cool story. cool characters. cool graphic. all in all cool. My biggest minus - the Linux support is quite bad. Controller are not supported in Linux. You have to map the keyboard layout to your controller to make it work.

amiruddin274
amiruddin274

A mix Super Hot and Prince Of Persia with infinite rewind time. Highly Recommend for stealth game lovers

CeyeN
CeyeN

I understand it's made by a smaller team with a low budget, And having finished the game, I would still rate the game bad for the following reasons

Negatives:

1. Bad Graphics (looks like a 2005 game)
2. Bad AI (Both enemy and Lily)
3. Awkward rope swing mechanics
4. Bad Platforming (The player will most often than not miss to hold otherwise easily reachable ledges)
5. Horrible animations
6. only 2-3 enemy character models
7. Extremely repetitive, Except the last level, rest of them looks and plays the same
8. I finished the whole game without killing a single guard and still found the game not a challenge at all
9. No linear difficulty
10. Repetitive world assets and character models, Looked like a poor man's assassins creed with in game assets copied and pasted everywhere

Positives:

1. The rewind mechanic saves the hassle of reloading a game from a checkpoint for a silly mistake

scotmcc
scotmcc

This is a great game. Engaging story, fun mechanics, and just difficult enough to fun but not frustrating. Great game!

SieEhmBe
SieEhmBe

not the greatest enemy AI, some can see you through walls/ objects, while others can't see you in plain sight "elevation."

quite a few bugs, but none are game breaking, there was a achievement bug i experienced that ruined my "kill 0 guards" run so i just ended up massacre'ing them. lily will annoy you on the later levels when she has a open path to go into next hiding spot but just runs back and fourth like a chevy equinox going to and from the repair shop.

the story is pretty interesting. but not really there. it's more of how you played the game.
replayability in this game is a no for myself, because there are too much annoyances for me to want to achievement hunt in this game. (lily being a derp, and guard AI inconsistencies that mash your buttons)

the game i wouldn't say is worth full price, maybe 9.99. pick it up on sale.. unless you prefer to support the developers. this game is a solid game and i definitely can recommend it.

pretty good spiderman game though.

snottie
snottie

Shadwen or as I like to call it Shart When? Ha ha...

For a stealth game it lacks a lot of the key fundamentals that make one good.

One of my Biggest gripes with this game would be the enemies. There are 2 variations of enemies light and heavy, not much difference. All of them have crossbows and will just insta-kill you as soon as they see you for longer than 5 seconds. Their AI is terrible, they go from idle to investigate and then alert, nothing more. Enemies will stumble around chasing a barrel being dragged around until you let go of it. They don't seem to question it nor go into a higher level of investigation or caution. Enemies
walk waddle around so slowly it's almost as if they been going to the toilet in their diapers waiting for shartwen to come through.

Worst part about any of this besides the story, the enemies or the terrible stealth, would be Lilly. For some reason the main character lets a child follow them around on their mission to kill the king... why bro. Why make me a baby sitter in a action stealth game, why make the entire game an escort mission. They at least had the decency to not give her a health bar or make her noticed by enemies. I understand for story reasons they wanted to have this big sister relationship dynamic or whatever. But, the story sucks arse anyway so whats the point even. I feel like only reason the developers added her into the game, was to stop the player from speed running to the end of the level without even having to deal with an enemy once.

Two things I like about the game.
#1 I like the fact that most of the game heavily relies on physics for stealth. Only problem is that enemies don't really respond to it much besides being able to kill them with heavy objects or investigating an object that has moved.
#2 The ability to control time is a great feature. Being able to go back without having to load a save or restart the entire level is a godsend. However it does feel clunky sometimes, I recommend binding a key to toggle Pass Time.

Over all the game sucks eggs, it's mediocre at best and a piss poor stealth game. Just play Thief or one of the earlier Splinter Cell games.

Abelhawk
Abelhawk

This game is just kind of boring. It has some cool mechanics in it and it's worth playing for a little, but after three or four levels of the same types of obstacles over and over, I just felt done. If the AI were better, or there were more types of enemies, or if the controls weren't as clunky, maybe it could be worth getting at full price, but the graphics and interesting storyline are basically only worth it if you get this title on sale.

rami.nuotio
rami.nuotio

Incredibly fun gaming experience after getting a grip of the gameplay. How hard can it be NOT to rush one's moves. :D I loved the paused time and rewind mechanics. It was also a revelation to see that it was a Finnish made game during the end credits and the song was in Finnish as well.
High recommendations!

Caley19
Caley19

great game with enjoyable gameplay mechanics with no rush since you can pause/freeze time at any point

CursedSaint
CursedSaint

After playing 1.2 hours of this game, i find this game is really good but not for me. Considering Assassin's Creed, this game is alright when it comes to stealth and deception. There is a side character called Lily and she is hiding while you are clearing the way. Here is where the game has a few problems. There has been a few times where Lily was suppose to be hiding or should've been caught by the guards when in fact she was running in the middle of the way. It didn't bother me as much but i think it's an issue to be considered. I didn't expect a game like Assassin's Creed but it's better than what i was expecting. I'm sure you'll enjoy it too.

Avocado Diaboli
Avocado Diaboli

https://youtu.be/zCStbihXc78

I admit, Shadwen stuck out to me because the last game I played was A Plague Tale: Innocense. When I saw Shadwen in my Steam library and noticed the many similarities it has to A Plague Tale: Innocence, I simply had to play it in order to see if these similarities run any deeper and how their respective design might say something about the other.

So yeah, Shadwen is a stealth-action game but very much more focused on the stealth portion than the action portion. Meaning that getting seen is not an option here, since that basically spells instant death at the hands of some very trigger-happy crossbow wielding guards. It starts the eponymous Shadwen. And with a name like that there weren’t many other career options open besides sneaky assassin.

Shadwen is on a mission to assassinate the king of some unspecified country for wronging her in some way. So the game is mostly just one lengthy intrusion across the many city districts that surround the castle. But there is a spanner in the works in the form of Lily, a young orphan whom Shadwen rescues at the start of the game and who insists on following along with her through her adventure.

Now I can already tell that some of you got that nervous eye twitching from years of forced stealth sections made worse by also being escort quests. And I admit, framing the game as a giant escort quest was a strange decision. However, the game makes up for it by making Lily automatically advance through enemy territory unseen. So it’s more that you have to create a path in front of her to follow rather than shepherd her from point to point. I mean, you can do that if you want to turn off the auto-follow option in the settings, but why would you, you masochist? You can still manually direct her, though it’s often a crapshoot if she’ll actually follow you and go where you intend to navigate her through. It never got so bad that it made me want to outright quit the game, but I’ll still mention that this aspect will have a high potential for frustration for some people.

Now I’ve implied that Lily is fairly competent in navigating these spaces, to the point where she’ll clear quite large stretches of any given level without the player needing to lift as much as a finger. However, that has as much to do with the design of the game as it does with how janky it is.

I’m not going to lie here, it’s extremely apparent that Shadwen is an indie release. There are so many rough edges around this game that are on display on a constant basis. Lily’s pathfinding is sometimes hilarious when she wanders straight through enemy sight lines that somehow don’t register her, while at other times refusing to move from cover to cover when the opportunity presents itself. Enemies also have laughably bad pathfinding and often walk straight into each other for seconds before managing to get past one other. And while they sometimes manage to see Shadwen if she’s standing somewhere above them, most of the time they’re blind as bats and mostly rely on their therefore elevated hearing. And speaking of jank, it’s fucking hilarious to see Shadwen dangle around on the end of her hook shot rope, flopping around in the physics engine like a stranded fish.

Now all of that jank doesn’t mean that I hated the game. Far from it, I actually enjoyed it quite a bit. And the reason for that is that it does stealth right. Shadwen is competent enough and has the necessary tools available to get around these enemies in ways that are fun. Now when I say “tools”, what I actually mean is “tool”, singular. Because the aforementioned hook shot is mostly all you really need. Since the game is very much physics focused, there are a lot of ways you can manipulate the environments to create paths for Lily to follow. You can push around boxes, if you want to be boring. Or you can use your hook shot to drag and dangle boxes to generate sounds that lure enemies away from the path you’re trying to clear while you’re also constantly trying to remain hidden. And I’ve found this approach to be very rewarding, since it carried me through the entire game.

Now while I personally would’ve been fine with just the hook shoot, Shadwen also has a bunch of craftable tools in there like bombs, arrow traps and a couple of decoys to distract guards. But while I almost never really needed the latter save for very few instances, the former went entirely unused because I wanted to go for a non-lethal run. That’s right, it’s a stealth game where you can actually pull off a completely non-lethal run from beginning to end. So forgive me Frozenbyte for not using all the fancy tools you probably put quite a bit of effort into designing and implementing.

But I think the best idea they’ve had was the time rewind mechanic. The game every so often completely freezes during gameplay. This isn’t a bug, as I initially feared, but completely by design. Yes, just like Superhot, or any proper roguelike, really, time only moves when you move. And since much of this game can be a bit trial and error prone, especially if you want to do things non-lethally and sometimes it’s just not clear how much force is required to kill a guard, the developers just lifted Prince of Persia’s time rewind mechanic. So you can immediately undo your actions and try a different approach. I don’t know how much of the gameplay gets recorded for you to rewind through, but I’ve tested it at one point and managed to go back quite a while to a very early state of the level. I feel the game would’ve been much more frustrating had this mechanic not existed, and I think the developers knew. But as it stands, every mistake is just a button press away from undoing. And I like that very much. Is it explained in the narrative or justified anywhere? No. But the game is certainly better for having said mechanic than not having it. It is a bit tedious having to push a dedicated button to move time forwards if you’re just trying to stand still and wait out guard patrols, though.

But yeah, that’s about it from a gameplay perspective. I generally liked the progression through the levels a lot. It’s one of the few games I’ve played that actually gets harder the longer you play, since the opportunities to Batman your way through elevated vantage points continuously shrinks while enemy density keeps going up. It mostly works and doesn’t get too overwhelming, except for one particular spot that somewhat tested my patience. Though it does become a bit comical by the end when you’re infiltrating the castle and still see giant bushes littered around the halls and corridors to give Lily a place to hide. And while it has a decent length to last you a couple of hours, it’s clear that it’s also somewhat brushing up against how far you can carry a game like this, since the scenery never changes much and without much in terms of narrative going on.

And that’s really where the game sadly feels a bit underwhelming. There’s not much interaction between the two female leads beyond the exchanges between levels on loading screens. And what’s there doesn’t really do much for me. The guards also have quite a bit of stuff to say while they’re idling around, and it is used to flesh out the world and story a bit. But it’s just as often inconsequential fluff you could entirely skip without missing much.

In conclusion I’ll give Shadwen a mild but very warm recommendation. I personally had fun with it, even with all the jankiness. But jank is something I can live with if I can get a nice and entertaining little stealth experience out of it. It’s a shame that there’s not much meat on the bone in the story department, but forgivable for an experience that mostly just exists for the gameplay.

Jabberwocky
Jabberwocky

This game isn't long, but very enjoyable. The rewind feature made it so much less annoying when one of your ideas doesn't go to plan. No loading endless saved games! Just rewind a few seconds, or to before the trouble started, and try again! Some replayability chasing the 2 sets of achievements. Definitely worth it on special. Ran really well on my Mac on Mojave.
One trick, if you have multiple screens, and you find the mouse pointer wandering on to the second screen and making it difficult to control. At the start of each session, push you mouse into your mission control corner twice. After the second, when the game is back on screen, you'll have no more trouble with the mouse leaving the game screen!

Jaejatae
Jaejatae

Shadwen is a nice stealth game with some interesting mechanics.
Getting caught is letal, but time only moves when you want it to, giving you nearly full control of what's happening.

Despite the consequences of being caught, the game is pretty easy to beat (both killing everyone or sparing them). The guards have a limited perception of their environment, making it easy to sneak around them for a kill or to hide somewhere else.

The story is cool, but not very deeply explored. Most of what happened is hinted at by guards' dialog or the ending cutscene.

Overall, I found it a very fun game.

mike9_the_snake
mike9_the_snake

It has been a long time since I finished a stealth game and was able to say they kept it stealth throughout, they skipped the random forced action sequences fights, and unneeded action boss fights along the way,

In this day an age not enough stealth writers and developers understand its importance, so a huge thank for keeping it a stealth game and not turning it into to an action stealth game.

I finished it with a huge smile and will look back fondly.

southernfinn
southernfinn

Basically I did not want to enjoy this game this much. Was just searching for something to play after quite a long action game. But as usual, sometimes plan and reality are two different sets of shoes.
Not being very good at parcouring in ANY game I had my doubts about Shadwen, when i saw, that mostly she is airbound, but in the end, steering her was not as difficult as I thought. The story is nice, the weapons reasonable. But taking out the guards was sometimes not as easy as it looked and needed a retry.
Nevertheless, this game is a great stealth game with a very good protagonist, decent weapons and a story, that makes a player want to continue to reach the final destination with Lily. Recommended.

crazipowerz
crazipowerz

Neat little game.
I'm a sucker for time manipulation.
Also for stealth action.
So yeah if you like those it's a good game.
I appreciated the 3 pronged story arc it was a nice add.
Overall worth it, and glad to have played it.

HellCess
HellCess

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑮𝒓𝒂𝒑𝒉𝒊𝒄𝒔❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ More real than yourself
☐ Gorgeous
☐ Beautiful
☑ Decent
☐ Ugly
☐ 8-bit
☐ POV: you're on 1958

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑮𝒂𝒎𝒆𝒑𝒍𝒂𝒚❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ 10/10 GOD
☑ Amazing
☐ Just another gameplay
☐ Depressing
☐ ZzZ -10/10
☐ Regretful

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑨𝒖𝒅𝒊𝒐❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ Eargasm
☐ Melodical
☐ Harmonious
☑ Average BGM
☐ If you mute it it doesn't even matter
☐ I'd rather be deaf

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑨𝒖𝒅𝒊𝒆𝒏𝒄𝒆❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ Kids
☑ Teens
☑ Adults
☐ Grandma

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑹𝒆𝒒𝒖𝒆𝒓𝒊𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒔❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ Check if you can run paint
☐ Potato
☑ Noob-friendly
☐ Are you a streamer?
☐ You're living your dream gamer life
☐ Ask NASA if they have a spare computer

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑺𝒌𝒊𝒍𝒍𝒔❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ Main Yasuo
☐ Ez
☐ Intuitive
☑ High IQ
☐ Nightcore
☐ Pro player needed

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑾𝒓𝒊𝒕𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ Blank space
☐ Cliché
☑ Some lore
☐ Original
☐ Tryhard script
☐ It'll replace your life

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑳𝒊𝒇𝒆 𝑺𝒑𝒂𝒏❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ Shorter than happiness
☐ Coffee lasts more
☐ A chilling afternoon
☐ Weekend's Game
☑ Bingy
☐ This is your new life

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑷𝒓𝒊𝒄𝒆❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ It's free!
☑ Worth the price
☐ Shut up and take my money
☐ Not the best choice, but I made it
☐ This action will have consequences

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑩𝒖𝒈𝒔❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☑ You mean the little insects?
☐ Some of them
☐ Can get annoying
☐ Get some water 'cause you're going to scream
☐ The game itself is a big terrarium for bugs
☐ Bugs: I am... inevitable

- ͙۪۪̥˚┊❛𝑷𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒐𝒏𝒂𝒍 𝑹𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈❜┊˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
☐ F
☐ D
☐ C
☐ B
☐ A
☑ S
☐ SS