But honestly, I generally found myself rolling my eyes more often than not. Though a lot of the jokes seemed dated, they did get a few chuckles out of me. Wang’s voice work was well performed, while shooting off jokes at every opportunity. I think this is the first game I’ve played that felt over-acted there was almost never a point where nobody was talking. I feel obligated to discuss the voice acting in Shadow Warrior 3, because there is a lot of it. Upon going back and watching earlier parts of the game, I was relieved to learn that it wasn’t just me not paying attention – the character had around two minutes of screen time after being introduced, and then was only around for the very end. During the end cutscene, I had to double take, as there was a character I was sure had never been introduced.
The characters were lifeless and lacked any kind of relevance to the story, never doing anything important and leaving pretty much everything up to Wang. I never cared about a single thing happening on screen, and as far as I could tell, the game didn’t really care either. Though none of the Shadow Warrior games feature award-winning narratives, Shadow Warrior 3 feels exceptionally shallow, as if Flying Wild Hog, the developer, forgot that a story is meant to be cohesive and have overarching themes. Unfortunately, as a series veteran, I would argue that the third entry has the weakest story in the franchise. Sounds intriguing? Don’t get your hopes up. It’s up to Wang to gain allies, weapons, and powers to track down the dragon and defeat it, saving the world in the process.
The game opens with a story catch-up of sorts: an ancient dragon has destroyed the known world and most of its inhabitants. Shadow Warrior 3 follows the story of Wang, a wise-cracking ninja with a bloodlust for demons. Don’t get me wrong the fast-paced, adrenaline pumping combat of Shadow Warrior 3 and its predecessors is an enticing mainstay, but the derivative new gameplay mechanics, cringe-inducing story, and painfully short campaign prove that the series has yet to solve its 25 year long identity crisis. Given the series’ quarter-of-a-century-long existence, you would think the Shadow Warrior formula has been set in stone, right? Well, Shadow Warrior 3 proves, for the third time since the series reboot, that this is not the case. Since then, the series has seen multiple publishers, expansions, and a recent 2013 reboot. The Shadow Warrior franchise has been around for quite some time, with its first entry, Shadow Warrior, releasing all the way back in 1997.
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