Short Review #23: Shadowgrounds

Shadowgrounds is a short indie game by Finnish developer Frozenbyte. I got it as part of a Humble Indie Bundle, which I bought mostly because it had Trine. Shadowgrounds sounded interesting enough, but ended up being a study in generic-ness.

The game has a generic plot, generic characters, generic gameplay, generic weapons, generic enemies... I've played the exact same game developed by different people under a different name many times before. Shadowgrounds has enjoyable (though again, generic) graphics, two elements which are somewhat interesting (the flashlight, which is severly underplayed and not that important to the gameplay in the end - and an upgrade system for the weapons, but that one isn't as good as it could be) and a good twist ending, though that one you can kind of see coming.

It's an enjoyable enough game despite being a poster child for a top-view camera action game, but I have to say, if I paid any serious money for this, I'd be seriously disappointed. My short recommendation is - get it only if you can get it for free or for a dollar or something like that. It's really not that great a game, unless you're a fanatic of the genre - in which case go for it. But for your regular gamer, Shadowgrounds really isn't anything worthy of a purchase.

A 6/10 all the way. 5/10 for being a standard, generic game, and +1 for actually being fun.