Publisher : Cenega Publishing | Developer : Black Element | Genre : Horror/Action/Adventure | Size : 200 Mb
No matter how you look at it, Shade: Wrath of Angels doesn't stack up. Taken as a survival-horror game, it's derivative, silly, and about as scary as an episode of Scooby-Doo guest-starring Don Knotts. As an action game, Shade suffers from a laundry list of flaws: a dull hero, boring and frustrating combat, repetitive levels, key hunts, scarce save points -- you name it. Shade isn't entirely bad, thanks to a few attractive visual touches and musical themes, but that's ultimately worth little in the grand scheme of things.
In Shade, you play as a generic tough guy whose brother just happens to be an archaeologist. It seems your little brother has stumbled onto an ancient mystery and gotten himself magically imprisoned by angry gods. You soon learn that you need to free him by first liberating four fallen angels trapped in parallel worlds. As described in one of the game's innumerable and unfailingly tedious cutscenes, this story makes little sense and is about as engaging as a page from the phone book. You'll just have to roll with it.
As you traverse the different game worlds, you'll run, fight, and jump from either a first- or third-person view. Neither view is satisfactory. The first-person view gives you the targeting crosshair that the third-person view lacks, but makes it harder to perform various Lara Croft-style stunts, like leaping chasms or shimmying along narrow precipices. The controls and camera are clunky, either way, making it hard to move fluidly or see clearly at times. It's also unclear how far you can fall without dying, which leads to frustrating trail and error during the game's many platformer segments. In addition to climbing and jumping, you'll also have to solve a smattering of relatively simple puzzles, which are often just tedious, no-brainer key hunts.
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Minimum System Requirements
Windows 98SE/ME
Intel PIII - 700 MHz
128 MB RAM
nVidia GeForce2, 32 MB RAM
2 GB free space on HDD
SoundBlaster compatible sound card
MS DirectX 9
Recommended System Requirements
Windows 2000/XP
Intel P4 - GHz
512 MB RAM
GeForce4, 256 MB RAM
4 GB free space on HDD
EAX Compatible sound card
MS DirectX 9
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