Shadowrun Returns

A bare bone CRPG. You have almost all the elements you expect from the genre, but in a very simplified way. A rigid, self-contained structure and story instead of a great and liberating adventure, full of choices. In other words: The game is a canned and on rails experience. But it doesn't drag on for more hours than necessary. Which is good. The only "new thing" here may be the turn-based combat inspired by X-COM, but without half the dynamism and customization. You have a serviceable variety of builds to explore, but nothing that is very noteworthy or replayable. The music is cool, though. The writing is reasonable and the story is passable, without many complex characters or crazy twists or dramatic and thematic density, but it serves as a solid introduction to the Shadowrun universe, which is more than reasonable to expect for such a short title. When it comes to mediocre stories told in a cyberpunk universe, a murder mystery with dystopian touches is actually quite interesting. Just don't expect a very memorable execution. The game presents flaccid technical competence and production values, without much personality or aesthetic value and deep mechanics, letting almost all of its charms appear through the text and some sporadically used concept art (Which is no big deal). Sure, at the time, it seemed more acceptable, but today, it seems like some kind of old cell phone game. I never thought I'd use that term to refer to an indie game, but Shadowrun Returns has aged a little poorly. It seems like a game that is too simple and shallow for its own good. It feels like a solid and versatile base for building more complex games (Which is exactly the case, given that Dragonfall and Chinatown are much better games). A techdemo if you will. If it were released today, perhaps its reception wouldn't be the best. But I think it's still worth it, even if it's just to play once. For better or worse, at least it's short and it's simple enough to function as a gateway to the genre, even if it's a somewhat crooked and unpainted gateway. And the interface is at least good and readable... Better than nothing, I guess.

Очень слабая игра: короткая, поверхностная, с не очень интересным сюжетом, со скучной прогрессией и малыми отличиями классов, с однообразными сражениями, со странной сложностью. Технически не хватает управления с контроллера, хотя такие версии игры существуют. Даже свою вселенную игра толком не раскрывает, в ней просто нет почти ничего кроме основного сюжета.

This game features no achievements on steam despite having them on other planfroms such as Xbox. (and despite the following 2 in the series getting them ... weird) The game's linear as hell. The story is interesting but again, this isn't a movie, it's a video game. You will have the same experience playing an idiot troll with an axe as you will the best decker out there, so go watch someone play on youtube... BONUS... you now have voice acting, which the game is lacking. What little gameplay there is is held back by the ancient system. Overwatch seems useless, just delays your turn.. maybe. *** Spoiler follows: *** By the later 80% of the game you will encounter some enemies that you have exactly 2 rounds to kill them with a very specific weapon. Otherwise they heal up to full and you have to start again... If you didn't put points into those weapons (shotgun in my case) you'll miss and miss ... bad design. Putting some points so late in the game won't work since you have to add points into Dex first, then ranged, then the weapon... and it takes a bunch to get it to decent. *** spoiler end **** They sold this initially as a platform that can allow for multiple expansions and DLC's ... that was a lie. Maybe the engine was developed but guess what, that turned into 2 more games that you have to buy. I'm going to say.. that maybe if you can get the entire trilogy for really cheap... otherwise this game alone for full price, Hell no!

[h1][b]7/10[/b][/h1] I guess I never reviewed this one. Too late to be of much use to anyone, but future me might appreciate the thoughts on it if I begin to go senile. (Also, I have many more hours played out of Steam and have completed the game multiple times.) [h2]Pros:[/h2] - The best cyberpunk game I've ever played - Combat is fun, abilities are fairly creative, and includes fantasy (or "urban fantasy") elements - I like it much better vs Hong Kong or Dragonfall [h2]Mehs:[/h2] - It's not very long. This is good because I don't like it when games drag on forever for no reason, but also kinda bad because I wish it was slightly longer [h2]Cons:[/h2] - Hacking sequences are annoying and repetitive - Race and customization options too limited

Nice to play game with great gameplay and story. Nice setting also. Works great on the steam deck.

[h1]투박함, 그 안에서 느껴지는 섬세함[/h1] TRPG인 섀도우런 시리즈를 원작으로 하는 아이소메트릭 장르의 게임. 섀도우런 특유의 사이버펑크+판타지가 결합된 특이한 세계관과 수려한 문장력의 텍스트들이 특징이다. 분명 저예산 게임 자체에서 느껴지는 투박함은 존재하지만, 이미 TRPG에서 검증된 세계관과 그에 긴밀히 연결된 플롯은 그 안에서 개발진의 열정과 잠재력을 느끼기 하기에 충분하다. 그럼에도 불구하고, 후속작인 드래곤폴을 위한 파일럿 게임이라는 느낌은 지울 수 없긴 하다. 거의 유일한 사이버펑크 장르의 아이소메트릭 게임 시리즈이고, 후속작인 섀도우런 드래곤폴이 워낙 잘 뽑힌 터라, 드래곤폴을 즐기기 전 한번 가볍게 거쳐가기를 추천한다. 보통 아이소메트릭 장르의 게임들이 압도적인 분량으로 입문자들에겐 큰 압박감을 주는데 반해, 이 게임은 그런 분량 문제에서 자유롭기도 하고.

I got this game for cheap in a bundle. It's worth what I paid for it. If you want a tactic's RPG it's good enough I guess. There's some interesting set pieces and ideas in the story, and Shadowrun deserves some praise for combining fantasy elements with a more modern sci-fi setting regardless of this game. Honestly, I only bought it because everyone hated the first person shooter of Shadowrun on 360 and that was one of my favorite games, so I figured this would be way better. It's not. But I don't play competitive shooters anymore so that's fine. It's good enough for what it is. Some of the writing is pure trash. Whoever wrote the script thought repeating statements was a good way to end conversations. And they end every conversation that way. Every fraggin one.