Shadow of the Beast | Cinematic Platformer Paradise

[00:00:03] In an ancient age known as the late 1900s, a video game subgenre took root that dared to be bolder, dreamed to be bigger, and reached for the stars. Did they wow us with expensive productions and advanced graphical techniques? They absolutely did.

[00:00:23] Were they any good? Uh, you know what? Don't worry about it. Let's just relax and revisit cinematic platformers of eons past. This is Cinematic Platformer Paradise.

[00:00:52] Hello, cinematic people. Hello, Thanksgiving people. It's your boy Dre, and I'm once again back with Steve.

[00:01:00] Gobble, gobble.

[00:01:02] Gobble, gobble, not gobble, gobble, bitches?

[00:01:04] More like gobble, gobble, beasties?

[00:01:07] Gobble, gobble, beasties? Um, we're back. It's Cinematic Platformer Paradise. Thanks for joining us. This time, we are going to talk about Shadow of the Beast.

[00:01:20] Rawr.

[00:01:32] Shadow of the Beast was developed by Reflections and published by Psygnosis, one of the best logos in video game history, Psygnosis. Would you agree, Steve?

[00:01:42] Yeah, I loved seeing that right before playing way too much Lemmings.

[00:01:47] Why associate with Wipeout? Wipeout was my

[00:01:50] Psygnosis.

[00:01:52] That's a good choice.

[00:01:53] Yeah. Shadow of the Beast was released in 1989

[00:01:56] for Amiga first, and then ported to other systems like Genesis, TurboGrafx-CD, etc.

[00:02:04] A port for Super Nintendo. I didn't know this before doing research for this episode.

[00:02:08] A port for Super Nintendo called Super Shadow of the Beast was shown at Summer CES in 1992, but that version never came out.

[00:02:18] That has to exist somewhere.

[00:02:20] Somewhere. Someone's got to have that in their basement.

[00:02:23] Okay, you know what? Fuck this. Thanksgiving's canceled. I'm going home.

[00:02:27] Forget it. There's no show.

[00:02:28] I'm gone. I'm out.

[00:02:30] Come on, Super Nintendo. Okay, Super Nintendo-liker, come back. I'm sorry. Come on.

[00:02:35] It's not my fault they didn't release it.

[00:02:38] Fine. I played the game anyway. Fine. It's fine.

[00:02:42] Oh my god, dude. And me as a tween, I would have been so attracted to something called Super Shadow of the Beast. Holy shit.

[00:02:50] And then I get it home and it kicks my ass, but I'm mad.

[00:02:56] Yeah. Me too.

[00:03:00] So, Shadow of the Beast was the brainchild of Martin Edmondson and Paul Horath.

[00:03:07] And the original Shadow of the Beast was known for its 12 levels of parallax scrolling, as well as having 128 colors on screen, which in 1989, that was kind of a big deal.

[00:03:18] That's more than double the Genesis, folks.

[00:03:20] I think the Genesis have 64 on screen.

[00:03:23] And Super Nintendo could have 256, but that wasn't out yet.

[00:03:26] So, to have 128 on a home console that wasn't super-duper powerful?

[00:03:33] Man.

[00:03:34] And you see it in the game, Steve.

[00:03:37] The parallax is still a crazy effect today.

[00:03:40] That shit looks incredible.

[00:03:42] I was very impressive with the version we played.

[00:03:45] Also, Martin Edmondson said the game was designed to be as difficult as possible.

[00:03:51] He said that he always liked difficult games at the time, and he, quote, used to get frustrated if the game was too easy.

[00:03:59] End quote.

[00:04:00] I was considerably less impressed with that.

[00:04:03] Me too, buddy.

[00:04:05] You and me both.

[00:04:06] Oh, boy.

[00:04:07] We'll get there in a second.

[00:04:08] Any personal history with Super Shadow?

[00:04:11] Super Shadow of the Beast?

[00:04:12] Wow.

[00:04:13] We keep pushing this game into existence.

[00:04:16] That's crazy.

[00:04:18] Maybe if I just say it enough times.

[00:04:19] It's like Beetlejuice or Voldemort.

[00:04:21] If I just keep saying it, it'll happen.

[00:04:23] They're going to find the finished ROM as soon as we post this.

[00:04:25] I know, right?

[00:04:26] It's going to surface somewhere.

[00:04:29] Anyway, what's your personal history with Shadow of the Beast?

[00:04:33] Mine is none.

[00:04:34] I knew it existed because I generally followed, like, Psygnosis.

[00:04:38] Like, if I saw that symbol, even before I played Wipeout, I was like, oh, man, that's, like, a cool-ass logo.

[00:04:44] So whenever I saw an advertisement, it's like, oh, it's those guys.

[00:04:47] So I saw, like, the Genesis version, I think, advertised in magazines of Shadow of the Beast.

[00:04:53] But that's about it, Steve.

[00:04:54] I had never played the game before.

[00:04:56] I definitely saw the Genesis box, you know, in stores near me.

[00:04:59] But I never played the game.

[00:05:01] No one had this game.

[00:05:03] Here's how we played it.

[00:05:04] There's a 2016 remake of Shadow of the Beast on PS4 and certainly other systems, probably.

[00:05:10] But within this remake, you can unlock the 1989 original for Amiga.

[00:05:15] And that's the version we played, Steve.

[00:05:19] I was not super impressed with the 2016 remake, but we're not talking about that game today.

[00:05:26] You know, I liked it more than you.

[00:05:27] It's cool.

[00:05:28] I mean, they got, like, the wide-open space, right, with all the grass planes.

[00:05:31] And it's like, you could see out there.

[00:05:33] And, you know, like, I don't know.

[00:05:34] I thought it looked cool.

[00:05:36] Maybe not very Shadow of the Beast.

[00:05:38] But, you know, I don't know.

[00:05:41] I don't know.

[00:05:41] I feel like they were trying to rip off A and Edda a bit.

[00:05:43] I mean, one of the first artifacts they had me find was, hey, smack enemy attacks back by moving the stick in its direction.

[00:05:51] I'm like, come on.

[00:05:53] Come on.

[00:05:54] That's some fucking Samus Return shit that I don't even like.

[00:05:57] You know, it's just like, come on.

[00:05:58] I don't think that's the most interesting.

[00:06:01] Anyway, we're not talking about that.

[00:06:02] We're talking about the 1989 Amiga original today.

[00:06:08] So should I do the story this time?

[00:06:09] I don't know.

[00:06:10] Should I leave them to you?

[00:06:11] I feel like you're so good at them.

[00:06:12] Why don't you do it?

[00:06:13] I don't want to do it.

[00:06:14] I'll tell everyone the story.

[00:06:16] Okay.

[00:06:16] Tell us the premise of Shadow of the Beast.

[00:06:23] As a child, Aberon is whisked away to the demon world, brainwashed and turned into a beast man by evil magic.

[00:06:31] One day, while watching sacrifices in the human world, he recognizes one of the victims as his father.

[00:06:38] Memories of his humanity suddenly return to him.

[00:06:41] He breaks free of his thrall and seeks vengeance on Malta, the demon king,

[00:06:45] not particularly caring where he needs to go or how many esoteric beasts he needs to punch to do so.

[00:06:51] This is Shadow of the Beast.

[00:06:59] I'm sorry.

[00:07:00] I don't know.

[00:07:02] You're right.

[00:07:03] You're doing them all.

[00:07:03] You got this.

[00:07:05] I can't.

[00:07:05] I can't top.

[00:07:06] I can't top.

[00:07:07] I almost said I can't top you, but that would have been something else.

[00:07:12] So what did you think?

[00:07:14] I already talked about the insane parallax scrolling, but Steve, honestly, I think one of my favorite things about doing all of this,

[00:07:22] all the games we played in this series is really going back and seeing how continually impressed I am by the graphics and the techniques they use to do it.

[00:07:31] It's not just that it's cool for the time because it is.

[00:07:34] It's still cool right now.

[00:07:36] Looking at Shadow of the Beast, this game looks crazy.

[00:07:39] You know, it's funny you say that because, again, I know I'm sorry to bring up the 2016 game again.

[00:07:44] I felt that looked and moved a little sterile.

[00:07:47] But then, you know, you do the requisites to unlock the game and then you go in.

[00:07:52] Music starts blaring in your faces and everything's flowing around like, oh, shit, this is Shadow of the Beast.

[00:07:59] Well, or Beast, because that's all they programmed on the title screen.

[00:08:03] But holy shit, this is a video game here.

[00:08:06] Holy shit, this is some effort they put over here.

[00:08:10] Yeah, let's not gloss over that.

[00:08:12] The title screen just says Beast.

[00:08:15] It doesn't say Shadow of the Beast.

[00:08:18] It's the same thing on Genesis, too.

[00:08:21] I don't know what that's about.

[00:08:23] I can only imagine some Psygnosis where it was like, look, we can't just say it's Beast.

[00:08:29] You might have programmed it on and they're already fine.

[00:08:32] We can't change it.

[00:08:33] But the box needs to say something else.

[00:08:36] That's the only thing that makes sense, right?

[00:08:39] I literally can't think of anything else.

[00:08:42] It has to be a very late change to the title of the game.

[00:08:47] Because I don't think the game, I don't think any of the text says not that they always have to say the name of the game in the text.

[00:08:53] I mean, I know that's your favorite thing.

[00:08:55] Yeah, they said the thing, right?

[00:08:57] But I don't know, man.

[00:08:59] I just, that is weird.

[00:09:01] I feel like your explanation is correct, though.

[00:09:03] I think what's very interesting about Shadow of the Beast compared to other games of the genre is that it's essentially the arcade version of a cinematic platformer.

[00:09:13] Wouldn't you say?

[00:09:14] For several reasons, because the movement, for one, again, with Prince of Persia, it's very deliberate and slow when you jump at the certain.

[00:09:22] It doesn't feel that way.

[00:09:24] This is totally like a title arcade game.

[00:09:26] It feels like Rastan or Kadesh, maybe.

[00:09:29] I know Kadesh didn't exist at this point, or maybe it barely existed.

[00:09:32] But it's like simple two-button controls, and it doesn't feel laggy.

[00:09:38] It feels snappy and fast.

[00:09:39] I wouldn't say you're necessarily agile, but you kind of feel like you are.

[00:09:45] It's weird because on paper, it sounds like, man, you are the Shadow of the Beast, aren't you?

[00:09:53] You should be able to go right through this thing.

[00:09:58] No.

[00:10:00] It doesn't happen.

[00:10:02] And it doesn't have any of the climbing stuff.

[00:10:06] You're not jumping up on ledges or doing this careful shuffling around for traps like Prince of Persia.

[00:10:12] You're just kind of like, again, very much like an arcade game.

[00:10:16] It's damn near Toki compared to Prince of Persia.

[00:10:21] Well, it's really weird because sometimes you end up going into places, and then it's telling you what you see.

[00:10:26] And it's like, take our word for it.

[00:10:29] You're climbing down a chasm and doing different things.

[00:10:33] It's really cool, though.

[00:10:35] It is cool.

[00:10:36] I love that aspect of the game.

[00:10:38] In fact, that's probably my favorite aspect of the game, that it still has those adventure game touches where it's like you go into someplace, and then it shows you like a sprite art version of that area.

[00:10:49] And then it describes it to you.

[00:10:51] I'll read one of them.

[00:10:52] I wrote one of them down here.

[00:10:53] Like, when you enter the treehouse, it says this.

[00:10:56] Inside, a winding staircase descends into darkness.

[00:11:00] Pausing for a while to allow your eyes to adjust, you make your way down the steps, which seem to deteriorate into makeshift planks the further down you go.

[00:11:09] Steve, that's fucking, that's Shadowgate right there.

[00:11:13] You know?

[00:11:13] Like, that's like point-and-click shit.

[00:11:15] Yeah, it's strange that they do that, but, you know.

[00:11:18] It's very hard to explain, because as we keep dancing around, it's an asshole game.

[00:11:25] And, look, I know we're looking at these as less, were these good and do these hold up, and more of the technical showpieces they are.

[00:11:33] But, look, Edmondson said, I made a hard game on purpose.

[00:11:38] I'm sorry, Andre.

[00:11:39] I'm considering this unwritten permission to call it out decades later.

[00:11:44] It's, it's, it single-handedly ruins the game.

[00:11:47] Let's just be honest.

[00:11:49] And I think I need to just describe my average loop to people that are unaware.

[00:11:55] Well, hold on, hold on, hold on.

[00:11:57] Before we get to difficulty, we'll do that in a second.

[00:11:59] But let me, let me say a couple more things first.

[00:12:02] Then I'll let you, you can unleash, big boy, all you want about the difficulty.

[00:12:06] But I wanted to say what was really arcade-y.

[00:12:09] I wanted to close off that portion first.

[00:12:11] Is that, like, when you can enter somewhere, like the aforementioned treehouse, it says N, like, big red letters N.

[00:12:18] And then it has, like, big flashing, pointing arrows.

[00:12:20] Like, it's fucking, like, a beat-em-up, practically.

[00:12:23] Exactly.

[00:12:25] It's, it, I, that's so arcade-y.

[00:12:27] It's very weird where they took different cues from.

[00:12:31] Like, we took this from Shadowgate, you took this from Final Fight, and what did we make here?

[00:12:39] I don't know.

[00:12:41] For three games!

[00:12:43] It's, it's an agglomeration of a lot of weird fucking stuff, man.

[00:12:46] It's, it's strange.

[00:12:47] Well, I guess maybe they did that, maybe they did that, like, point-and-click style, like, describe the area to you before you go in.

[00:12:55] Maybe they did that because, like, obviously at this point, just like Prince of Persia, they don't have the technology yet to do, like, real-time cinematics or anything crazy, right?

[00:13:05] On Amiga.

[00:13:06] They would a couple years from now, but not in 1989.

[00:13:09] So maybe that just made the most sense.

[00:13:12] I don't know.

[00:13:13] Based on the 2016 remake, we don't have it now either.

[00:13:16] Wait, why do we keep saying that shit?

[00:13:18] We certainly don't.

[00:13:19] But everything we're saying that's cool about this game is, like you said, ruined by the difficulty.

[00:13:25] And now, go ahead.

[00:13:27] Say whatever you want.

[00:13:28] I'll chime in.

[00:13:29] Tell the people what an asshole game Shadow of the Beast is.

[00:13:33] So I'm just going to tell you how my average loops of this game went.

[00:13:37] You start the game.

[00:13:39] You start charging towards things because, you know, you're a beast, man.

[00:13:42] Of course we're going to start charging towards things.

[00:13:44] You get smacked by things that suddenly appear out of the ground.

[00:13:48] You punch some really cool-looking monsters.

[00:13:51] You get killed.

[00:13:53] You wait for the game to load the title screen load back up because despite playing on PlayStation 5, it's going to be accurate with load times from back in the day.

[00:14:03] You know what?

[00:14:04] I know most people complain about that.

[00:14:06] I liked it.

[00:14:06] I liked that it was, like, super authentic that way for some reason.

[00:14:11] I'm a sicko like that, though.

[00:14:12] I mean, fair.

[00:14:13] But then we try again.

[00:14:15] We try to do the same shit a little bit more carefully.

[00:14:18] We wait to load.

[00:14:21] We see the bind I'm in, right?

[00:14:23] I mean, they don't really leave you any crumbs in these things to tell you what to do.

[00:14:28] Like, it might have been in service of the game to use some of the cinematics, like the cool painting in the title or the opening text crawl to maybe give you that hint to go left instead of right.

[00:14:41] Because, you know, we've been trained by everything to go right in these games.

[00:14:45] Well, that's what they say, right?

[00:14:47] Because, like, the intro text really to say that.

[00:14:49] To the left, there's a big forest.

[00:14:51] And to the east, there's some, you know, wasteland of whatever.

[00:14:55] Like, they do describe the places, but that's it.

[00:14:58] Both of those things sound unpleasant.

[00:15:00] Well, yeah, but you're the beast.

[00:15:02] You're the shadow of the beast, okay?

[00:15:04] You are supposed to punch everything into submission.

[00:15:09] Okay.

[00:15:09] The reason why the game sucks, and I feel like you're not emphasizing this enough, the enemies appear out of nowhere.

[00:15:15] You have such a small reaction time for them.

[00:15:18] They just keep appearing from the left and right in front of you and behind you.

[00:15:22] And you just, you got a punch.

[00:15:24] That punch is not very active.

[00:15:26] I like how you can hold the button down, by the way, and he just permanently sends his arm out.

[00:15:31] Like, just, yeah, it's weird.

[00:15:33] I don't think it does anything, though, because it's not active anymore.

[00:15:35] I think you just hold down the button and just have stuff run into his fist.

[00:15:39] I don't think it works that way.

[00:15:41] Look, you know what my big problem is with this?

[00:15:43] I'm just not sure on what you're supposed to do.

[00:15:47] Prince of Persia, without a manual, makes it real clear, real fast, what's going on.

[00:15:52] Prince of Persia, you're in a dungeon.

[00:15:54] Get the fuck out of there.

[00:15:56] I dare anyone that's playing Shadow of the Beast without context to figure out what the hell's going on.

[00:16:03] And you know what?

[00:16:03] There's plenty of games I could let vagueness slide, too.

[00:16:06] But as we keep going over, they give you no time or space to figure that out.

[00:16:11] But for a game that starts with a red welcome on the screen, I don't feel very welcome, Andre.

[00:16:17] I don't either.

[00:16:18] And here's the thing.

[00:16:19] I think it's okay that you don't know what to do, but then don't make the game so fucking hard.

[00:16:24] Exactly.

[00:16:26] Don't have enemies flying at my back and front every second that can do damage before it can even press a button to punch them.

[00:16:34] I get it.

[00:16:34] Okay.

[00:16:35] I don't think my reactions suck that much.

[00:16:41] You know?

[00:16:41] I think this game is just over the fuck tuned.

[00:16:44] And by the way, I played the Genesis version for contrast so I could just compare something to this Amiga version.

[00:16:51] And that was a terrible idea because I thought, oh, maybe this will be easier.

[00:16:54] It's actually harder because our version sucks because it's too fast because they didn't account for the 50 hertz from the UK when they made our North American Genesis version.

[00:17:08] So it's even faster.

[00:17:10] It's even more fucky.

[00:17:11] I see it.

[00:17:13] Yeah.

[00:17:15] So I didn't get a break.

[00:17:17] Didn't it be so cool, though?

[00:17:18] You know what I love?

[00:17:19] I love those flying Pac-Man motherfuckers with the mean, like they're like little munchie, like weird things like piranha flying piranhas in a Pac-Man shape.

[00:17:28] I don't know how to describe half the enemies in this game, but whoever was on art was having a great time.

[00:17:37] Yeah, they sure were.

[00:17:40] There's like some weird Cthulhu shit.

[00:17:42] There's like some weird green scorpions that also kind of look like ants, like they don't have the scorpion tail.

[00:17:48] That's weird.

[00:17:49] They have there's like weird walking Venus fly trap face hugger things, too.

[00:17:53] There's also that Eldrick horror boss that I got to that one shot at me inside of the treehouse.

[00:17:58] It just killed me in one hit.

[00:18:00] And then the overlay of this emulated version within Shadow of the Beast 2016 actually said on the screen, you can't kill this thing with your bare fists.

[00:18:09] You better find something else.

[00:18:11] So it actually gave me a hint.

[00:18:13] And that was definitely not text like in the game.

[00:18:16] That was like an overlay.

[00:18:17] It was a 1080p ass overlay on the screen.

[00:18:22] So I don't know.

[00:18:23] I feel like whoever ported this was trying to throw us a bone somewhat.

[00:18:27] But man, it's really hard, too, because I feel like everything else is on point.

[00:18:33] The music's fantastic because the music's so good.

[00:18:37] They hit you in the face with it as soon as you start just loading the title screen.

[00:18:42] That's like I haven't even entered by it.

[00:18:44] You know, you never enter your name, but it's like it's like I just got here and we're already hitting me with music.

[00:18:49] And then it just keeps going.

[00:18:51] Is is the Amiga sound chip basically the Genesis, but good?

[00:18:56] Yes, I think I think that's what's going on.

[00:18:58] Yeah, it feels that's kind of what it feels like.

[00:19:00] Huh?

[00:19:00] Yeah, the music fucking.

[00:19:02] Oh, so good.

[00:19:04] Again, I love all the sound effects to all the slappy, punchy sound effects.

[00:19:08] Again, it's very arcadey.

[00:19:09] Like literally when you punch one of them, Pac-Man Chronos is like, you know, like a like a fucking cartoon.

[00:19:14] But I like it, you know, watching the video of that's also included in this version of the game of someone playing the game.

[00:19:21] Good is very satisfying to watch because of all those things.

[00:19:24] But actually playing it.

[00:19:25] Oh, God, it's torture.

[00:19:27] It really is torture.

[00:19:29] Sure.

[00:19:29] Overall, I feel like this should have been something like a Zelda 2 or even like Goonies 2 without the asshole map.

[00:19:39] Right?

[00:19:39] Like I feel like it should have been that kind of action adventure game, but it just doesn't want you to play it.

[00:19:46] It just doesn't.

[00:19:47] I mean, to be fair, the more I did play it, I did get better and better and farther and farther at it.

[00:19:52] So maybe that is the point.

[00:19:53] I was getting better at it, but it's just too much, man.

[00:19:56] At some point, I'm just like, I don't I don't want to do this.

[00:20:00] And it's a shame because audio visually, it's fucking excellent.

[00:20:05] I don't know.

[00:20:06] I have that weird point.

[00:20:08] I'm that weird person where I I'll do really good the first time or one or a certain time.

[00:20:14] And then after that, I'll just suck other times.

[00:20:16] And then, well, no, this isn't happening.

[00:20:20] Very I've I've had that my very first run of Returnal.

[00:20:24] I beat that first boss.

[00:20:25] My very first one.

[00:20:27] And I got to like the second biome, the desert or whatever.

[00:20:30] My very first fucking run.

[00:20:31] I couldn't believe I did that shit.

[00:20:33] I knew how lucky I was, too, while I was doing it.

[00:20:37] Yeah, you got you got anything else to tell wax poetic about Shadow of the Beast some more or whatever you want to say.

[00:20:43] Now that we've bitched enough.

[00:20:45] You know, I'm just going to take a wild guess here just because of how computer games work back then.

[00:20:51] If you put up with all of this, I'm sure you don't fight a Maltoth or whatever his name is at the end of this.

[00:20:58] I'm sure you just get to the end.

[00:20:59] It's like, oh, man, this is just the beginning.

[00:21:04] Join us for Shadow of the Beast Part 2 where we continue the story.

[00:21:10] Like, really?

[00:21:10] I just almost killed myself and lost all my hair trying to do this.

[00:21:14] Now we're going to do this again.

[00:21:16] That made you go bald.

[00:21:20] It might have if I was playing Super Shadow of the Beast in 1992.

[00:21:26] The world's only bald 10-year-old.

[00:21:29] Not by choice.

[00:21:31] It just happened.

[00:21:32] Is that possible?

[00:21:33] Can you be born?

[00:21:34] I mean, I know we're all born bald, but can you is that possible for someone to never have grown hair?

[00:21:40] I don't know what's going on with Charlie Brown.

[00:21:43] That is true.

[00:21:46] His dad's a barber.

[00:21:48] I mean, yeah.

[00:21:50] I mean, to cut them little three Homer hairs basically is what.

[00:21:54] What's going on there anyway?

[00:21:57] Who knows?

[00:21:58] Okay.

[00:21:59] So is it ranking time?

[00:22:01] Is it safe to say?

[00:22:02] Yeah.

[00:22:02] Shadow of the Beast is below Prince of Persia.

[00:22:06] Yeah.

[00:22:06] We got to stick Shadow of the Beast at number two.

[00:22:10] Number two.

[00:22:11] There we go.

[00:22:12] Putting it on the board.

[00:22:14] All right.

[00:22:15] Well, that's about it for now.

[00:22:16] Hope you join us next week on Cinematic Platformer Paradise 4.

[00:22:21] Here's your hint.

[00:22:23] There's another world out there or we will all be searching for the heart of the alien.

[00:22:32] Don't.

[00:22:33] Is that a good hint?

[00:22:34] Does that work?

[00:22:35] You all might even say it's out of this world.

[00:22:39] Wow.

[00:22:40] See you next time on Cinematic Platformer Paradise.