Hi!

I skipped Shadow Man back in the day, so im going in blind. However, my first impression isn't really that good. I explored the swamp for a bit before using the teddy bear and i'm now in Deadside, just after the second enemy type appears. These fast guys charging you. I took a break after that because i was bored with the game. I had to slog through hordes of identical enemies (first dogs, now zombies) that take way too many hits to kill, making combat a chore. That you have to do this every few steps you take doesn't help. So, is the rest of the game like that or does it get better?

Its gets much better the further you get into it, once you start gaining a few shadow levels you can charge your gunshots up making it quicker and easier to dispatch enemies.

You do have to go around Deadside and Wastelands quite a bit and initially it is quite confusing, just think of each area as a small contained map. You will start visiting temples to get extra items and tatoos which allow you to shift the fire blocks, climb the waterfalls and the likes.

You will also be visiting the Asylum a fair few times going through different sections of it which is like a Victorian Steampunk type setting. You also visit Victorian London later, a Prison and a few other places. Once you get L'Eclipser you turn daylight to night so you can break open the Govi at the swamp and collect a few other items.

First 2 hours or so is a bit of a long slog, I would follow the text in the guide to get you where you need to be.

Also use a controller / gamepad if you aren't already, makes play a lot more fun and accessible.

The story starts moving along once you get through the Asylum Gateway and first bit of the Asylum

Ok, seems i just have to stick with it. And yes, i'm using my 360 Pad. But i'm not happy with my current bindings, i'll have to experiment a bit more i think.

This is my setup and it works nice and is comfortable

I suggest using Left & Right shoulder buttons as what is in in your hands.

B - Duck
A - Jump
X - Action & Holster
Y - Lock on Strafing
L3 - Sniper Mode
R3 - Camera control
Select - Inventory

Bottom 3 options are left blank for controller, they are quick save, strafe L & R but you don't need those as when holding Y in my setup you can stay locked on and circle the enemies hitting the shoulder buttons to attack.

I have the same mappings for the face buttons, the rest is a little different. I put L/R Hands on the triggers via JoyToKey, lock on on LB and sniper on RB. My main gripe however lies on the movement. I'd like to move and strafe with left stick and turn with right stick, like in modern dual stick games. I know Shadow Man isn't built for that, but i'll try to replicate it with JoyToKey. Maybe then i don't have to fight against my muscle memory. ;-)

The camera is funny on it, the movement is in increments its not free flowing like modern 3rd person games.

You hold the button down and then use the movement keys to view from a different angle, this helps when doing jumps to platforms behind you etc but then you need to put it back behind the main character. It does work pretty well once you are locked on, it manages to stay behind you even when in tight corridors.

For me Shadow Man is the prime example of a game that gets better after the start. I remember thinking it was crap on N64, wandering around some kind of cliffs or caves (can't really really remember), but as it was a new game I'd just paid full price for I felt obliged to stick with it. And thank goodness I did, it gets sooo much better. It's very much worth sticking with past the opening areas.

Oh, I am so terribly sorry Shadow Man doesn't have health regen, ADS, cover based shooting and way points.

You're obviously just trolling, but let me tell you there are some people that play video games for a long time, like me, that find Shadow Man to be a pretty 'okay at best' game. Not all our complaints come from people who only played modern third person action adventure games. In fact, there are games from around the same time (Soul Reaver comes to mind) that are better than Shadow Man in every single aspect.

Soul Reaver didn't have way points as well, no ADS, no cover based shooting and no health regen (only a slight variation of it when you were in the Spectral Realm, albeit a regen that would take half an hour to fill up your life meter all the way up). We don't need to be young gamers more used to modern games to have issues with Shadow Man, it's pretty mediocre at times, and even if the story and setting are great (which I'm willing to readily say they are), if the gameplay is boring and frustrating, then I couldn't care less about the story and the setting. Oh, and mind you, the gameplay is 'hard' not because of being rewarding-hard, "tough to master", but mainly out of appalling design flaws that shouldn't have happened in 1998/99.

I'm still trying to beat the game, it's a goal I have set to myself, but, honestly, like I said before, it's just an O.K. title, at best, nothing more. It's not terribly bad, I've certainly played worse games, but it's not good, either, even if the story and environments are quite good themselves. This game has a lot of flaws that I covered on a post of my own, so I'm not going to repeat myself, but let's face it: if you enjoyed this game when you were younger and you have good memories of playing it, it's absolutely worth buying it; if you never played it, though, chances are, more likely than not, you won't have a good time with it at all.


[EDIT] in regards to what the OP asked: well, from my experience, no, it doesn't get that much better. You get some power-ups that definitely help, but the game is as a chore later in as it was when we started.