Shadowgate

Dungeon master.

No summary available

This is a definite case where nostalgia is inseparable from the game, and Shadowgate is a great modernisation of a classic of the adventure-RPG genre. An abusive classic, but still. If you remember it fondly, it’s both a return trip and a good chunk more of the same, beautifully drawn and well made, despite a clumsy UI and a few annoyances. If not though, the design is past its sell-by date, and it’s still primarily a 1987 game with a makeover rather than a 2014 game with history.

Shadowgate on Nintendo Switch is very much the same reboot we saw on PC back in 2014, taking the same mix of puzzles, difficulty and exploration the original was famed for and mixing it up with some enhanced conundrums and much more appealing presentation. Even with the updated visuals, Shadowgate still has a clunky UI, however, the button mapping on Switch does help negate this issue a little. Problems aside, this is a faithful remake that retro fans will lap up, although newer players might find this elder gaming statesman has teeth that bite a little too hard.

No summary available

“Shadowgate is a loving recreation of a seminal point-and-click adventure, with a few modern touches tacked onto a thoroughly 1987 chassis.”

If all the Shadowgate Kickstarter’s 3,468 backers just want a better-looking version of the 1987 game with nice audio and rejigged puzzles then I’m sure they’ll all be happy because it’s exactly that. Unfortunately having an interface cluttered with Verb Icons combined with such unintuitive nonsense as having to use a lever on yourself to push it wouldn’t be acceptable in 1996, let alone 2014. Several antiquated mechanics like the limited supply of torches and the unhelpful hint sys...