Kickstarter works – Shadowrun Returns!!

Call me impressed. Looks like Kickstarter actually works! I backed the game Shadowrun Returns probably over a year ago, and if you hadn’t heard it actually released! And on top of that, its a damn fine game! Its exactly what I expected, although I don’t think some people fully knew what to expect so might have been disappointed with the game in the end (unfortunately, that’s more of a misunderstanding on their part or off-base/unrealistic expectations).

The game itself feels a lot like a text-based adventure – there’s a lot of reading involved with this game.  A big requirement when you play is an imagination.  The game will be as fun and rewarding as you want it to be – if you put in a little bit of work.  And by work I mean, the “fun” isn’t spoon-fed to you, you have to be interested in the lore, the history of the franchise, and get your mind right for stepping into this kind of game.  It is very reminiscent of classic paper/dice based Dungeons & Dragons type games (Shadowrun was, after all, originally a pen & paper table top game).

When you aren’t reading and interacting with NPC’s via extended dialog trees, you can freely wonder around the game world (although honestly I haven’t found much to do besides just go right to my next objective).  Once you do get into battle, its an interesting take on turn-based strategy. Every character in your squad has action points that can be spent on anything from regular shooting, to casting magic spells, to hacking the Matrix!

You can equip your characters in a number of ways, from weapons to specialized equipment (specific to your type of character).  The skill trees that you can upgrade via leveling up is quite extensive.

I’ve only really scratched the surface of the game, and haven’t really had a whole lot of time to play. But, if you are at all a fan of the original game on the SNES and/or Genesis, then this game is definitely paying classic homage to those originals!  On top of that, the community is already flourishing – with tons of new campaigns available via Steamworks.  Not to mention, a group of dedicated individuals hard at work creating a port of the original SNES campaign!