Shadows of the Damned: Hella Remastered review: imaginative underworld fun plagued by misogyny

Published:

Search for the top events of 2011 and you’ll find things that change the world… and things that don’t. The Xbox 360/PS3 release of Shadows Of The Damned may fall into either camp, depending on whether you liked it previously or not. It’s a third-person action-adventure game that brings together two renowned video game developers: Suda51 from No More Heroes and Shinji Mikami from Resident Evil. And as far as I know, it’s considered a cult classic.

- Advertisement -

So, playing Shadows of the Damned: Hella Remastered without having ever played the original game, do I think it’s a good thing? If you were a fan of the OG, you will no doubt love this. If you’re modern to the game, I think it’s refreshing in the sense that it’s a throwback with some captivating ideas and average to good execution. But this whole schtick isn’t just a product of its time – it’s downright terrible.

Your name is Garcia Hotspur, and you are a hot-headed biker whose arms are covered in tattoos and whose hair is shiny with gel. Right from the start, his girlfriend Paula is kidnapped from the hotel where they are staying and dragged into the underworld. Garcia’s love for Paula is so great that he throws himself into the portal to the afterlife with one thought: saving her. Fortunately, he doesn’t have to rely on his bare fists, because he has a magic gun called… Johnson.


Light Shot can also be used as a way to remove the shadowy cloak from enemies or as a way to stun them. | Image source: Production of shotguns/grasshoppers from stone paper

In addition to being the first of many penis jokes, Johnson is a dashing yet wise skull who acts as a guide to the underworld – which itself is more than just pools of lava or a river full of ghosts. It’s a journey through gothic streets, an overwhelming forest, a hellish dimension, dingy libraries, muddy sewers and more. This is actually quite a distinctive depiction of the demon kingdom, although it is also a procession of areas of primary colors typical of the era.

And since Resi veteran Mikami worked on the game, Shadows lets you control Garcia in typical Resi fashion – before the remakes, anyway. Over-the-shoulder shot with tank movements and laser aiming. Much of the tension in combat comes from the pressure of lining up shots as the demons close in on you, and this is heightened by Garcia’s inability to move during this action.


Garcia steps into the darkness and sees a red vein in the distance leading to a red ball.
I should probably quickly touch on how this remaster differs from the original in general. Well, it runs at 60fps, looks a little nicer, and has a New Game Plus option (you can play through multiple games and keep things from previous ones), as well as some modern outfits. As I mentioned at the beginning of this review, I haven’t played the original, so I have no point of reference. Either way, technically it’s fine, it works fine on both my desktop and my Steam Deck. | Image source: Production of shotguns/grasshoppers from stone paper

And thanks to the influence of Suda51 from No More Heroes, your journey through the underworld will keep you on your toes. One of the game’s key tricks is the ability of demons to summon darkness that cloaks you in an alternate reality that gradually destroys your health bar while you sit in it. Demons though? They thrive in his mantle, gaining an impenetrable skin that makes them impossible to kill. To counter this early on, you’ll need to operate Johnson’s Light Shot, an alternate fire option that lets you escape the darkness by finding and shooting nearby goat-headed statues. Thanks to this, the fog clears and voila, the demons become killable.

Throughout the story, the trick deepens. Suddenly, goat statues can be replaced with red veins leading to bursting balls. You may need to delicate fireworks, and their explosions will give you a momentary respite. Perhaps there is a powerful hand throwing out darkness and you will have to go in and out of shadowy zones to find the right path to close it. There are even strange hybrids of anglerfish and snails that can aid you traverse dimly lit places.

The variety on offer means nothing gets vintage, and I like that exploration is largely a collection of interconnected arcade scenarios. Sometimes they have very little consistency, but due to the craziness of the game, they just work.

If all the shooting and the complete lack of fear didn’t make it obvious, Shadows is an action game first and a horror game second. One where you’ll spend 99% of your time shooting armored demons, skittish bastards, giant brutes, and weird bosses with clearly marked red gems on their bodies. Defeat these bosses and you’ll unlock modern weapon modes for Johnson, who can transform and upgrade into some truly stimulating modern toys: an assault rifle that targets multiple enemies, a shotgun that loads multiple skull bullets, and a revolver that fires sticky bombs. They are all useful in specific situations and provide wonderful body shredding when their bullets hit bad guys.


Garcia stares at a lewd poster of a woman on all fours with a portal placed in a specific place and the words:
Image source: Production of shotguns/grasshoppers from stone paper

However, despite the variety of gameplay on offer, I can’t aid but feel that the game’s rhythm stops and shoots, quite quickly and rarely rising to any great heights. I think it’s because the darkness trick always adds pressure and affects a lot of fights, so it didn’t take long before I got tired of racing around looking for a goat head, or bullets, or anything that could stop my health from being drained. This all combines with laborious tank aiming, which adds tension to some of the more terrifying encounters, but becomes a bit tired when you’re forever fighting streams of nasty enemies.

Worse yet, even absolutely perfect shooting wouldn’t save Shadows from its biggest problem: it’s just truly terrible. While Shadows deserves praise for the way it represents Mexican culture – including the fact that the main character is of Mexican descent – it avoids the usual stereotypes, it is also wrapped in blatant misogyny and the crude humor of a terminally unfunny twelve-year-old. For example, Garcia’s partner Paula is not just a helpless damsel in distress, but is constantly displayed as eye candy in lingerie. At one point you enter the pleasure district and sigh inwardly as Johnson comments on how he basically “used” these women in the past. You jump through holes (I don’t need to describe it) and have no choice but to treat the squirming topless Paula like a bridge, darting in and out of land after land clearly designed to serve the salivating male gaze.

Shadows Of The Damned: Hella Remastered will no doubt please fans of the original as it doesn’t touch the demonic flesh and bones of the original, other than freshening it up a bit. For those coming in fresh, this is a pretty good time, but only until you start noticing how nasty it is. I respect its madness and its sense of past double-A, but I also despise how the characters and the world portray women. Honestly, I wish this approach had been thrown in the trash and “remastered” instead.

Related articles