Well, I have enjoyed seeing many Metroidvania maps up on the VGMaps Atlas, but does anyone here in the community remember Shadow Complex?
In case you don't, or have not heard of it yet, I'll tell you, anyway.
It is a Metroidvania game made for Xbox 360's XBLA developed by Chair Entertainment, powered by Unreal Engine 3, and released on August 19, 2009 during its Summer of Arcade 2009 event as it draws to its close. A remastered port for Xbox One and PS4 was made later in 2016. Little contextual, but, still.
I loved playing the game because it gave out a rather fascinating story and amazing 2.5D gameplay straight out of a downloadable exclusive game for a home game console. Being a downloadable game, of which the size was about 835MB, there, under the 2GB limit for 360's downloadable XBLA games, for many, it was a really fun summer treat to play. Good memories.
Now, the story is, running parallel to a particular novel, "Empire", and dovetailing with the sequel, "Hidden Empire", by Orson Scott Card, who didn't work on the game, FYI, a secret group called "The Progressive Restoration" is bent on churning civil war across the game's setting of USA, and through their duplicitous means, the group tries to bring the country to its vision of its empire-based rule, under their control.
For a rather villainous group, the name they took on is obviously hypocritical to its self-centered goal of restoration there. Just saying.
The intro had its brief, playable hero, Colonel Dallas, armed with an experimental battle suit, called the V5 Omega Armor XOS-7, undergoing an assignment tasked to stop the villains attacking in Washington's streets, and succeeds, but finds himself an unwilling pawn in The Restoration's scheme, in thanks to their apparent emissary, Commander Lucius, and disposing him when they were done using him.
Expected out of any villain, within or out a group at work. Even he said such words to him, to quote, "If it's any comfort, you're not the only pawn who's in play today. There's a very large chessboard out there.". He would've been wiser not to underestimate such a "chessboard" that can topple a "king" when he least expects it.
The main game truly begins in a particular location in the Chinnereth Reservoir, where its setting takes place, two characters, Jason Fleming, the actual main playable, and his girlfriend, Claire, undergoing hiking in the mountains and spelunking in caves, but their trip goes rather south when she goes "missing". Then, Jason finds her, only to be entangled in a rather dangerous situation involving The Restoration when he finds their massive secret base they built quite a long while ago for their operations, and sets out to rescue her, but he's soon thrusts himself into the fight against them. Despite the odds, and his objections about his situation and about what his father said in his past, Jason sets out to save her and stop The Restoration's plans of civil war, at all costs, even by eventually finding weaponry and said armor hidden in the complex to better said odds.
So, Shadow Complex is a really great game, and I've had a lot of fun playing it to the end, but I don't actually know its full size yet. My only guess, rather large of its time. And, I'm not too versed on XBLA/360 emulation, not that I'm thinking of it, but what I can tell you about the game is its Super Metroid inspired gameplay really invokes great exploration and fun beneath it. Plenty of secrets, enemies to take down, and a good assortment of weapons, upgrades, and gadgets to collect. There's a funny, non-canon joke ending to see before rescuing Claire for real. Really funny.
The game's bosses are a bit hollow on variety, but that doesn't mean they're not fun to fight. Only about 7 bosses were seen. Most were one-time fights and unique, but only 2 are fought many times. Granted, the game's size is sustainable there, so I'm not complaining.
1 - Black Falcon (Intro)
2 - WSA2 Tarantula IFV (4 times, 3 actually fought, 4th, chase and technical fight)
3 - WSA3 Devastator
4 - XOS-1 (3 times, first 2, solo, 3rd, 2 at once)
5 - AP4 Saw
6 - WSA1 Walker
7 - 25A Airship (FINAL BOSS)
Shadow Complex was a blast of a really great downloadable console game. I'm sure any who played it and beaten it many times would keep on beating it many more times. I'd be surprised if we'd get a sequel to the game. Who knows?
So, any mapper up to providing the game's full maps, well, have a good time. Thanks.
