Lost in Shadow | Review

Synopsis: Hudson comes through with a review copy of Lost in Shadow to give my Wii some use over the holidays with something to play besides Donkey Kong Country Returns. Lost in Shadow is a unique action platformer exclusively for Wii where shadows are altered as your main source to manipulate levels to work your shadow boy up the tower and discover its secrets. You will not complete this journey alone as you are accompanied by a sylph that goes by “Spangle” to help manipulate light and shadows to ensure your way to the top. Lost in Shadow is a platformer with puzzles, action, RPG elements, and of course shadows. As some may know, I have been looking forward to the finished product after playing through the demo multiple times, so let’s see how the experience was.

Praise: The visual style behind Lost in Shadow is what makes this title really shine. The gameplay is rather basic but does not grow old and while it does have some RPG elements, the majority of the gameplay focus lies within attacking shadow creatures, manipulating light, and working your way up the tower. Getting used to focusing on the shadows throughout the castle takes some time, but once you get the hang of it, you are hooked! Along with the fun gameplay, there are a lot of puzzles to keep you thinking while not making the game overly difficult and keeping you on your way to the top. The title takes about 8 to 10 hours to complete and it goes by rather quickly collecting keys and unlocking paths to continue to the next floor. Though Lost in Shadow does use the remote and nunchuk, the controls work rather well as it does not rely on motion controls.

Gripes: While my experience was mostly favorable, there were some issues I had in the initial play through. The biggest was combat, as it is very simple, just hit the attack button when by the enemies, and the whole combat aspect of this game was sluggish for the most part. The other problem was that if you miss any keys to unlock your path to the next segment, then you will be backtracking to locate what you may have missed. While the graphics add a lot to the environment and gameplay, the story and sounds are shy of memorable, while the sounds of gears and industrial noises go with the moving behemoth of the castle, it did not make it feel any larger, in fact it kind of made the tower feel smaller.

Overall, Lost in Shadow was a blast to play and easy to go back to after the first play through, even though it does not provide much in the way of additional content, it is just a unique, good looking game, with a concept that borrows from multiple games like Ico and Limbo. I would say that if you’re not a fan of puzzles in your games, you may want to stay away. However, if platforming and puzzles is your cup of tea, then you will like playing through this title over and over again.

Mashbuttons.com gives Lost in Shadow an 8 out of 10.

Lost in Shadow is available now for the Nintendo Wii.