Shadow Warrior

Shadow Warrior is a game with one foot in the past and one foot in the future of the first-person shooter genre. Shadow Warrior is a reboot of the 3D Realms cult-classic PC shooter from 1997 and in many ways retains much of the same spirit as the original. Shadow Warrior is a game that faces its racial past, acknowledges it, and embraces it—mostly for the better. While it revels in its own nostalgia—almost to a gratuitous level—it still manages to straddle the line carefully enough to remain fresh. Once again the player steps into the shoes of Lo Wang, the wise-cracking badass assassin, albeit less of a caricature this time. After all, Lo Wang is now given some nuance to his personality. He “Drinks Four Roses bourbon, neat, collects…comic books…and works for…Orochi Zilla.” Lo Wang speaks with a less stereotypical “Asian” affectation in this rendition. And he has a penchant for 80s rock music, as the game opens with him singing “The Touch” from The Transformers Motion Picture Soundtrack. It’s clear this game was aiming for the audience that was a fan of the original game and a fan of 80s culture in general. Lo Wang is guided by a banished spirit, Hoji, who often remarks on Wang’s egomaniacal behavior to a comic degree. This tongue-n-cheek approach to the buddy-movie dynamic also provides a commentary on the amount of killing that goes on in first-person shooters in general. Hoji further gives Lo Wang grief after his discovery of his “Wang-cave,” lamenting, “500 hit men in this country and I have to get the nerd.” Still, Lo Wang is given an identifiable presence, recognizable for more than his simply being Asian. Lo Wang is representative of a male power fantasy, one equal to that of his often-white counterparts, and given his personality quirks, is relatable to a larger audience, as opposed to being reduced to a stereotype.