Limited Edition + Language Pack (MULTi7)

English/German/French/Spanish/Italian/Russian/Japanese

The honeymoon period for Kickstarter is long over. There are a number of reasons why but perhaps the most impactful is the failure of several high-profile campaigns to deliver what was promised, or going full Darth Vader: ‘We are altering the deal, pray we don’t alter it any further.’ Such drek leads us to Shadowrun Online – a game that was due for release in May 2013, but on March 31 2014 crept onto Steam Early Access, available for sale to non-backers at the princely sum of £25. So what’s going on?We’ll come to the tortuous twists and turns of Shadowrun Online’s development soon enough, but for ponying up the dough this is what you get: Early Access to what is currently four singleplayer missions and a miniscule multiplayer map, along with the full campaign on release. Worth noting is that this purchase does not include future expansions (i.e. they’re already thinking about DLC), and when the game is eventually released there will also be a free-to-play version of it.

In fact there are some pretty big claims for Shadowrun Online, so I’m just going to quote the developer before coming back to reality: “Every character perceives the game world differently […] the collective actions of players will not only determine the fate of the online game world [but will] also cross over into the pen and paper storyline […] accessible through Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, and Linux and on Ouya […] it is fully cross-platform, meaning you can play it on your tablet [then] sit down at your PC to continue with the same character.”Hoo boy. The kickstarter promised co-op gameplay and faction wars, with hubs where players could mingle and pick missions to undertake – as well as all the Shadowrun bobbins you’d expect, from computer hacking to magic to gritty combat. The current build of the game has none of this, but it is of course Early Access.

The good news is that the backgrounds look pretty great. More than anything else in Shadowrun Online, the look and atmosphere of these few environments is bang-on. The missions are short ‘kill all the dudes’ affairs, and showcase a relatively slick but simple turn-based combat system. Think XCOM but without the dynamic combat camera.But that comparison is a problem in itself. I think XCOM’s amazing but Shadowrun Online really shouldn’t play like a poor man’s XCOM – yet it does. You have two guys who each have two weapons: a bulky SMG-toting Orc with a machete, and a mage that can shoot fireballs or whip out a shotgun. The big problem is that combat doesn’t live up to the interface: the battles don’t seem enormously dependent on tactics, more on the random chance of shots landing and who gets the first good hit in.