Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun

This is an amazing squad stealth game. It reminded me of good old "Commandos" but this is even more fun than Commandos. This game has got personality, it has got atmosphere. Story is ok. Music is awesome! Art is pretty good and voice acting is pleasant. Skills and tactics are satisfying to use. Lethal takedowns and non lethal takedowns. Ability to hide enemy corpses. Different navigating methods for each character like the first character you use in the game is more into parkour and using a hook to climb on top of buildings and such. Game encourages saving as it gets more and more challenging. The tutorial is also good at getting you familiar with different skills and tactics and how the game generally plays. If you love patient tactical stealth games, I highly recommend this masterpiece as long as you don't mind squad games where you control a few characters not just one.

This game is what video games used to be. A form of entertainment not bound by politics that challenged your imagination and kept you interested through game play . The graphics are amazing, the sound is top notch, the missions are complex, varied and interesting, never letting you get bored. Its a video game like the games of my childhood. Tough but fair, abusable but fun, not to long but not too short, innovative but not at the cost of game play. Its a gem, rare, with a glow to remember, a classic that you feel is great before you even press New Game. Buy it. You will not regret it. Also as a plus it has a demo. I mean who does that this days? Its like they had faith you might like it or something. Insane i tell you.

Amazing. Better than Commandos and Desperados together.

Gameplay wise, the levels you first see them are full of detail and very good looking. Unfortnately it quickly becomes apparent it's mostly a background matte painting on a soundstage. For all the focus on "stealth", for much of the game it becomes a kill-everyone slogfest or an absurb timed sequence game from quickloads and abusing the limitations of the AI. Mid-game, the story takes a reasonably large turn, which left me feeling the gameplay now missed something. Maybe that's good interactive storytelling and perhaps a comment of modern views of the Edo period. Without saying any more to avoid spoilers, it felt very different afterwards. Use the Japanese voices with subtitles. The English language ones are pretty low effort to begin with, and becoming increasingly annoying with the repetitive nature of some their command acknowledgements.

If you liked the old Commandos games or are interested in an isometric stealth games then you'll like this game. There is a real sense of accomplishment when you get all the characters working together to wipe out a group of guards or finally overcome some roadblock--the corollary is that you have to be ok playing a game where you'll sometimes be stuck, unable to actually advance and play it. And know that you'll spend too much time rotating the camera just right and delicately positioning the cursor exactly where you want it without it jumping up on a ledge or wall or impassable terrain. It will also take some trial and error to figure out exactly where you need to click at times. The plot is predictable, the characters good but also cartoony