To say that I had been looking forward to Shadow Complex is like saying a football match between West Ham and Millwall might cause a couple of minor scuffles, or that Jay has a mild appreciation of humus. As soon as the names ‘Castlevania’ and ‘Metroid’ started floating loosely around the game it was always going to be a day one purchase given how much I dribble over the classic adventure/platform leanings of the former two, and having played through it as thoroughly as humanely possible it not only bears comparison, but stacks up pretty bloody well on its own two legs.

Those looking to plunge themselves into a sweeping epic of a story might want to know at this juncture that there isn’t one, but it doesn’t matter a jot. There’s a plot that develops gently as you go obviously, with your character starting off on what seems an innocent hiking trip in some woodland with a female friend until things go HORRIBLY WRONG DA DA DAAAA. You pretty quickly discover what’s happened and set off to set the world to rights, but to do this you’re going to have to do a heck of a lot of adventuring first.

The game is viewed as a traditional two-dimensional platformer would be, although it’s actually somewhere between the second and third dimension during points of the quest. Using Epic’s Unreal technology the game is able to have enemy soldiers ragdoll around, bombs and grenades bounce about like footballs and boxes and the like flying off into the distance when exploded. It’s a pretty fresh feeling title despite the classic viewpoint, and graphically it is pretty impressive too.

If you’re new to this type of game, perhaps a little explanation before we delve into what the game does right (a lot of things) and what it doesn’t (a few). You start the adventure as an average Joe with limited abilities and a limited scope as to where in the huge world you can reach. Through adventuring you gradually pick up tools and weapons that not only make you more powerful in combat, but also expand upon your movement and exploration capabilities too. Thus, the game pretty much leads you along a path for the main quest, but allows for a massive amount of exploration when it comes to picking up the more minor ammo upgrades and the like.

Of course this is nothing new at all as already mentioned, so why does Shadow Complex do such a good job at it? Firstly, it allows the player enough areas to practice and exploit his new items and equipment after obtaining them so they can explore a fair bit before having to follow the dusty trail to the next main objective. The world is big enough and packed full of enough secrets that you’ll want to hunt down those little ammunition boosts and the like, and this extends the game’s life appreciably. To help you keep track of all these areas you have a handy little map that you regularly update with the general outline of each new area you reach, but won’t tell you what you can expect to find there until you’re explored it.

Secondly, it often rewards clever thinking in the solutions of its puzzles, but never strays too close to leaving you up against a brick wall when it comes to the main quest. The most tricky sections are usually saved for the optional bonus items and hence if you get a bit stuck on one you can always nudge the main adventure on another notch, gather some more items with your new equipment and come back later. Apart from a tiny portion pretty much all of the map is available to traverse at any point you wish once you’ve gained the toolset to get there, so you can pace it however you wish.

The weaponry is pretty impressive too. You always have an infinite-ammo gun to fall back on should you need to (with more powerful versions being picked up along the way), but you also get missiles, grenades and expanding foam to play with too. Not only do these serve as pretty tasty weapons to use on enemies, but they also can be used and cleverly combined to solve some of the game’s more difficult bonus item riddles.

Overall, though, the main thing that Shadow Complex does right is simply to do with how it feels to play, and how enjoyable and addictive it quickly becomes. Jumping around like a loon and shooting at things left, right and centre is great fun, and it doesn’t throw a ridiculous amount of different control schemes at you either which allows you to just get on with it. It’s also got that annoying ability to keep you pressing on past what was supposed to be your last checkpoint before bed just so you can see what you can now achieve with your new stuff or because you’ve had a lightbulb moment and remembered how you can use something to reach a new area or pickup. It’s compulsive stuff, and it keeps dangling carrots in front of your nose so you want to carry on and find new items and routes.

One other major positive is the musical score that, whilst used sparsely, is actually beautiful classically based stuff that perfectly suits the mood of whatever you find yourself doing, whether it is the uplifting tones you get when you get a new piece of weaponry or such or the stark moment when you flood an entire enemy base and then have to swim back through dozens of floating corpses to find an exit accompanied by a solemn piano sonata. Brilliant stuff.

There’s no multiplayer, but then again it’s hard to think of how it could have been done, and the game doesn’t need it anyway. For 1200 Microsoft points you’re getting ten hours of excellent adventure platform gaming with decent production values, so you’re getting a bloody decent slice of bang for your buck. Is it better than the Metroids and Castlevanias that it takes inspiration from? Not as such, no. What it does manage to do though is give you a game that can’t be described as worse either; it’s just a different, slightly more modern take on the genre. If this one isn’t in my top ten of 2009 come Christmas then I’d be one very surprised gaming critic.