And while that focus on fun is refreshing, Shadow Warrior 3 is almost completely unremarkable in its execution, being about as straightforward as an FPS can get. Instead, it throws you into the action right away and rarely lets a moment of ease set in from there. In an era where games feel like they keep trying to be bigger, this one is happy not to draw itself out with lengthy dialogue or exposition-filled cutscenes. (It doesn’t help that the notification arrow to let you know someone is attacking is relatively subtle and easy to miss in the thick of things.Shadow Warrior 3 doesn’t beat around the bush. It can even be difficult to tell what’s going on during the most chaotic battles because every enemy bleeds together (pun intended) and they all end up looking like the same tones of blood and mud. Slow-moving zombies with heavy wind up swings never pose a challenge and even the most aggressive hulking monstrosities wielding shields lack oomph after the first few fights. The one part of the combat that did grow a bit dull by the end of Evil West was the lack of enemy variety. You can just wait for stuff to recharge while using something else. It’s a ludicrous selection of weaponry that’s easy to switch between on the fly since nearly every piece of gear has its own dedicated button and cooldown timer – no ammo or bullets to keep track of. ![]() Or you can charge up your rifle with a high-powered beam of electricity that ricochets between enemies before unleashing your flamethrower to finish them off. You can zoom across the map and stun enemies then rack up a melee combo, uppercut them into the air, and jump up to smash them back down into a pool of blood and guts. In addition to that constant evolution, combat has a frantic flow that feels great in motion. That wasn’t so bad, though my RTX 2060 Super desktop PC was able to play smoothly at 60 fps with no stutters on High settings the vast majority of the time. Ultimately, I opted for setting a 40 FPS frame limit in the Steam Deck’s performance setting menu to get the most consistent performance. Frames dipped down to the low 20s on Epic or High settings, but after turning off motion blur (yuck), leaving on V-Sync, and lowering to Medium settings it was much better, hovering around 40-60 frames-per-second. Performance was a bit all over the place at first. It’s already optimized for controller support so all of the UI switched over to gamepad prompts immediately. You have to use the touchscreen or touchpad to install some Unreal Engine supporting files on first launch, but after that it ran great. To that end, I decided to install it on my Steam Deck (I’m using the 512GB model) and give it a try anyway. The UI is clearly designed to reflect a controller layout for quick reference and some commands, like pulling enemies towards you with the electric gauntlet, feel awkward on a keyboard. ![]() While I primarily played on my desktop PC, I found I vastly preferred using a gamepad over a mouse and keyboard. Evil West on Steam Deckĭuring the review period, Evil West was still rated as “Unsupported” on Steam Deck, but that’s likely because it just hadn’t released and been certified yet. There is rarely a stretch of time longer than 20 minutes in which you won’t either unlock a new ability, augment an existing weapon with a fresh effect, or find an entirely new gadget for dismembering enemies in glorious ways. The way combat is always expanding helps break up the otherwise monotonous layouts of Evil West’s levels. For example, you can increase the number of shots your pistol gets off in a single magazine, augment your rifle with electrical damage, and even incorporate new abilities like ground pounds and aerial combos to continue evolving your arsenal. ![]() Over the course of Evil West you’ll gradually unlock new weapons, powers, and upgrades that alter Jesse’s abilities in fun new ways. It’s a tale riddled with entertaining expletives and truly distinct characters, such as the fiercely opinionated doctor, Emilia Blackwell, so there’s never a dull moment – I just wish the story as a whole was more sophisticated than Jesse simply chasing down some bad people for revenge. You’ve got Illuminati-esque floating pyramids, portals to hell, and demonic little girls with skin-crawling voices. Developer Flying Wild Hogs really latched onto the whole “Wild West, but Weird” idea and ran away with it screaming. Its story puts you in control of Jesse Rentier from The Rentier Institute, an organization founded by Jesse’s father to hunt down and eradicate all manner of vampires and other foul beasts. The formula of Evil West’s levels is rarely mixed up save for a few unique situations, such as a wacky mine cart segment or the handful of times you walk around the base camp while being spoon fed exposition.
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