It seems that action and adventure games with horror themes are being released left and right nowadays.  Some are of excellent quality, and others are not so entertaining.  Acclaim's Shadow Man enters the fray with some real signs of creative genius that definitely set it apart from the competition.

Based on the popular comic book, Shadow Man follows the adventures of Mike LeRoi, a man with an alter-ego named Shadow Man that can cross between the worlds of the living and the dead.  Legion, an evil being with great powers, is trying to open the gates between the two worlds.  To do this, he needs to collect "dark souls" in order to operate a twisted machine that will complete this task.  Basically, it’s your typical "end-of-the-world" story where the hero tries to stop the evil being and so on.  The small revision to the formula that keeps things interesting is that Mike must chase five deceased serial killers and take them out before reaching Legion.  Each one of these encounters is memorable and downright creepy in one way or another.

What sets Shadow Man apart from other horror games is that it really IS a horror game.  Most of the game is spent in Deadside (the land of the dead) and because of that, things can get extremely creepy.  The deeper players explore Shadow Man, the more horrible the surrounding environment gets.  At first, lost souls will roam around and occasionally engage you in combat.  Further into the game though, you'll run into awful creatures that have hooks for hands or may be wielding chainsaws.  And if that isn't enough to stop you from playing, you can look forward to battling freshly decapitated corpses.  Sometimes their heads even explode right in front of you accompanied by gut-wrenching screams.  To put it simply, this game is evil.  I'm personally convinced that the designers are either creative geniuses, or just really messed up.

This game is all about details.  One level has a section littered with body bags hanging from the walls (full ones, mind you) that have flies buzzing around them.  It’s pretty disgusting.  Another good example is the level called "The Playrooms".  This level is so messed up I can't even begin to describe it accurately.  The background music consists of a type of lullaby with the sounds of squeaking toys, dentist drills, and screaming people.  You could get scared just standing still and listening to this awful arrangement of sounds.  On top of that, there are floors and walls splattered with blood, people in cages, and a few other surprises I won't mention.  Bottom line, this game has what it takes to draw you in and make you feel like you're there.  The only problem is that most sane people would never want to be in some of the places in this game.

As for the action, Mike can jump, climb, swing across ropes, duck, tumble, and do pretty much anything Lara Croft can do.  That doesn't make this "Shadow Raider" though.  Mike can use two guns at once to shoot two enemies while using a number of maneuvers to evade their attacks.  Not only that, but once Mike has been to a location, he can use his dead brother's teddy bear to warp there at any time.  Sound tweaked?  It is.

While that is all fine and well, Shadow Man is not without its fair share of problems.  First of all, the first 6 hours of the game could have been left out completely.  Most players will find it hard to play the game since Mike will only have a couple of weapons and the initial areas aren't that interesting.  On top of that, enemies take way too many shots to kill.  Some take around 10 shots to put down and that makes things very difficult when you have four enemies bearing down on you and your gun doesn't fire at a very fast rate.  After around 6 hours though, things get better and Mike starts getting some decent power-ups.

The graphics in Shadow Man are, for the most part, excellent and really do a good job of showing what the Dreamcast is capable of, as well as what the N64 and Playstation aren't.  Everything is in high resolution and every detail -- right down to the wrinkles on a ghoul's skin -- is displayed.  The only problem in this department is that some areas of the game are too dark.  There is a torch and a flashlight to find, but I had problems playing the game during the day.  At one point, I resorted to putting a sheet over the television and my head while sitting a foot away so the reflection of sunlight wouldn't get in the way.  There are no problems at night, but you should probably play it then anyway if you want the full creep-out effect.

Aside from those minor flaws, Shadow Man is a fine game that not only takes advantage of the Dreamcast's power, but fills in the void left in the action/adventure genre.  It should be noted however that children should not play this game.  There is occasional swearing, but the real threat is the seriously evil theme of the game.  There are probably some adults that will have nightmares after playing through this one, so keep the children away and gather your courage before getting into this one.