Shadow Complex

Shadow Complex is a Metroidvania video game developed by Chair Entertainment in association with Epic Games and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 in 2009¹. The game follows Jason and his girlfriend Claire, out to explore some caverns. When Claire goes missing, he finds a massive underground complex with soldiers and high-end technology. Jason must rescue Claire and discover the plot behind the faction operating the complex. Inspired by the Metroid series, the player in Shadow Complex controls Jason as he explores through the underground complex, defeating hostile forces, and finding various power-ups that enable further exploration of the complex. The game is based on the setting of Empire by Orson Scott Card, with Peter David brought in to write the script for the game. Shadow Complex s reception has been positive. It has received and been nominated for several Game of the Year and Editor's Choice Awards. Critics praised the gameplay, narrative and graphics, with several reviewers stating that it was fairly priced. It also is considered as a leading game that revitalized the Metroidvania genre through indie games. It broke sales records for Xbox Live Arcade titles, selling over 200,000 units within the first week of release and as of year-end 2011, has sold over 600,000 copies.…

Shadow Complex is a Metroidvania video game developed by Chair Entertainment in association with Epic Games and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 in 2009. The game follows Jason and his girlfriend Claire, out to explore some caverns. When Claire goes missing, he finds a massive underground complex with soldiers and high-end technology. Jason must rescue Claire and discover the plot behind the faction operating the complex. Inspired by the Metroid series, the player in Shadow Complex controls Jason as he explores through the underground complex, defeating hostile forces, and finding various power-ups that enable further exploration of the complex. The game is based on the setting of Empire by Orson Scott Card, with Peter David brought in to write the script for the game. Shadow Complex s reception has been positive. It has received and been nominated for several Game of the Year and Editor's Choice Awards. Critics praised the gameplay, narrative and graphics, with several reviewers stating that it was fairly priced. It also is considered as a leading game that revitalized the Metroidvania genre through indie games. It broke sales records for Xbox Live Arcade titles, selling over 200,000 units within the first week of release and as of year-end 2011, has sold over 600,000 copies. A remastered version was released for Microsoft Windows in December 2015¹, for Xbox One in March 2016¹ and for PlayStation 4 in May 2016. A limited physical printing of 7,500 for the PlayStation 4 was released on August 19, 2016 through Limited Run Games. ===Sales=== Shadow Complex was the top selling Xbox Live Arcade game for the week within its release, and furthermore was one of the top ten played titles for all of Xbox Live. It also broke all sales records for Xbox Live Arcade titles, selling over 200,000 units within the first week of release. It is estimated that the game has sold nearly 490,000 units, based on leaderboard statistics, within a year of its release. That number increased to over 600,000 as of year-end 2011. ==Possible sequel and remastered version== Chair has considered a sequel to Shadow Complex, and had started working on development after the release of the first game. At that time, both Mustard and executives at Epic Games were considering possibilities for mobile games based on the success of spirit-based titles like Fieldrunners. Around mid-2010, about eight to nine months after the release of Shadow Complex and into the development of its sequel, Apple was preparing to announce the iPhone 4 which they said would offer enough processor power to run games using a 3D engine. Mustard got into contact with Apple with the offer to develop a game for the iPhone, and Apple allowed them to, but required completion of the title in a very short timeframe, approximately five months, as to have it ready for the iPhone release event. Because of the limited size of Chair, they could only work on one project at a time. Over one weekend, Mustard halted the development of the Shadow Complex sequel and put his team on developing Infinity Blade, which proved successful; the title had two further sequels. During this time, Mustard stated that they were stockpiling ideas for the Shadow Complex sequel after they completed Infinity Blade. Though they do not expect a sequel to perform as well as Infinity Blade, they have pledged that a sequel will be made. In a March 2016 interview, Mustard stated that the sequel's map and core game is in a playable state, but would need about a year and a half to add art assets, enemy behavior, and other mechanics needed to polish the title. When the third Infinity Blade title was completed in September 2013, Chair was looking to return to Shadow Complex but a new opportunity came about as Apple had introduced Chair to Bad Robot, the production company of film and television director J. J. Abrams. The two companies recognized a potential game could be developed. Chair spent the next two years working on Spyjinx, which is set to be released in 2016. During 2015 as Spyjinx s development continued, Mustard recognized that Chair had grown large and mature enough to handle a second project. He opted to have part of his team create Shadow Complex Remastered, using the help of a friendly third-party studio to help port the game to the Unreal Engine 4, giving the game more realistic rendering capabilities enabled by the nature of the original game assets being developed at high resolution. Chair included keyboard and mouse controls for personal computer users and added in new melee takedown maneuvers, as these were already developed for the anticipated sequel. The Remastered version includes new achievements and Master challenges. However, Mustard did not want to add many other new features to the game, wanting to leave the game otherwise untouched for experienced players. Shadow Complex Remastered was made available for free download on Microsoft Windows through Epic's storefront on December 3, 2015, with plans for wider Windows release on other storefronts. The Windows version was released for free during its first month; Mustard said that Chair was financially secure to enable this decision and found that through Infinity Blade that releasing the title for free would allow them to get it to as many players as possible and to see what interest there is for pursuing a sequel. The remastered version was released on Xbox One on March 16, 2016, and a PlayStation 4 version, as well as PC version offered through the Windows 10 Store and Steam on May 3, 2016. A physical printing of the remaster was made by Limited Run Games with 7,500 copies being produced for the PlayStation 4, and was released on the distributor's website on August 19, 2016. Of the 7,500, only 6,900 were made available for sale, with the rest being given to employees of Epic Games.

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