ShadowCaster

Year 1993, ShadowCaster landed on my disk and I had no idea what to expect. It looked like Ultima Underworld, behaved a bit differently, and after the first ten minutes I realized I'd stumbled into something peculiarly unique.

Raven Software were at the beginning of a career that would later lead them to Heretic and Hexen, and ShadowCaster is essentially their quiet coming-of-age test. The game runs on an engine provided by id Software — the foundation from which Doom grew, except here it's still in its raw, pre-Doom form. The story revolves around a hero named Kirt, who gradually discovers he's not an ordinary human, but a descendant of a shapeshifter race. The evil ruler Veste, war between factions of shapeshifters, the rest of the world in ruins — it's a dark fantasy backdrop with mythological ambitions, though the game hints at the narrative rather than telling it outright.

The heart of the game is movement through a pseudo-3D first-person environment — you walk, fight, solve simple puzzles. The key mechanic is transforming into various creatures, each with different abilities, movement properties, and attack styles. One can swim, another fights better up close, another is faster. This form-switching gave the game a dimension few competitors had back then. The problem is that the level design sometimes resembles a maze more than an intentionally crafted world, and navigation can be frustrating without an automap or paper next to your keyboard.

ShadowCaster didn't echo in memory as loudly as Doom or Underworld, even though technically it was on the right track. The engine handled height differences and floor slopes — things Doom couldn't do yet. The graphics were solid for 1993, the Sound Blaster sounds created atmosphere. What the game lacked was sharp rhythm. The pacing is uneven, tough moments alternating with stretches where little happens. Today you feel it twice as much.

Playing it today in a browser via DOSBox appeals mostly to those with a connection to that particular era — games still searching for their form, unafraid to be a bit clumsy. The shapeshifting mechanic still works as an idea, and if you're looking for the precursor to what grew into later Raven titles, you'll find it here in fairly pure form. It's not a game you'll forget to eat at. But it's a game where you'll understand which paths led forward in 1993.