Shadow Warrior

Censored

In Great Britain this game was partially censored: they took out the ninja star weapon (shuriken) and reduced the gore levels.

Cut content

In the Master's Dojo, there is a picture of four Hentai girls (naked anime women) but only three of them can be found throughout the level. The graphics of the missing girl are still in the data files where she can be seen plunging a sword into her belly (presumably at the feet of her dead master).

Development history

Shadow Warrior was in development way before Duke Nukem 3D hit the store shelves, but as evidenced by pre-Duke ads it originally was a much more "serious" game. Duke's success as a politically-incorrect, off-the-wall shooter prompted a re-focusing of the game's content. So Lo Wang was created (originally the main character was an avenging angel kind of character), the story and levels were rewritten, and the weapons were modified (originally you had one Uzi, and threw only one shuriken, plus your arsenal included a crossbow, a lightning-throwing gauntlet, and an assortment of spells.

German index

On August 30, 1997, Shadow Warrior was put on the infamous German index by the BPjS. For more information about what this means and to see a list of games sharing the same fate, take a look here: BPjS/BPjM indexed games.

Graphics engine

Shadow Warrior uses the same Build engine as Duke Nukem 3D, but has some additional enhancements over that version, like transparent water, colored lighting, and reflective floors.

Humor

As an example of the game's subversive humour, the main character's name is Lo Wang. Wang is actually a slang term meaning penis. Consider the possibilities when Lo Wang says to a bunch of geishas "so, you want to wash Wang or you want to watch Wang wash Wang?" Also at one point in the game it is mentioned that Lo Wang has a brother, Hung Lo, continuing the same style of humor.

Novels

There were two novels based on Shadow Warrior. You Only Die Twice by Ryan Hughes, and For Dead Eyes Only by Dean Wesley Smith. Both were published by Pocket Books.

References

In the Seppuku Station level, head to the snack area (enter into the station via the door that has to be opened with the gold key, go down the luggage chute directly across from the door, and head into the conveyor on the left immediately exiting the first chute). Look at the little fliers all over the column in the room, and you'll see one of Lina Inverse of Slayers.

References to other games

In one level, Lo Wang comes across a female character chained to the wall that bears a striking resemblance to Lara Croft of the Tomb Raider series. He utters, "I guess she raid her last tomb!"* In the Bath House stage (level 12), you're treated to a nice display of explosions just before the level starts. Lo Wang makes a comment when they end about how it looks like something Duke Nukem would do.

Source code

On April 1, 2005, 3D Realms released the full source code, based on the 1.2 version, under a restrictive GPL license. The data files can be used for entertainment and education purposes, but they remain licensed/copyrighted and are not to be redistributed. There is no official support, but the company has opened a new dev forum on their website.

Voxels

Shadow Warrior has a feature that wasn't present in any of the other Build games, it supports voxels. Voxels are kind of like 3D pixels (i.e., cubes), and 3D objects constructed out of voxels don't have the ugly, blocky look that polygons give them. Ken Silverman finished a rudimentary voxel engine just in time for Shadow Warrior, and it was added to the game. You can enable voxels in the options menu, and it makes all game objects 3D at the expense of a lot of memory.

Wanton Destruction add-on

Soon after the release of the game, an add-on pack by the name of Wanton Destruction was announced, but ultimately cancelled. In September 2005, Anthony Campiti, from the Sunstorm company, which was developing the expansion, found the code back and passed it on to 3D Realms. Owners of the original v1.2 registered version can now download it for free. It contains 12 new missions and 4 multiplayer maps. The more in depth story about this can be read here.

Despite their note, it is possible to play the add-on with JonoF's Win32/Linux port without having the original DOS version installed. Either run the setup, and search for a WT.GRP file on your hard drive (it'll be in a temp folder), or use an archive program to extract the file from the setup EXE without running it. Nevertheless, 3D Realms offered a token of good faith by reducing the price of the original game to $10.

Information also contributed by Andy Voss, ClydeFrog, Maw, Satoshi Kunsai, Sciere, Tomer Gabel, Xoleras, and Zovni