Shadow of the Beast is a 1989 platform game developed by Reflections and published by Psygnosis for the Amiga. It was later ported to several other systems. The game was known for its graphics, with many colours on screen and up to twelve levels of parallax scrolling backdrops, and for its atmospheric score composed by David Whittaker that used high-quality instrument samples.

It was followed by two sequels, Shadow of the Beast II in 1990 and Shadow of the Beast III in 1992. The series was acquired by Sony Interactive Entertainment through Psygnosis, with Heavy Spectrum Entertainment Labs developing a remake, which was released for the PlayStation 4 in May 2016. The game uses up to twelve levels of parallax scrolling, and up to a maximum of 128 colours on screen. The game's cover art was designed by British artist Roger Dean, who has also done cover artwork for other Psygnosis-published games. The music for Shadow of the Beast was composed by David Whittaker. Whittaker wrote six main pieces of music, with each piece containing its own sub-theme, to "fit the changing scenes in the game." The instruments were made using the Korg M1 synthesiser and then sampled at 20 kHz.

In an interview with The One regarding Shadow of the Beast III's development, the team behind Beast III noted the original Shadow of the Beast's selling point was its graphics, and Edmondson stated that "It was definitely a case of being in the right place at the right time. Apart from how many colours and layers of parallax and monsters we could squeeze on screen, no thought went into it whatsoever", and furthermore called Shadow of the Beast a "graphics showcase".

Shadow of the Beast was released in 1989 by Psygnosis. It was initially retailed for £35, and was bundled with a T-shirt. to the TurboGrafx-16's Super CD-ROM² System and the Commodore 64 by DMA Design, to the Mega Drive by WJS Design, to the Atari Lynx by Digital Developments, to the Master System by TecMagik, and to the FM Towns by Tim Ansell of Creative Assembly. An Atari 8-bit version was in development in 1990 to be published by Harlequin, but it was never finished due to collapse of the company. A port for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System titled Super Shadow of the Beast was shown at the 1992 Summer Consumer Electronics Show, and it was planned to be released by Information Global Service, however it never materialized. The Mega Drive and Super CD-ROM² versions of Shadow of the Beast were released in Japan by Victor Musical Industries on 27 March 1992. The FM Towns and Super CD-ROM² versions feature a soundtrack arranged by Chris Howlett and Ian Henderson of DC Productions.

Reception

Shadow of the Beast and Shadow of the Beast II were reviewed in 1991 in Dragon where both games got 5 out of 5 stars. Sega Pro praised the Master System version for its graphics and sound, but criticised the "awkward" controls method.

In 1996, Computer Gaming World declared Shadow of the Beast the 76th-best computer game ever released.

Remake

A re-imagined version of Shadow of the Beast was revealed at Gamescom 2013, developed by Heavy Spectrum Entertainment Labs and released by Sony Interactive Entertainment for the PlayStation 4 in May 2016. The original Amiga version is included along with the remake.

References in other games

Graphics from Shadow of the Beast and Shadow of the Beast II were featured in two special levels in the original Lemmings game (Amiga, Mega Drive, PC, Super NES, and Atari ST versions), called "A Beast of a Level" and "A Beast II of a Level". These references were supported by cameo versions of the title music from each version, in this case both pieces were arranged by Tim Wright.

References

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