Shu (Switch eShop) Review

Initially, Shu impresses, sporting a clean and crisp art style reminiscent of the Torchlight series or the recent exploration title RIME. The music, too, reaches out as atmospheric and professional, causing you to look forward to an engaging platformer. A few levels in, though, it becomes apparent that as far as platforming ideas go, Shu never pushes past the lower gears. Ideas are introduced quickly but unfortunately never explored in much depth, which results in a pleasant enough experience, just not a particularly exciting one.

The game’s structure works against it, introducing new abilities for the titular character via companions who run along with you like obedient, hand-holding children. Across the game, you gain the ability to slow time, double jump, wall jump and walk across water, which sounds great as far as abilities go, the problem being that they only ever last for the two or three levels of each main area (of which there are six). And even when you do have these extra abilities at your disposal, the actual platforming mechanics offered just aren’t that interesting. I completed the game in two sittings and by the time I was halfway through I had honestly lost interest. There were a few moments of decent flow, but nothing even approaching the platforming perfection found in the recent Rayman revival (which, by the way, you can find for just a little bit more than Shu’s asking price).

This is not to say that Shu fails to try. Present are the ubiquitous collectibles, which do nothing at all and offer no reward for finding them all as far as I can tell. Most levels, though linear in their left-to-right design, do offer several alternative paths, which succeed in making levels feel slightly more open and organic. There’s just very little here that feels essential, so you’ll dutifully push through each level without feeling much in the way of excitement.

Everything is unfortunately hamstrung by main character movement that feels flighty and awkward, combined with a repetitious structure that sees you having to run from an encroaching evil spirit during the final level of each area. These frustrating sections will see you die many times not from your own ineptitude but from level design that feels untested in relation to the time needed to run the gauntlet versus the oncoming speed of the insta-death spirit. Thank God the level checkpoints are quite generous, otherwise, I doubt that I would have persisted to the end. And it’s an end that you’ll reach quickly, likely only in an hour or two, depending on your skill/patience. With little replay value, I can’t say that I recommend a purchase at anything other than sale price.

Shu is an okay platformer with a pretty façade. You jump, do a few interesting moves and that’s about it. With little compulsion to obsess over collectibles and skills that are given then taken away, Shu feels like a handful of decent ideas without a meaningful vessel to contain them.

Rating: 3 / 5