Going back to the original reboot of the original Shadow Warrior from 1997, how did the team at Flying Wild Hog recreate the best elements of that game while leaving behind some of the less desirable elements? We chatted with Shadow Warrior 3 Game Director Kuba Opon about that refocus, how the developers worked to inject more verticality into this third entry in the franchise, and why Unreal Engine was a good fit for the first-person shooter. This time around, the studio decided to go back to that source game, and pull forward a renewed focus on a story that was historically an “insane, bombastic adventure.” Shadow Warrior 2 received equal acclaim, quadrupling the sales of its predecessor, and laying the groundwork for this year’s Shadow Warrior 3. That first reboot hit in 2013 and managed to do what few other reboots from that era achieved: create an enduring success that would become a foundation for a new series based on the franchise.

They wanted to sanitise some of the cheesy one-liners and ‘90s crass humor of the original, but not strip away so much that the game lost its character.

When Flying Wild Hog decided to reboot classic 3D Realms shooter Shadow Warrior, the team knew it had to walk a fine line.

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