Who Is Shantae?
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English - June 22, 2021 19:30 - ★★★★★ - 10 ratingsVideo Games Leisure video games videogames nintendo sony sega microsoft xbox playstation wii Homepage Download Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Plenty of us passed over WayForward's Shantae when it was released for the Game Boy Color back in 2002. After all, it showed up very late in the GBC's lifespan and, if you didn't know any better, you might mistakenly peg it as a childrens' game about a cute little genie that uses the power of dance to fight her enemies including the dastardly pirate, Risky Boots. Boy, did we miss out. There's actually a lot of tricky platforming and sly innuendo that makes the game more appropriate for an older audience than a younger one. As series co-creator Matt...
Plenty of us passed over WayForward's Shantae when it was released for the Game Boy Color back in 2002. After all, it showed up very late in the GBC's lifespan and, if you didn't know any better, you might mistakenly peg it as a childrens' game about a cute little genie that uses the power of dance to fight her enemies including the dastardly pirate, Risky Boots. Boy, did we miss out. There's actually a lot of tricky platforming and sly innuendo that makes the game more appropriate for an older audience than a younger one. As series co-creator Matt Bozon says, the games are "too sexy to be a kid's brand, and too girly for a male gamer brand."
It took a while, but that little game eventually spread its wings into a whole franchise of fantastic character platformers in the Metroid style of collecting new abilities and backtracking to see what has opened up in previous paths. Today there are a bunch of Shantae games spanning a variety of platforms (not including the games that were cancelled before they could really get off the ground including pitches for Super NES and Game Boy Advance versions), and it can be difficult to keep them all straight. WayForward has produced a short retrospective detailing all of Shantae's adventures in celebration of the entire series arriving on Nintendo Switch (including that first GBC game!) and, soon, other contemporary platforms. Review your history lesson and then jump in with whichever adventure appeals to you the most.