"Die along with these foolish humans!"
Shadow the Hedgehog is a game that's mostly known as having some pretty bad writing, edginess to the point of parody, and more jokes of it than you can shake a stick at. That doesn't mean it can't have some creepy moments, however...As per Nightmare Fuel page policy, all spoilers are unmarked. You have been warned.
- If the game's intro didn't set the tone of the game, then the Story Mode menu screen will with it's simple design. Shadow's face takes up most of the screen with a Kubrick Stare with fire in his eyes and a dark library backdrop. The theme
playing during the main menus only serves to enhance the dark, ominous tone. - Cryptic Castle; not only does it have ominous feel to it, but there are also negative-looking blue ghosts that rise up towards you as you're falling. Then there are the pumpkin scarecrows that drop down from the ceiling with a creepy laugh, and at the very end of the Neutral path, you get chased by a giant, skeleton-like creature with blue flames surrounding its face that literally cannot be killed. Even Eggman himself had no idea what it was and was downright terrified of it!
- The game as a whole, also thanks to its Multiple Endings, can end with Shadow himself being pretty scary.
- All but one of the final Eggman bosses end with Shadow killing Eggman, and sometimes threatening to finish off Sonic, or take over Eggman's empire.
- The Pure Dark ending; Shadow has just beaten both Sonic and the Commander of GUN, and has the seven Chaos Emeralds. He intends to destroy the whole planet out of crazed omnicide, and he not only has the means to do so, but has just crushed the main opposition. It's underscored effectively by the despair-laden Evil Ending theme, and the sight of Shadow giving up on both humanity and everything he'd previously fought for; the scene fading to black as he devolves into insane laughter.Sonic: (barely conscious) Shadow... What are you going to do with them?
Shadow: (Beat) I'm Shadow... the Hedgehog. I was created to bring order and justice to the humans. With the power of these Emeralds, I'm going to destroy this damn planet! THIS IS WHO I AM! (cackles evilly and insanely) - What makes the Pure Dark ending even worse is the fact — as elaborated on below with his master plan — that Shadow reverting to his evil state after being reprogrammed by Prof. Gerald Robotnik out of grief-induced madnessnote in order to annihilate the entire world and all its inhabitants turns out to not be what even Black Doom wanted. Simply put, no one wins in this ending.
- And the Semi-Dark ending.Sonic: (barely conscious) Shadow... w-why? Why are you siding with them?
Shadow: (Beat) I'm Shadow the Hedgehog. The ultimate life form, born to protect and serve the dark lord, Black Doom! With the power of these Chaos Emeralds, this world will become the dark empire! This is who I am! (cackles evilly) - The Pure Dark-Hero has Shadow becoming The Starscream to Black Doom, betraying both the Earth and his former master to take over everything for himself. The thought of Shadow ending up Eviler than Thou — to Black Doom, of all beings — and setting out to conquer the universe is perhaps even more disturbing than the most evil ending. Particularly in how he maintains more of his sanity compared to his crazed, genocidal Pure Dark-Dark self, but still actively and willingly chooses to become an even bigger monster.
- The Semi Hero-Hero ending is frightening in a different way. The way Shadow calls himself a mistake that should never have been created uncannily resembles what people often say before attempting suicide. It invokes all the fear of hearing someone say that as they lose themselves completely to despair, yet being helpless to stop them from going through with it.
- Then, in the Last Story, Black Doom revealed his master plan involving paralytic gas.
- Imagine the plan here. Black Doom engaged a 50 year long plan to prepare an invasion of global proportions, completely curbstomping our defenses and manipulating Shadow into retrieving the Chaos Emeralds so that he could bring the Black Comet safely into Earth's atmosphere and merge them both. Once completed, the entire alien race would capture all humanity. For what purpose? To provide them with a bountiful harvest that can be farmed, reproduced, and grown like cattle for the purpose of providing food. Shadow didn't just save our lives, he saved our future.
- Why does Black Doom want to do this? Because in his mind, the Black Arms would be "saving" humanity from their greed, thirst for power, and affinity for betrayal. In other words, humans destroying themselves would be a total waste of a valuable livestock.
- Black Doom mentioned that their temple has been here for over 2,000 years. How long have they been planning to devour us, and have they done more to our history than just creating Shadow?
- Speaking of that gas, we actually get to see it in action - Not on any regular old humans, mind you, but on Sonic and all of his friends (as well as Eggman), minus Shadow, with Black Doom unleashing the larvae of his army on them to feast. Complete with screaming and yelling as the group is slowly feasted on by the larvae - which means that they can feel it, but can't do anything about it except scream. Not only that, but once Black Doom leaves, Shadow follows after him, just leaving them to be feasted upon by the larvae... Granted, they escape later (if offscreen) and cheer on Shadow for the final battle, but it's still an incredibly unnerving thing to think about, especially once you realize that if Shadow hadn't stopped Black Doom, this would have been the fate for the entire planet.
- Black Doom is implied to be an Eldritch Abomination messing with your mind. It is particularly notable in how, on the Dark routes, Shadow unquestioningly obeyed Black Doom's orders, with said orders being about terrorist attacks.
- On the subject of Black Doom's mind control, the fact that he managed to bring back memories of the day the ARK was attacked and Shadow can walk around in them is pretty terrifying. It implies Black Doom may have planted false memories within Shadow's head just to pull him onto the Black Arms' side. Who knows what else he did to Shadow's head, even in the canon ending?
- It gets even worse if you believe in the interpretation that the game is Black Doom forcing Shadow into a "Groundhog Day" Loop to either break him and get him to join the Black Arms, or to see if he'll be a liability to his plan. In either case, there are 326 timelines and Shadow is made to go through at least 10 of them before unlocking Last Story and breaking free.
- During the final fight with Black Doom in the Last Story, if you take long enough, you get to hear Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Dr. Eggman choking to death on nerve gas, cheering you on in battle until their last breath.
- While the preceding scenes are a little on the Narm side due to the characters being stuck motionlessly while they yell and exclaim at little jelly Black Arms bouncing next to them, the context is actually rather horrifying: that's them being prepped as food. It's not just that they're choking on nerve gas, but effectively about to become corpses to be devoured slowly yet surely and hearing every minute of it.
- One of the FMV cutscenes in the Dark routes shows the Black Arms using the Eclipse Cannon to wipe a city off the face of the Earth. Not even Eggman would be so brazen or evil as to cause such a colossal loss of life.Black Doom: Annihilation for this planet is near. It is time to embrace the dawn of your demise and despair.
- It's especially terrifying when you consider Gerald built the Eclipse Cannon to wipe out the Black Comet, and by extension the Black Arms — yet, it's used to annihilate humanity by the same creatures it was built to destroy.
- The opening FMV can be pretty frightening, given the game's Darker and Edgier direction and such scenes as the Black Arms' invasion, Shadow looming over a GUN soldier with death in his eyes, and the final shot of Sonic collapsing, Shadow standing over him with a gun in his hand.
- Couple this with the Sonic and Diablon boss fights and endings — The Semi-Dark one especially with Sonic's "Shadow... why... why are you siding with them?" line — and the implications are nothing short of horrific.
- The Neutral path can get quite unnerving, especially when Shadow believes he is an android, where Shadow delivers a surprisingly creepy Evil Laugh, and then gives us this line, underscored with images of Heroes and Adventure 2. Neither the plot holes nor the hamminess could keep this scene from being creepy.Shadow: The pieces are coming together. The "ultimate life form" they keep referring to is the black hedgehog, and he... died! And I'm his copy. Now, I know what I have to do...
- The sheer venom of Shadow's line upon completing the Dark Mission in The ARK — bringing down the space colony's defences so the Black Arms' attack force can take control of the Eclipse Cannon — is quite unnerving.Shadow: The Eclipse Cannon is nearby. Say your prayers, you disgusting humans!
- To say nothing about the Blue Falcon boss fight that happens immediately afterwards, where the fight ends with the heavy implication that Shadow kills the pilot inside by sending the mech plummeting down to burn up in the Earth's atmosphere.
- Black Bull's boss fight in Death Ruins. Once his health drops to half, be careful once you reach the top rail. He'll approach you and try to bite you, which can scare first-timers.
