I'm on the last few levels of this now and really liked it. Of course, I liked "Hard Reset" way more than others around here seemed to, but I think "Shadow Warrior" is a much better game than HR was in most respects. The melee is awesome and I love the "street fighter-esque" inputs required for special moves. Plus, the karma system (which rewards you for dispatching enemies in the most creative ways possible) ensures that there's always some variety to gameplay as you are penalized if you just do the same things over and over (it reminded me a lot of "Bulletstorm's" Skillshot system, in that way). My only complaint regarding the melee is that I wish there were more battles where you fight enemies with swords. There are only two enemy types that have swords, which is disappointing as sword vs sword fights can be challenging and fun but the game doesn't use them nearly enough. The opening scene of the game where you fight a bunch of humans with swords was a blast, kind of like playing a video game version of the Crazy 88 fight in "Kill Bill Vol 1," I just wish there was a bit more of that before all the crazy demons show up.
Anyhow, it's waaaaaay easier than Hard Reset, but I also think it has way more gameplay variety and more room for unique strategy. Plus, it's still plenty hard if you play on Insane (honestly, there aren't many games out there as difficult as "Hard Reset" played on Insane is......especially when you consider that "Hard Reset" has check points, unlike "Shadow Warrior's" save anytime system).
My biggest complaint, though, is that it's kind of ugly. I thought "Hard Reset" had awesome art design and it really nailed the "Blade Runner" aesthetic more than any other FPS I can think of (even if it overdid the post processing effects at times). "Shadow Warrior" has greater variety in the look of its levels, which is a welcome change, but alot of the effects are still annoyingly distracting. I ending up having to just turn mirrors and bloom off because I found them distracting in battles. Plus, the story isn't anything great, but it gets the job done (and is a MASSIVE improvement over Hard Reset's, which didn't make any sense at all due to piss poor localization).
As to level design, the levels start out really linear, but as the game progresses they open up (there's some pretty huge levels towards the end that are as intricately designed as anything in the original "Shadow Warrior"---at one point the protagonist actually complains about the "old school" nature of one massive level which has you searching for various colored statues to unlock doors centered around a central circular arena, which was kind of funny. That level in particular is very 90s FPS--although there are a few flaws which keep them from achieving the heights of some of the original's level design, chief among them being that they use the same graphic for openable doors that they use for unopenable doors. Which is kind of annoying as it forces the player to try to open every door just to see which one's might contain secrets, while also forcing the designers to rely a bit to heavily on their lazy "follow the door that's glowing to find your way around" guidance system). It's just kind of odd that they saved these larger levels for the end and had more generic, linear, levels at the start....especially since one of the complaints in some of the reviews I've read is the purported linearity of the levels.
Anyhow, it's one of the better, new, FPS's I've played in a while. And over all I think it strikes the right balance between keeping everything that was good about 90s FPSes (the difficulty, some of the more intricate level design), while adding some of what's good about modern FPSes (atmosphere, story, variety). It doesn't reinvent the wheel, but it's lots of fun and definitely worth playing if you like the original. Especially if you can get it on sale (I got it for 10 dollars in the last steam sale, and it's more than worth that).