Allegra Frank said he is a fan-favorite. "For others," wrote Kotaku Mike Fahey, Shadow "signifies the looming death of a beloved series." Fahey felt Shadow's self-titled game was when the Sonic franchise lost its identity, and dismissed those who argued in favor of his role in Sonic Adventure 2. Jim Sterling, writing for GamesRadar+, ranked Shadow among the series' worst characters, arguing he lost his relevance over time and calling him "the ultimate example of a good idea gone rotten." Brian Shea from Game Informer included Shadow in a similar list, whom observed "Shadow's brooding "tortured soul" personality wore on a lot of fans quickly..." In a more positive write-up, Fanbyte's Kenneth Shepard argued Shadow's characterization was more complex than most characters in the series, but recent iterations have leaned harder into a one-dimensional "edgelord" archetype. Despite this, in 2005 Naka said Sonic Team had determined Shadow was the series' most popular character excluding Sonic himself, a finding reaffirmed in a 2009 Sega poll. In 2011, Guinness World Records named Shadow among the 50 greatest video game characters of all time. In other media Outside the video game series, Shadow appears in the anime series Sonic X, which adapts the story of the Sonic Adventure games and also appears in the animation Sonic Boom (TV series) and Sonic Prime. The original Japanese cast from the games reprised their roles, while Jason Griffith voiced Shadow in the English dub by 4Kids Entertainment. In the Sonic Boom (2014–2017) spin-off franchise, Shadow appears in the 2014 games Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric for the Wii U and Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal for the Nintendo 3DS, and the episodes "It Takes a Village to Defeat a Hedgehog" and both parts entitled "Eggman: The Video Game", voiced by Kirk Thornton, and usually appears as a rival to Team Sonic. Ian Hanlin voices Shadow in Sonic Prime. After Sonic inadvertently opens the path to the Paradox Prism for Eggman, Shadow has a vague vision of the universe's shatter and tries to prevent it but fails, he manages to escape it using Chaos Control and is trapped in the void between Shatterspaces. Shadow also appears in the Sonic the Hedgehog comic books published by Archie Comics and IDW Publishing, and his likeness has been used in Sonic merchandise. Shadow made his live-action debut in a non-speaking cameo appearance in the mid-credits scene of the 2022 film Sonic