[Video Game] Shadow of Mordor

[Rich H]

Bit off-topic this, so apologies for that!

It's my birthday and as I'm 42 (going on 12) my partner bought me the Shadow of Mordor game for my sparkling new Xbox One. I suppressed the "Oh no, you got me this game" ungrateful comment as she will have seen that it's Middle Earth and thought she'd get it me not knowing that I'd not liked the sound of it when it was previewed a few months back.

I remember hearing about it and dismissing it, but I've been playing it for an hour or so and it's surprisingly pretty bloody good. There are a lot of additional elements added but it's currently feeling a bit like an RPG campaign by someone, not necessarily using the TOR system, who isn't too concerned about deviating from canon if it means entertaining his players. I'd actually put it as being no 'worse' for this than the PJ films; and I'm talking the LotR trilogy there not the Hobbit ones. A particularly nice touch is how Orcs in the games, if they survive encounters with you, spend XP on themselves and challenge other Orcs and grow in power. Just got killed by a group of them and one of them spent his XP, levelled up, challenged another Orc Captain and killed him to take his place! I didn't know they could do that so I sat there thinking "OMG WTF?!?!*"

Anyway, I'd recommend it based on the, albeit short, time I've played it. I'm really happy it was bought for me as I'd probably never have tried it having already made up my mind about it.

Has anyone else got it? What do you think to it? Are there any elements of it that you've introduced into TOR? No spoilers please!

* I'm writing like this so I sound 'street' and 'with it', not old like I am!

[Otaku-sempai]

If you're old then I must be ancient since I'm about 12 years your senior. I have no prospect nor expectation of acquireing Shadows of Mordor any time very soon, but it does look like something that I might enjoy.

[Rocmistro]

I'm also pretty impressed wit the story line, Rich. I thought I was going to hate the fluff and love the mechanics. It's actually turning out to be quite the opposite. (I'm playing on PC, so my pinky finger is getting a cramp from constantly being in stealth mode)

So much so, in fact, that I think I'm going to be doing some houseruling to implement daggers in my own campaign stuff as an assassination style weapon.

[Glorelendil]

Just got killed by a group of them and one of them spent his XP, levelled up, challenged another Orc Captain and killed him to take his place!

I'm suddenly reminded of Bloodlord Mandokir.

"Ding!"

"Gratz!"

[shipwreck]

Fun, well made game, but my inner Lore Monkey can't get over the initial premise. An Elf Ghost?! Is there anything in the source material that can help support that?

[Wilogrim]

shadows of mordor is made by the same people that make lord of the rings online so I would expect it to be a good game but with a looser grip on tolkin cannon.

[shipwreck]

LOTRO is made by Turbine, Shadow of Mordor by Monolith. They are, however, both under Warner Bros so I can see how that would be confusing.

I have plenty of gripes with LOTRO but they do try really hard to stick to the text as much as possible and have done a bang-up job with locales and [most of the] stories.

[HotSnow50]

Ok, Celebrimbor and I get to skip through Mordor intimately involving ourselves in the power struggles of Uruks with the deepest AI-driven RPG Middle Earth videogames have ever seen?!? Yes please!

I have it on PC at max settings... I have played 33 hours of it already and am only 25% of the way through the campaign... Those stats scream "open world success!"

P.s., as we are all spouting ages here, I am 30

[Beleg]

I don't own it since I vowed long ago to never pay full price for a video game ever again, but I've been watching others play it and frankly as I game I think it's fantastic. Like others I'm not entirely sold on the premise, and I'm somewhat baffled by how the developers managed to get away with such a jump from canon, especially considering their own obvious misunderstanding of the books, but I am seriously excited about the prospect of getting to fight all those orcs

[Bomilkar]

I've played through the first half of the game and so far have been really enjoying it. While the premise itself is something you just have to buy, there are a lot of little details to keep us lore monkeys happy. All these small, personal stories connected to the artifacts you find show how much effort the designers have put into their research for the game. These alone can provide some nice resources for my TOR sessions.

Now while I am overall quite happy with the game, there are some reservations:

- After some time the game becomes less and less challenging. So far, I have not received that famous "branding" power and yet, I have already been browsing forums and discussion groups for ways to make the game more difficult. What I especially dislike is the orcs' general lack of awareness. Far too often have I managed to sneak behind a group of orcs and murder them from behind one by one, even though they were standing right next to each other. And from what I have heard, combat becomes a walk in the park as soon as you have unlocked certain powers and combos. Even though I am much more of a casual than a hardcore gamer, I would like my challenges to be ... uhm .. challenging. Now, apparently, Monolith have acknowledged the problem and are now listening to ideas from the fanbase. Let's hope for the best.

- For my own, personal taste the game is a tad too brutal. This might be the one thing that rubs me the wrong way much more than any potential inconsistencies with the lore. Decapitations and severed limbs are just your ordinary fare, but the "brutalise" option you get to unlock in the game lets you kill your opponents in a very 'orcish' manner. Maybe that is the point, though. From the beginning on, it seems to be clear that our protagonist is bound to collect Shadow Points at a constant rate. One might think that there is a multiplayer extension in the pipeline where you play orcs vying for the position of Warchief. It wouldn't change too much behaviour-wise.

Now, this leads me to the things I am stealing for my TOR campaign.

-The characterisation of the orcs is spot on. The dialogues and little insights into orc society will really help me flesh them out as antagonists - especially in social encounters (think Goblin Town and the Great Goblin). And a character like Ratbag, who you meet rather early in the game, has a lot of potential to provide some interesting dilemmas for the players by offering them 'assistance' and a 'temporary alliance'. Shadow Points guaranteed.

-The nemesis system is also something that I find rather intriguing, because it highlights the fluidity of the hierarchy of evil. If an unnamed antagonist somehow survives a combat with the PCs, give him a name and promote him to major antagonist. If a named antagonist dies or is somehow weakened by the players' actions, have someone ready to eagerly replace him. If a PC dies, give the creature that struck the death blow a name, promote it, and then keep it of-screen until the players want to hunt it down to avenge their fallen friend.

-There are some other things I am considering for my campaign but discussing those would be somewhat spoilerific, so I will reserve them for a later time.