Middle Earth: Shadow of
Mordor Review
Fellowship of the
Review
Shadow of Mordor follows Tallion, a ranger posted on the outskirts of Mordor with his
family. We start the game very tragically with him and his family being
executed. Through some strange blood oath he is linked to a wraith that keeps bringing
Tallion back to life forcing him to complete one task before returning to his
family; stop the Black-Hand.
The first thing I noticed while
playing this game was how beautiful it was. The graphics were amazing, and the
environments were lively, despite being set in Mordor. There was long green
grass, and bright flowers that littered the landscape which added to the
setting. The next thing I noticed was how similar this is to the Assassin’s Creed series. As I played
more of the game though, I realized that it wasn’t just an Assassin’s Creed clone but that it had improved the formula and had
substantial substance.
The story itself is well written and
respects The Lord of the Rings as
much as it possibly can. Although it makes some bold moves that I’m sure will upset
some of the die-hard fans of the series. I don’t believe that the game is considered
canon and I felt as that without those bold moves the game wouldn’t be quite
what it turned out to be. It is a very sad story, albeit a little predictable,
and has some extremely interesting characters within it. Most of them are new
to The Lord of the Rings and the
developers rarely relied on any existing characters to help progress its story.
The gameplay is the main draw of the
game and the reason for that is simple, it’s fun. Though extremely similar to
the Assassin’s Creed or Arkham series, it does something that
both of them do not. It adds an extra layer of depth to the enemy AI. This is
one of the strongest AI’s I’ve ever experienced in a game. There is a ‘Nemesis
System’ implemented into the game, which allows the player to look at the
Captain’s and War Chief’s within the army of Sauron.
Each captain and war chief has his own set of weaknesses,
strength’s and fears which can all be used against them. Not only this, but
each grunt within the army has his own life, and they can be promoted through
the ranks to the point of being an actual threat to the player. The Uruk’s
actually remember encounters with the player. For example if they flee battle
they will remember this and will grow a fear of the player and continue to flee
from battles with Tallion.
If a grunt kills you then they will get promoted to captain.
If a captain defeats you or survives a battle without fleeing they will power
up, with each level they gain there is a chance that they lose their weaknesses
and gain strengths. This can make the difficulty substantially harder. I
actually had a captain kill me over twenty times and the only reason I got rid
of him was because of a Caragor killing him. The game literally got so hard
that I was only able to defeat him because of dumb luck.
Some of the captains can even learn. I had almost defeated
one captain by repeatedly jumping over him and hitting him in the back,
unfortunately he survived and the next time I saw him I tried to implement the
same strategy. When I tried to jump over him this time, he caught me and threw
me to the ground. The Uruk captains almost never look the same, each time a
grunt is promoted he adds a type of armour and a special weapon each which is
unique to them. Their names are also unique to each captain. I believe all of these
to be randomized, but I am still impressed with the sheer amount of selections
given to the random number generator.
The Uruk’s also have their own lives aside from the player.
If the player just lets time pass then the Uruk’s will fight each other and
train which will have them automatically level themselves up. This is a nice
touch as it gives the enemies a life that the player isn’t a part of.
Despite all this the game is not unfair, in fact it is quite
the opposite. I am the reason that the captain had gotten so difficult because
I stubbornly kept trying to beat him without any strategy. This brings up another
point; strategy. This game is not a button masher (trust me) and actually
requires that the player understand the combat, because although a few enemies
are easy to take care, their numbers can rise exponentially. At one point I had
almost a hundred enemies on screen at once, all of which were trying to kill me
(sadly, I didn’t make it).
*This is a PRE-ALPHA image*
Racking up combos is super satisfying as it is quite
difficult when you have fourty or fifty enemies trying to kill you. The game is
also very gruesome, as any Lord of the
Rings game should be, but be warned there are decapitations left and
right.
Unfortunately, sometimes when trying to run away from enemies
Tallion will cling to walls and try to climb up them, resulting in my eventual
death. This is a recurring problem. The music is well done and is similar to
the soundtrack of The Lord of the Rings
Trilogy. Tallion, although visually plain and uninteresting, is actually a well
thought out and interesting character to follow. The strong story and fun
gameplay come together to make one of the strongest games to come out this
year. Once I beat the game I was no longer able to look at the Nemesis screen
which really seems like an oversight and will hopefully be fixed in an upcoming
update. Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor
truly is the game that The Lord of the
Rings has always deserved. Hopefully there are more to come.
8.9/10
No comments:
Post a Comment