Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor - Game of the Year Edition
  •   Staff

    01-02-2021 04:29 AM (Updated 01-13-2021)

Dare I Say the Closest Thing to a Next Gen Game on the Xbox One

When a Next Generation console is released it also needs to have next games. You can see that jump with older consoles especially in the graphics department. That is not the case now a days. I have even joked in the past when Microsoft was releasing a new Xbox (The S & X versions) each year that it was the most powerful console to run 8 bit games on. Developers were making enough of them this generation. The computing power that the Xbox One has should mean some amazing new games, but games like Ryes: Son of Rome was just a regular 360 style title. It had your generic limited repeating enemies. This was considered next gen? Why are there like only 3 character models?!

There have been other Lord Of The Rings game, but this incarnation is as close as next gen gaming has gotten in my eyes. I say this because the developers delivered what they promised for one (I’ll throw an early alpha video at the bottom of the review. You will see that some details have changed, but the core gameplay was solid even then). It has a very impressive game mechanic called the Nemesis System and the amount of unique models displayed at one time is impressive. The game has as many as twenty unique Captains and five War Chiefs that tracks interactions. I found this system to be very innovative for this generation of consoles. Imagine running into a Captain and his minions, but they are to much for you to handle. So your best bet is to run and fight another day. The Nemesis System records the interaction and saves it for the next encounter. When you meet up with this Captain again he will remember that you tucked you tail between you legs and ran. He will call you out as a coward along with threats of bodily harm before the fight begins. There are many variations, personalities, and dialogs with each meeting. After a couple of hundred run ins with these Captains they all had something to say, but the interaction that occurred when I ran into Kruk The Immovable is my favorite. It also made me laughed out loud, so here it is for you to enjoy as well:

Kruk The Immovable


There are different incarnations of Uruks (A higher functioning lethal Orc) in this game. You do have classes like archers and shield bearers, but then they diverge into very detailed and creative Captains & War Chiefs all with unique names. If you kill them without chopping of their heads they come back with battle scars and they will remember you. Their names are great too, like Feldush Blood Licker, Stakuga The Beheader, and Mozu The Diseased to name a few. If a grunt kills you then they take the place of a downed Captain adorning a new armor set because of the promotion. Captains can challenge other captains to gain power and even become War Chiefs themselves. The developers did a really great job on creating unique and memorable encounters. The developers could for sure have taken it further and did more in this department. That would have made the replayabiltiy factor even much better because if of course you do play the game long enough repetition is bound to pop up in one form or another. I did experience this just a little during my complete achievement run through. At the same time I also experienced one offs with Kruk and then another unique character called Olrok Drooler. And yes, he has a Saint Benard level of drool hanging off his jowls.

The story was well crafted and there are some twenty quests that drives the story. You are a Ranger of Gondor killed by a servant of Sauron, but you do not die in the normal sense. Instead you are fused with an Elven Wraith called Celebrimbor who doesn’t remember much. Together you fight through the story to discover who you are and take revenge for your deaths. Twenty quests seams like a standard amount for a game, but the quests feel like they go by so quick. Because of the merging with Celebrimbor you also gain the ability to enter the minds of the Uruk Orcs to have them do your biding. Once they are branded with your mark they can give you intel about the Uruk horde, or you can help them move up the ranks to eventually become a War Chief bodyguard that then betrays their War Chief. Each member of this horde has different sets of weaknesses and strengths that can be exploited. It make every encounter and play through different.

The combat is really enjoyable in Shadow of Mordor. It is similar in ways to Mad Max and Batman Arkham Asylum, but it involves unique swordplay. The execution finishers are really great. My favorite one involves kicking a downed Uruk into the air and while he floats in for that brief moment you remove his head with your sword. You can also fight from afar with a bow in wraith mode which slows time, it lets you shoot special explosive targets, and bait that calls forth beasts that you can then bend to your will to ride. You can also play this game in complete stealth mode if you choose. Combine this with a myriad of special abilities and the combat becomes a really fun multi pronged experience. This game almost received a top ranking from me, if it wasn’t for the occasional clunkiness of controlling your character when sprinting or when riding a mounted beast. It was most evident when you were doing the timed trails and you mount would get caught up some piece of terrain or structure. This made completing the Trials a bit frustrating. Everything else however made this a great game. Between the combat, the diversity in Uruk enemies, and the innovative Nemisis System this made it a next gen level game to play. More of this is type of ingenuity is needed in the gaming industry to make games better and take advantage of that processing power.

Note - The following achievements are now unattainable:
Repaid In Blood
Lord Of The Ring
The Hunt Is My Mistress

Update: To their Credit, Monolith has patched the game in a way that now makes these achievements un-lockable again.

Alpha Footage of the Nemesis System:

Nemesis System
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