The fact that all the Orcs are procedurally generated means that ostensibly, no player will encounter the same enemies twice, but it also creates a unique sense of identity for each individual captain and once you’re got one in your pocket, the game starts to feel like Nintendogs: The Michael Vick Edition, as you watch your own scaly little bundle of love murder his way to the top of the pile before stabbing his master in the back to become warchief. Difficulty issues aside, though, the stealth elements are incredibly fun and well-implemented. The time it takes for them to spot you is also huge – you’ve usually got a good 10- to 20 seconds to silence the poor schmuck who’s seen you before he’s even twigged you’re a threat. They’re not supposed to be the brightest creatures, granted, but when you can go through a single-file patrol by creeping up and methodically neck-stabbing each one in sequence, it gets a little ridiculous. On top of that, the Orc AI is staggeringly stupid. It’s a useful feature, but it removes a lot of the challenge of stealth sections, and means you can sneak up on pretty much any enemy without even trying. You can run even in stealth mode and it’s only marginally slower than sprinting, meaning you’ll probably spend most of the game running around doubled over as though you’re roleplaying the back of a pantomime horse. However, they’re also astonishingly easy. They also spend an absurd amount of time loudly discussing what they’ll do to you if you try anything on them, which makes it especially entertaining when you drop three stories to stab them in the trachea.Īnd it has to be said that doing so is immensely satisfying – Stealth kills are brutal and violent. The incidental dialogue gives them real personality, arguably much more than the main characters they’ll bicker and boast among themselves, along with spreading Chinese whispers about your terrifying abilities, which helps to make you feel like a legendary badass. The place the writing really shines is the Orcs. The interplay between Talion and the Wraith who’s wearing him like a Halloween costume is also pretty interesting, despite the fact that both of them are angsty, po-faced fun-spongesīut forget the broody brothers. The accents manage to stay in the same rough region and I don’t want to punch any of the characters in their hackneyed cliché-spouting throats (again, looking at you, War In The North). None of which is to say it’s bad – the writing is, for once in a LOTR game, halfway decent. Possessed by an ancient Wraith after he and his family are murdered by the minions of Sauron, they set out to wreak joint vengeance on those responsible. It stars an original character, a Ranger by the name of Talion. However, unlike previous LOTR games, instead of forcing us to play as a bunch of D-list background characters while the real adventure happens off-screen (looking at you, War In The North), Shadow Of Mordor instead serves as a prequel, taking place during the slightly nebulous period in between The Hobbit and the start of The Fellowship Of The Ring. Game of the year, while others rolled their eyes at the prospect of another tired retread of a familiar franchise. Some camps were hailing it as the best action While it was one of the major triple-A releases of 2014, no one quite knew what to expect from Middle Earth: Shadow Of Mordor. The stealth and combat mechanics, while appearing to be shamelessly cribbed, have changed enough to keep things fresh, and the ability to form your own Orc posse makes this title surprisingly compelling, and the best Lord of The Rings game we’ve ever had without a doubt. For all that, though, it’s incredibly fun. The pacing is all over the place, the length of the story would embarrass a paperback, and the gameplay genuinely feels like Ezio Auditore and the Dark Knight had a baby and took him LARPing. Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor is far from flawless.
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