Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor | Review Thread - Welcome to Middle Earf

ironcreed said:
I don't normally do the season pass thing. But for this game? Bought. It's just one of those games that I knew would be great and it sounds like it has turned out to be even better than I thought.
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Yeah, man, I was set on not getting the season pass even though I'm really hyped for the game, but I don't know now. I may have to get it.
 
VanWinkle said:
Yeah, man, I was set on not getting the season pass even though I'm really hyped for the game, but I don't know now. I may have to get it.
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Hell, why not? It's one of those games you already know you will like. It's just more content for what will be one of the better games of this year.
 
Bwahaha! Never doubted it! Pre-ordered game and season pass weeks ago, but I'm really glad it's getting credit where credit is due.
 
So glad I was seemingly wrong about this game. I was pretty convinced that it wasn't going to end up turning out as good as it looked.

Love being wrong!
 
This is the game that should've been called Destiny because it's destined for 2014 GOTY.

Fuck the Moon, The Wizard came from Mordor motherfuckers!
 
For those of you who purchased the base game from GMG and are trying to buy the 30% discounted Season Pass from Steam, but can't because Steam won't let you buy it, this is what I posted a few days ago:

Now, let me explain something.

Let's say that you took advantage of one of the GMG coupons for the base game and purchased it from there. Naturally, this means that you don't own the game on Steam yet. If you attempt to buy the Season Pass from Steam, you will get an error message saying that you need to own the base game first before you can purchase the DLC. So what to do?

Here is how you get around that: purchase the 30% discounted Season Pass as a gift and store it in your Steam Inventory. Then when you activate the base game, all you have to do is add the Season Pass to your Steam Library.
 
I should have been paying attention to this. Forgive me SoM GAF. Gonna drop Destiny like a hot sack of crap and go for this.
 
KingJolly said:
They gave Vanquish a 5/10. So yeah, I don;t like them too much lol
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Ah well. You are always going to have the odd standoff review here and there anyway. Whatever, lol.

For you, Destructoid:

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Damn seemed like the game has almost no hype and now it's out blowing away reviewers minds.

Also my 2gb r9 270x cries now ;_;
 
I was pretty meh on this during the reveal, but the stuff leading up to launch gave me confidence that this was going to be a good game. I didn't think it would be this well received, but it's good to be pleasantly surprised.

Congrats to Monolith! As a LoTR fan, I can't wait to jump into this!
 
The nemesis system seems really interesting, but every time I even think about paying money for this game I just remember that combat system and all the climbing and I get sleepy just thinking about it. This game just looks like a complete fucking bore
 
You guys have no idea how happy I am to see this get reviewed well. Hopefully it sells even better than WB was expecting because of this. Tuesday can't come soon enough. :D
 
GDJustin (IGN) also posted this over in the OT thread:

GDJustin said:
Yay! I can finally talk about how good this game is! The short version is that it's REAL good - a very strong Game of the Year candidate.

The basic formula (Assassin's Creed traversal + Batman Arkham's combat + Orcs!) is already really damn compelling, but there's three elements to SoM that people don't know about that really send the experience over-the-top and make it an AAA must-have:

1) The execution of all the game's "little elements" is almost completely perfect. Writing and acting are great, even though they didn't need to be. The stealth system has a neat tweak - you see an outline of yourself, like a ghost, when you break line-of-sight with pursuing orcs. That outline is where enemies last saw you, which helps you plan an escape route, and confirms in an unobtrusive way that you did indeed escape their vision. Game is full of polish and intelligent, tiny design elements like this.

2) The game's upgrade tree is full of real, meaningful upgrades that make you dramatically more powerful and badass, all the way through to the end of the game. You'll want them all, and it's a genuinely hard choice to decide where to drop each new ability point. These aren't ticky-tacky upgrades like 20% more damage. It's stuff like the pinning the enemies to the ground with arrows, or stunning enemies any time you vault over them, or doubling the speed of your counter-attacks, or unlocking a limited time "berserk mode." You'll want all these things.

By the end of the game you will feel genuinely more powerful in a real and dramatic way, and it isn't thanks to a bigger health pool or damage output. It's through all the additional combat tricks at your disposal.

3) Shadow of Mordor might be the first third-person sandbox game to truly let players tackle a challenge the way that THEY want. I can't emphasize to you how different/fresh and important this feels.

Imagine GTA 5's heists or Batman's detective work, but without the on-rails, scripted choices. Instead you just plan the heist within the rules of the sandbox - tailing the owner, casing the place, etc. All without mission objectives - the mission objective would just be "rob this business" and you're left to sort it out. Without planning, you'll fail. That's what the final ~1/3rd of Shadow of Mordor is like, once you're kitted out.

Once you gain the ability to "brand" an Orc and make them fight for you, the Nemesis System, which I previously found pretty pointless and underwhelming, finally clicked. You can take a low-level Orc, Brand them so they'll fight for you on-command. Then you can manipulate the Nemesis System to raise that orc into a Warchief that commands and entire army of Orcs! Or you could gather intel on the existing Warchief and just take him out directly by learning his weaknesses. Or you could brand the archers that guard him and let them pelt him with arrows. Or you could brand his Captain bodyguards so they turn on him when you initiate combat (bonus points if you do this and one of the Warchief's fears is betrayal).

The game just says "take out these warchiefs" and it's up to you to build in the sub-goals that let you accomplish this goal. And they're not really optional - without prep, the Warchiefs are too strong to take down. It's an awesome feeling. And although it doesn't feel half-baked, it's easy to imagine this open-ended design and enemy manipulation being taken much farther in sequels.

Very small potential cons that didn't detract from my enjoyment:

- Game world is not big.
- Read Dead-style hunting/gathering challenges are half-baked. Should have been cut.
- Controls are extremely complex - all four face buttons and triggers do something, and there are 3 separate actions mapped to pressing two face buttons simultaneously. D-Pad does important stuff too. It's crazy at first, although you adjust with time.
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reviews + $10 rewards + GCU = day one
 
I'm so happy right now. Will definitely get this (after selling off Destiny). First Forza Horizon 2, now this. We're off to a good start everybody. :)
 
HOOOOOOLEEEEEEEEY SHIT.

Those are some goddamn incredible reviews.

I've been saying recently that this game would either be a breakout hit or a huge disappointment, but likely nowhere in between. So so glad that it's the former. This may be the first truly great game of fall!
 
Do we know how varied the sidequests are? Anything like Fallout, or smaller scaled/combat oriented?

Also, how varied is the map? I'm assuming it isn't too varied, we aren't getting something with forests and mountains to climb, right?
 
GMG's coupon is still live, bringing the game down to $37.50, guys.

Had to jump on it after these reviews and finding out it had Arkham combat with a sword.
 
TimeEffect said:
Do we know how varied the sidequests are? Anything like Fallout, or smaller scaled/combat oriented?

Also, how varied is the map? I'm assuming it isn't too varied, we aren't getting something with forests and mountains to climb, right?
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Sidequests are three varieties: combat (sword), stealth (dagger) and ranged (bow). There's also random doo-dads to pick up on the map.

Game map is not varied or large. Two big areas that look and feel very different, separated by a loading screen. No forests, mountains, etc. You can travel from one end of the map to the other very quickly. I expect any potential sequel to be much much bigger, geographically.
 
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