Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor
Shadow of Mordor is a third person action title developed by Monolith. It takes place between The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Some people have been put off by the game considering it uses a character and explores some concepts that weren't included by Tolkien and his son. But regardless of your personal feelings on whether or not Shadow of Mordor has a place in Tolkien lore what's presented to the player is a solid action title that can definitely stand on its own.
Review Criteria
I completed the main story of the game within 20 hours while taking plenty of detours for side missions. Discovered every collectible, elevated all of Talion's weapons to Legendary and dominated every warchief in both regions of the game. The game was played on PC with an Xbox 360 controller on Ultra graphics settings.
Story: 7/10
Shadow of Mordor's story won't be winning any awards. It is a tried and true tale of revenge and is pretty unapologetic about that fact. Talion's family gets murdered, as does he. Due to some dark ritual that took place during his death he has found himself bonded to the soul of an elf-wraith which, in addition to preventing him from dying, is giving him some pretty cool powers. Now he and the elf are moving around Mordor, murdering orcs and trying to get revenge on The Black Hand of Sauron who murdered Talion's family. There are some neat sequences within the story such as the tutorial giving players a glimpse of Talion's life before all of these terrible things happened to him. But other than that the story, while decent enough, is pretty predictable. The ending of the game did make me very excited for the potential sequel though, which works heavily in the title's favor.
Gameplay: 9/10
Shadow of Mordor has been criticized for essentially being a clone of Arkham Asylum mixed with Assassin's Creed. This is not a bad thing. The gameplay is all stuff some gamers may have seen before but it's solid and fun. The game does suffer from some issues of abilities that are completely useless (Brace of Daggers) and some that effectively turn you into a god (Shadow Strike Combos) but even with these few issues combat is still incredibly fun and polished and that is what counts. Jumping into the middle of a huge group of orcs and executing every single one of them is fun. Wandering around a stronghold, turning a large number of orcs to your side and turning them all on the Warchief making camp there is fun. Riding a caragor through the plains of Mordor while firing your bow and leaping from it to tackle an orc is fun. Everything about the game's combat and movement is just a treat. On top of that battles require the player's full attention in order for them to succeed. The player will often find themselves outnumbered and Talion can't take many hits before he goes down. This helps make every large-scale encounter really feel like life or death and helps add to the tension, especially when a Captain or Warchief enters the fray. The Nemesis System is incredibly interesting as well. As you kill important orcs others will rise and fill the power vacuum you have left, even ones that have killed you. Some orcs might cheat death and return to seek revenge on you. You will even have your own hand-picked pet orcs climb the ranks to become Warchiefs themselves. The system adds an interesting twist to what would otherwise be a mundane task of hunting orcs, really making the player feel invested in this weird power struggle within Mordor.
Graphics: 8/10
Shadow of Mordor is an absolutely beautiful looking game marred by some minor technical issues. I did encounter some issues of corpses sinking into the ground. Talion's face can look kind of odd at times and some of the textures on the orcs can be questionable. But these are all pretty minor concerns. Mordor manages to look lush and rich in some areas, which is a welcome change from the stark brown that we only saw in the films. The world feels alive with flocks of birds moving through the sky, caragors roaming the wastes, well made foliage and bats flying out of caves as you leave them. Minor touches the team has added ranging from Talion occasionally wiping his sword on his cloak and the expressions on the faces of Orcs as they are defeated and beheaded add a bit of charm to the world as well. What I feel deserves special recognition is the elf-wraith. His model in particular looks amazing and seeing him in the wraith world is just as beautiful as it is spooky.
Sound: 7/10
The game has a pretty decent soundtrack, though it won't be winning any awards. The music is fitting with the areas you are in and the score during combat does feel exciting but I couldn't for the life of me remember the tunes that played. There are some satisfying sound effects like Talion's sword whirling through the air. The voice acting is great as well with Talion's voice actor giving a believable performance but the elf-wraith's performance ultimately outshines every other. The biggest issue players will probably notice is that a lot of the orc dialogue will start to repeat itself when they've gotten well into the game. This can be annoying to some and there were quite a few times where I wanted a Captain to get over his spiel so I could fight him. But it's just an issue that pops up after killing tons of orcs I guess.
The Bottom Line: 8/10
Shadow of Mordor, while short, is an incredibly fun and well-made game. Combat is entertaining throughout the entire game and while the story isn't very impressive the gameplay alone is more than enough to keep players coming back for more. Definitely at least worth a rental if you're strapped for cash and can't commit to purchasing it. But if you have the cash it's definitely a title worth owning and replaying.
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