It's $30 on PSN's Black Friday sale, so I'm curious to know what you GB'ers think of the game now that the "new and shiny!" has worn off. Also somewhat related - since I constantly heard them compared - are you a fan of or heavily dislike the Assassin's Creed series?

I don't really like Assassin's Creed and I didn't like this (And make no mistake, this is a Ubisoft-ass game through and through). It's just a bunch of busy-work side quests and collectible hunting with a short, forgettable story. Nemesis system did nothing for me, either.

Mordor is in my top three games of 2014, maybe my Game of The Year - and I haven't liked an Assassin's Creed game in years. I put 55 hours into it and am looking forward to playing through again.

Thinking back I may have been swept up in the hype. It definitely is a good game but not one deserving all the praise.

It was a lot more intriguing when I was weaker and more prone to dying. I don't buy Brad's assertion that you become invincible by the time you've reached the third and fourth tiers of the power tree but you definitely aren't far off. I put about 30 hours into the game and still have to mind control all the Warchiefs to see how the game ends but I'm not sure I need anymore Mordor.

The combat is just as satisfying as it ever was in the Arkham games, perhaps more thanks to its wanton brutality, and I think the game controls better/has more basically enjoyable side quests than any Creed game I've played (then again, not even II could sweep me off my feet).

THe environments are very drab.

But overall once I got enough powers and just wanted to start steamrolling the story instead of playing make believe with the Army's chessboard I began to realize there really wasn't THAT much variety in the orcs. The warchiefs were just bigger versions of the regular baddies ala Destiny, and some of them were incredibly annoying (I'm looking at you Berserkers). Once you see through the novel nature of the chessboard - and start eliminating several orcs from it at once - it reveals itself as far less engaging than it seems in those first few hours. The best part about it is running into important orcs out in the field, that never gets old, but actually manipulating the board isn't as fun after the first few times you play with it.

I'd recommend you play it if you love the Batman games and/or want an Assassin's Creed that's actually fun to play, but I'll fully admit I got swept up in the hype. I'm not sure I'll ever finish the mainline story unless/until I get fully tired of Destiny.

Maybe not the best choice of words, but you know what I mean :) It's been long enough to get past first reactions/nemesis system hype and into more "honest" thoughts.

Its a solid game certainly worth playing through, but I think if you can wait for a lower price point, you definitely should.

The nemesis system is awesome, and it's backed by a very entertaining combat system, but that's all there really is to it.

The main missions are lame, which throws replayability out the window, and the side content is much too repetitive.

20 bucks would be the perfect price point.

I played it a few weeks ago. I enjoyed it. It isn't revolutionary, but it's a very solid and well made game. It does what it sets out to do well. You do end up rather OP at the end, but I don't hold that against he game too much.

I also think it is a way better game than anything in the Assassin's Creed franchise. Both the stealth and combat are way more satisfying.

I wouldn't have regretted paying $60 for it. $30 is a steal.

I wrapped on it three or four weeks ago or so and my memories are still overwhelmingly positive. It plays great and the Nemesis system does a great job at hiding SoM's saminess by maintaining a system of petty grudges that hide (or at least break up) the trivialities of many side missions. The illusion does break down over time (and they picked a poor nemesis for me) but by then I'd already had enough "whaaat" moments that my hat was tipped. It did get really easy but for me it fit the flow of the game.

I still believe that, despite the hype, the Nemesis system will be a spark that inspires some great new games.

I would be wary of judging it by opinions of Assassin's Creed. I think enjoying "Arkham" combat is by far the key requirement to enjoying the SoM.

Best open-world game I played all year, but that's mainly due to its refined gameplay. Don't come to it for a great story or top notch mission design.

I think the nemesis system is over-hyped. This game is a fairly standard open world game and by standard, I mean of the Ubisoft variety. I don't think the combat is as good as batman either. The story and characters are practically non-existent. The ending is bad too. This game did not feel special to me like so many reviewers felt it was. Take this all with a grain of salt because I am a big fan of the Assassin's Creed series, but I haven't played Unity yet.

It's definitely one of the most entertaining games I've played this year.

I really like the Assassin's Creed games (even 1 and 3), and Mordor doesn't remind me of them as much as it does the Arkham games. The movement and combat feels straight out of those games. The running might be a bit faster actually.

From what I've played it's Assassin's Creed with a world that is a little less stealth friendly, but it has a better combat system. The story seemed pretty "meh" to me but the nemesis system is neat as hell. I think it's worth getting cheap. I just don't know if I would go with $30 or if I'd wait for like $20 in the more distant future.

One of the best of the year without a doubt. Very authentic in middle earth lore, GORGEOUS world if you're playing on PS4 or PC, does the Assassin's Creed formula better than Assassin's Creed, and meets Batman Arkham's combat right there with it in terms of quality. Very well made open world action game. I highly recommend it. If you think you'll like it, you probably will. The praise speaks for itself.

And I actually liked the story....the ending events feel very epic when you have your whole army with you due to the awesome Nemesis system.

It's one of the best games I've played all year. Not necessarily ground breaking in what it does, but it does what it does very well. There's not much to be disappointed about. It's all around a solid game.

I really liked it. I didn't play hardly any of the batman or assassin's creed games, so a game that molded both beautifully to me was pretty great.

That said it's not like I'm still playing it now. I just did side stuff for like 10 hours, went through the story stuff interspersed with more side stuff, finished the story at about 25 hours in and at that point said "well guess I'm done."

It's a really solid focused experience but if you want like 40 hours out of all of your games I don't think this would cut it.

I also think it's more than the sum of its parts. The Nemesis system, the world and everything are pretty okay, but the combat, stealth and hell even the shooting just feel so damn good that for long stretches of playtime I didn't really care what I was doing because I was having so much fun running around the world.

@overnow: I actually thought the game was much more stealth friendly than Assassin's Creed honestly. That's actually one of the things that has turned me off of AC recently, the stealth feels so lackluster. But you can be a total stealth badass in Mordor.

@frostyryan: The final boss is one of the most anti-climatic ever, but the rest of it is entertaining enough.

I absolutely agree. I'd argue it was flat out disappointing. That final battle though....yeah.

EDIT: And I'm someone who thinks games with combat don't need proper final bosses anymore. Halo 3 and Gears of War 2 for example didn't have proper final bosses and I was fine. However, I reeeeaaally wanted to FIGHT the final enemy in Mordor. Would have been better than what we got if done well.

I didn't like it that much. It was a poor mans Assassin's Creed in my opinion. I very rarely like open world games, but Assassin's Creed games are some of my favorites and that is because they have really interesting environments to climb around as well as having stories that I find intriguing. Mordor, while worth $30, wasn't anywhere as well done as say something like Unity. That's probably not a popular opinion, but I had way more fun running around in an amazing recreation of Paris, as opposed to the muddy plains of Mordor. Mordor had one thing going for it and that was the nemesis system, which after some examination starts breaking down.

Wonderful game, probably this generation's AC2. Black Flag is better, AC3's multiplayer is better than the absence of multiplayer (not to say every game needs it but it's certainly something they could shoehorn into this game/improve upon the existing "vengeance" system). Dark Souls 2 is like the 7th or 8th best game ever; Shadow of Mordor is around the 100th and whatever comes after that is in the mid 200-300s; though I'd accept a determination of Alien being a bit higher than that. All respect to Rebirth, I put 50 odd hours into that not including 30 hours of afking but if a game is inherently designed to be broken I can't really hold it up and say it's flawless.

Mordor, despite having an amazing trick, does not hold up compared to Arkham City for basically all the reasons surrounding that; as someone who has a mild interest in LoTR's universe it was interesting enough but the core storyline is not all that compelling. The characters are generally pretty good (except Gollum who's pretty meaningless) just what they're doing aside from the unscripted stuff is not great.

.......................?

I reeeeaaaaallly think you mis-used the phrase "well done" there...

@frostyryan said:

@liquidprince said:

Mordor, while worth $30, wasn't anywhere as well done as say something like Unity.

.......................?

I reeeeaaaaallly think you mis-used the phrase "well done" there...

Thank you for being the eight millionth person to post that bullshit series of screenshots that were confirmed only to happen if you were playing the PC version without the day one patch. Here's a link for you showing of the myriad amount of glitches that plague Mordor. Why wasn't that as publicized as the Unity stuff? Because barely anyone cared enough about the game to point that stuff out. Also any game, especially open world games, will have a lot of jank, because it's hard to account for all stuff that can go wrong. At least in Unity there was technical innovation, what with the 5000 strong crowd of people. Mordors 50 people on screen glitches seem a bit more inexcusable when compared what Unity does.

I bought it after hearing all the praise but it hasn't really done anything for me. I've played for a few hours but I don't really feel drawn to keep playing, I haven't played for over a week. It's a good action game, but everything about it feels average to me. The nemesis system is not as impressive as I thought it would be, it's like randomly a stronger enemy will appear with extra health and a name and a weakness. It doesn't fundamentally change anything about combat, especially when you have so many powerful abilities or can literally escape at super speed to use stealth as the orcs seem to instantly forget where you went. As someone who is a huge fan of the Arkham games I don't think the combat is nearly as challenging or engaging as in Batman. You don't really have any gadget analogues like the grapple gun so all you tend to do is hit people until a x7 combo so you can use the execute move.

If you want something to play for a good few hours you could do a lot worse but you could also do better.

It's worth $30. I wasn't as into it as reviews and some people were, but it's a solid game with a pretty great, and fairly well implemented, idea in the Nemesis System. The biggest issue is probably that it takes too long for that stuff to really become special, and by then the game is almost over - the neat thing about it, though, is that it's something you can continue to mess around and have some fun with after you've finished with the story.

For those comparing it to Unity...which I'm not sure why you even would...Mordor did get a five star review on GB. Unity got a two.

Just sayin.

@mb: I actually like Unity more than Mordor, but Assassin's Creed is like my own personal Dynasty Warriors. :P

It's a decent game. However, it's way, way too easy. Games being easy isn't necessarily always a problem (Sunset Overdrive is incredibly easy, it's also my favorite game released in the past 5 years), but the Nemesis System, the thing that really sets this game apart from other open worlds, hinges on you dying. The entire point of the system is to develop actual nemeses, which relies on the orcs actually being threatening or difficult, in which they are neither. Every Warchief or commander I faced died right when I decided to kill them, there was no cat-and-mouse chase throughout the game, never did I slowly begin to truly hate the Warchiefs. They are simply too easy to kill, or rather, Talion is too powerful.

Even disregarding the rune system (which includes such great ideas as 'restore half of your health upon executing a finisher', truly and utterly trivializing the combat), the skills you can obtain after just 2-3 hours into the game are absurd. I understand wanting to make Talion this whirlwind of death, but it works against what the Nemesis System is trying to achieve. You want to feel like the Warchiefs are big, powerful, hulking pounds of flesh, you want to feel like they could fuck you up if you try to just rush them. I didn't once go up against a Warchief that couldn't simply be killed by performing a combat finisher over and over and over again, which are insanely easy to build up and execute. I actually had one Warchief that could be killed instantly by simply shooting him in the head with an arrow once.

Overall, I finished the game with a total of 3 deaths, every single one being to archers, which are the only somewhat difficult enemy in the game. I'm not trying to say I'm amazing at this game or anything either, anyone who has played an Arkham game can do what I was doing. I came away from it really disappointed, as I could see the makings of a truly fantastic system, if it actually worked the way it was intended to. I actually feel like the worse you are at this game, the better it is.

@liquidprince said:

@frostyryan said:

@liquidprince said:

Mordor, while worth $30, wasn't anywhere as well done as say something like Unity.

.......................?

I reeeeaaaaallly think you mis-used the phrase "well done" there...

Thank you for being the eight millionth person to post that bullshit series of screenshots that were confirmed only to happen if you were playing the PC version without the day one patch. Here's a link for you showing of the myriad amount of glitches that plague Mordor. Why wasn't that as publicized as the Unity stuff? Because barely anyone cared enough about the game to point that stuff out. Also any game, especially open world games, will have a lot of jank, because it's hard to account for all stuff that can go wrong. At least in Unity there was technical innovation, what with the 5000 strong crowd of people. Mordors 50 people on screen glitches seem a bit more inexcusable when compared what Unity does.

Yah it's a little tiring to see those same screenshots get posted every single time Unity gets brought up. It's actually a little disappointing to see Patrick constantly using those screens whenever writing anything about Unity. At length it appears a little childish.

I think the gameplay was great, I loved the combat, the platforming felt very free, all sorts of cool upgrades, and the nemesis system is a great idea. The content they give you for that gameplay could use some work though, I definitely wasn't in love with the main missions, and the story could've been a lot better. Overall I think it's a great game, and a wonderful debut for a new series. If they listen to feedback, and expand on some of the good ideas this game had, then the sequel could be pretty incredible.

It is really easy, to the point that the nemesis system becomes a joke. Stabbing them with a sword or knife works on 99% of captains, so their special attributes are immaterial. The story is super drab, and falls into the classic Rockstar trap of the main character spending most of the game just being ordered around by guys on they vague hope that he gets something out of it. The combat is fine, but it's just standard batman stuff, ditto with with stealth being just AC. Basically, it's just an average Assassins Creed clone, just nowhere near the quality of games like Black Flag.

I really liked it. Got my wisdom teeth pulled out and played it for like two days straight since I couldn't go to work, and almost 100%'d it.

Mordor was cool. I ended up not finishing it, but the sandboxy stuff was fun for 10h or so. Also cool to play a lotr game where you could sink into the universe a bit better for once also. All in all, I think that game is more novelty than anything else, and when it runs out there isn't much left. Enjoyable in the grand scheme.

I haven't liked Assassin's Creed since Brotherhood, and even the old games are hard to go back to. Unity looks terrible, but I suppose I can't comment on it.

The only reason people compare it to Assasin's Creed is that you can climb stuff and be stealthy. Except Mordor blows it out of the water. AC wishes it was as sound mechanically, fluid, well-realized as Mordor. You can play Mordor using stealth and feel empowered a la the Arkham games, rather than a bumbling buffoon. Man I hate AC games.

@liquidprince: I guess it's mostly because hating on Ubisoft is the hip thing to do right now. (I'm not saying they don't deserve the hate thought, that company needs some serious restructuring)

That being said, I put around 25 hours into Shadow of Mordor and didn't encounter a single glitch and If I did, I didn't notice it. I didn't play every single Assassin's Creed game, but the one I did, I enjoyed, even Assassin's Creed 3.

Shadow of Mordor was far more enjoyable than most of them to me. It's a great game and if you're into open-wordly-sneaky-stabby games, it's great. It DOES get a bit too easy near the end when you're character is stupidly overpowered and you can command an army of beefed up orcs that can murder the opposition by sneezing. The game doesn't really hand you that army thought, you have to build it from the ground up and it's your reward for doing well. It's a really cool idea but it's a bit too easy.

That it's in the running for my game of the year shows what a poor year I've had with new games.

It's decent, and I like it far better than any Ass Creed since Brotherhood and more than any of the Arkham games.

For the first few hours I really enjoyed it and by the end of the game I started to really hate it. It got really annoying when a Captain would randomly appear as I was doing something and everything stops because it has to zoom in on them every single time. And it got even more annoying because I decided to attack the final war chiefs before killing the captains so it did the zoom thing about 5 times during those fights. The combat is fun, but some scenarios I really dread.

Its an Assassin Creed game without the detailed world those games are known for and with Batman combat and "The Nemesis system" thrown into the mix.

The nemesis system didnt do much for me as its little more than named npc enemies all things considered but for some people it seems to be the second coming of Christ.

Although nothing revolutionary i enjoyed the game for what it is and im happy whith having spend 60$ for the game and im eagirly awaiting the announced DLCs.