To Platinum or Not: Shadow of Mordor

So I finished the storyline of Shadow of Mordor yesterday and today I've finished up all of the side quests. The side quests are actually pretty fun, so no problem wrapping those up and getting the extra trophies. Then I perused the trophy list and noted that there were only a handful of trophies left. So I decided to go for them, and just spent a couple hours working on them.

It's just not a very fun way to play a game, really. I was getting frustrated trying (and failing) to free enough slaves in enough time to earn the "White Knight" trophy, which took me about a half hour.

Then I started working towards a couple others more strongly involving the nemesis system, which I thought would be more fun because I found the nemesis system so much fun during my regular gameplay. But one trophy in particular requires randomly getting one of seven quest types after you use an Uruk Captain to becoming a bodyguard for a Warchief which really got on my nerves.

I actually got one of these things to pop after about a half hour or going through the motions, but of course after I finished it for whatever reason the trophy didn't pop. Really quite annoying.

I guess after that I realized this simply isn't the way to play a game. Trophies of this sort might be fun for some people, but it felt like a chore, not like fun. I'm still fighting a bit with myself over this--I'm three trophies away from getting the Platinum on a game I really, genuinely enjoyed. But at the same time, I don't want my experience with the game to be tarnished by a poor last couple hours extending the game artificially just to grab a couple of trophies.

I'll probably put it down for the night and work on wrapping up Episode 1 of Tales of the Borderlands. See how I feel tomorrow about finishing off the trophies.

This also represents the first game I've finished of 2015. I'll wait until I decide on the trophies before checking it off once and for all and writing up a quick review.