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Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor (Open World RPG, XB/PS/PC) Game Informer Details

Allonym

There should be more tampons in gaming
Because setting anything in the first age would require licensing the rights to the books from Christopher Tolkien, who has categorically stated he will not give those rights to anyone for any reason, and wishes he'd never given out the rights to The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.

Basically, he doesn't believe his father's works should be adapted in any way from their literary roots, and won't let anyone.

Why? I actually enjoyed the movies, thought they got progressively better. Hmmm, maybe he felt like they tarnished his father's legacy but I think it's good in the fact that the films have reached a larger audience and therefore more people like me who didn't read the stories actually have become interested in the franchise.
 

Riposte

Member
-The combat seems like it takes cues from the Batman games. They mentioned there was a rhythm to it and you get to keep a combo multiplier going.

Welp, so much for this game being much good.

NPC reactivity over the long term may be impressive though.
 

DrBo42

Member
Welp, so much for this game being much good.

NPC reactivity over the long term may be impressive though.

Wtf-is-this-shit.jpg
 

Joelio13

Member
Only thing I'm wondering about is if you die against an enemy or "boss" type character, your next time facing them they'll be even stronger, possibly killing you again and so on and so forth. I'm sure that they will have it worked out but it is something to think about since they keep emphasizing that enemies level up.
 

Derrick01

Banned
Only thing I'm wondering about is if you die against an enemy or "boss" type character, your next time facing them they'll be even stronger, possibly killing you again and so on and so forth. I'm sure that they will have it worked out but it is something to think about since they keep emphasizing that enemies level up.

Well I don't think it's guaranteed that they'll always get stronger. They made it sound like anything could happen.

Besides even if he did get too strong the progression seems somewhat open, if not fully open. You could take on some other guys until you get stronger, or find better ways to take the main guy out like that assassination trick I mentioned in the OP.
 

sohois

Member
Interesting, but this:

In Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor, gamers take on the role of Talion, a valiant ranger whose family is slain in front of him the night Sauron and his army return to Mordor, moments before his own life is taken. Resurrected by a Spirit of vengeance and empowered with Wraith abilities, Talion ventures into Mordor and vows to destroy those who have wronged him. Through the course of his personal vendetta, Talion uncovers the truth of the Spirit that compels him, learns the origins of the Rings of Power and ultimately confronts his true nemesis.

Sounds like the stupidest fucking story ever, especially as a Lotr fan.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
All I know is that I'm glad that Middle Earth games are finally being allowed to be created without riding the Lord of the Rings movie license.
 

Nirolak

Mrgrgr
It doesn't.

Yeah I just went to linkedin to double check:

- Unannounced Project
Designed mission parameters and maintained designs based on internal and user feedback. Scripted missions and enemy encounters using proprietary language & engine. Supported developers by fixing bugs, providing feedback, and assisting new team members learn proprietary tools. Took ownership of critical side-mission structure to support unique game systems.

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/jared-goldberg/13/783/14

Must be something else they want that for.
 

FourMyle

Member
-The combat seems like it takes cues from the Batman games. They mentioned there was a rhythm to it and you get to keep a combo multiplier going.

The combat in TW2 was absolutely awful and that was pretty close to the Batman games. If this is anything like that then I am out x2
 
oh lawwwd i'm so in. i'll settle for an average lotr rpg at this point. if this is even above average it will have me excited lol.
 

Sentenza

Member
The combat in TW2 was absolutely awful and that was pretty close to the Batman games.

No, it wasn't.
They claimed inspiration but the result was quite different.
Which, on a side note, is my problem with everyone claiming to take inspiration from the Batman games, at this point: many did it, but I have yet to see someone capable of offering a combat system which is every bit as good as the Rocksteady's one (because it *is* good).
 

wazoo

Member
Ah, wasn't aware of that. Thank you. I do recall him expressing disappointment with the movies, but didn't realize that the First Age was a seperate copyright.

The First Age is not copyrighted. Silmarillion and stories within are properties of C. Tolkien.
 

DiscoJer

Member
Interesting, but this:



Sounds like the stupidest fucking story ever, especially as a Lotr fan.

I was excited when I first heard about this, I've really wanted an Elder Scrolls/open world style Middle Earth game...

But yikes. The first part is a fantasy cliche (family getting killed and wanting vengeance), and the second part is like something out of a comic book.
 

Ark

Member
I really hope this game isn't just limited to Mordor. I'd really like some open-world LOTR exploration outside of Mordor, but I won't get my hopes up. Still excited though, the info in the OP makes it sound really cool.
 

IvorB

Member
I like the stuff with the enemy AI. One thing that always pisses me off about games is the way the enemies just seem to be sitting there waiting for you to come along and fight them. I would love to see RPG games where intelligent creatures actual have some kind of society that's functioning when you find them. They are actually doing stuff not just standing there waiting for you.

Having said that the story seems wonky. If he died and came back then surely he is, in fact, a wraith not "fused with" one?

Even if this game is sh*t I am glad that developers are at least thinking in this direction. I think it's a great direction for enemy AI to develop towards.
 

glaurung

Member
I am sure this game will piss off a whole lot of hardcore JRRT fans. Like, myself.

On the other hand, most of the things that I have read sounds fascinating and I would not mind a sandbox game in Middle-Earth that makes it justice.

I will remain skeptical until I get to play this myself.
 

IvorB

Member
Only thing I'm wondering about is if you die against an enemy or "boss" type character, your next time facing them they'll be even stronger, possibly killing you again and so on and so forth. I'm sure that they will have it worked out but it is something to think about since they keep emphasizing that enemies level up.

Seems fine to me. Maybe leave that dude the hell alone until you've got your sh*t together.
 

Jharp

Member
Game sounds fine and all, but why the fuck has Warner turned Monolith from a studio that was pumping out stellar fucking original games, to a studio putting out mediocre licensed stuff? Gotham City Imposers was okay, Guardians was okay, and I'm willing to bet this will be somewhere between okay and good, but fuck, give me back my FEARs, Condemneds, and, hell, how about No One Lives Forever 3?

Or, and it might be crazy, but have them try something new. They started last gen off with two original games, and both kicked ass, and so did each game's sequels. No reason they can't do it again.
 

JaseC

gave away the keys to the kingdom.
Game sounds fine and all, but why the fuck has Warner turned Monolith from a studio that was pumping out stellar fucking original games, to a studio putting out mediocre licensed stuff? Gotham City Imposers was okay, Guardians was okay, and I'm willing to bet this will be somewhere between okay and good, but fuck, give me back my FEARs, Condemneds, and, hell, how about No One Lives Forever 3?

Or, and it might be crazy, but have them try something new. They started last gen off with two original games, and both kicked ass, and so did each game's sequels. No reason they can't do it again.

http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/04/08/no-one-lives-forever-lives-in-licensing-limbo/

I find it hard to believe that Acti doesn't have the rights, though, since Fox Interactive -> Vivendi Games -> Acti-Blizz. I'm guessing they were just misplaced during the shuffles.
 

Ulumsk

Member
Have to admit as a Tolkien fan from childhood I'm a little sceptical of any commercial ventures using the license, but this looks interesting on paper. Will keep my eyes peeled for this one.
 

H3xum

Member
I imagine Batman combat with weapons to be more similar to Assassin's Creed. I can totally live with that.

There are way too many other angles they can take on combat from similarly themed games. That style fits fast paced action games. Not something seemingly as deep and methodical sounding like this game is trying to be. Doesn't fit at all
 

vareon

Member
That's some ambitious concept. An open world Middle Earth is good enough to lure me in, hopefully this has some nice locales and music to let me fully enjoy the world.
 

Derrick01

Banned
Batman combat does not sound like it would fit this game at all :( what a huge disappointment.

I can't imagine it's going to be a 100% copy of that game. All that was mentioned was following a rhythm and keeping a multiplier going, there's a bit of freedom to work within those rules. Plus there's stealth and ranged combat too which obviously would be a lot different than that.
 

Adarael

Neo Member
Why? I actually enjoyed the movies, thought they got progressively better. Hmmm, maybe he felt like they tarnished his father's legacy but I think it's good in the fact that the films have reached a larger audience and therefore more people like me who didn't read the stories actually have become interested in the franchise.

That's basically his attitude. He is not a fan of movies, especially ones with action, and is of the opinion that if people want to experience his father's works, they should just read the books. Here's a quote from him:

"They eviscerated the book by making it an action movie for young people aged 15 to 25," Christopher says regretfully. "And it seems that The Hobbit will be the same kind of film. Tolkien has become a monster, devoured by his own popularity and absorbed into the absurdity of our time. The chasm between the beauty and seriousness of the work, and what it has become, has overwhelmed me. The commercialization has reduced the aesthetic and philosophical impact of the creation to nothing. There is only one solution for me: to turn my head away."


The First Age is not copyrighted. Silmarillion and stories within are properties of C. Tolkien.

Yeah, but if you want to set things in the First Age, you have to draw on the events of the Silmarillion, Children of Hurin, etc, or else it'll be a story "out of time", I.E. no different than setting something in between The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. It would be nearly impossible to set anything in that time period without doing so, because even the appendices in Lord of the Rings only provide the barest outlines of what was going on. As awesome as doing a story about the Fall of Numenor and Ar-Pharazon's doomed conquest of Valinor would be, you'd run into three connected problems without having access to the Akallabeth:

1) The license to make LotR-branded games is tied to the film licenses, not the world at large. The films ONLY have the rights to what exists in LotR and The Hobbit and the time between, not necessarily expanded-world stuff. It's a gray area, but it's a huge ground for litigation, and nobody wants to risk millions like that.
2) Even if you did make a First Age game, you'd be running off a bare-bones timeline, so you'd have to fill in the blanks. Filling in the blanks would necessarily run afoul of what was written in the Akallabeth, which isn't allowed under any kind of licensing agreement you'd have.
3) If you wanted to make it canonical, you'd have to include events from The Silmarillion, which, again, runs afoul of licensing woes.

It'd be a giant litigous clusterfuck, basically.
 

Some Nobody

Junior Member
That's basically his attitude. He is not a fan of movies, especially ones with action, and is of the opinion that if people want to experience his father's works, they should just read the books. Here's a quote from him:

"They eviscerated the book by making it an action movie for young people aged 15 to 25," Christopher says regretfully. "And it seems that The Hobbit will be the same kind of film. Tolkien has become a monster, devoured by his own popularity and absorbed into the absurdity of our time. The chasm between the beauty and seriousness of the work, and what it has become, has overwhelmed me. The commercialization has reduced the aesthetic and philosophical impact of the creation to nothing. There is only one solution for me: to turn my head away."

He and Alan Moore should start a club.

Why? I actually enjoyed the movies, thought they got progressively better. Hmmm, maybe he felt like they tarnished his father's legacy but I think it's good in the fact that the films have reached a larger audience and therefore more people like me who didn't read the stories actually have become interested in the franchise.

The movies actually got progressively less accurate, though fortunately we were saved from some things that would've been brain-meltingly stupid. (Like Aragorn actually fighting a physical form of Sauron.) They're good films, though.
 

Riposte

Member
The focus on Arkham-esque "multipliers" is really what makes me lower expectations. While a focus on scoring itself could be consider a slight derailment at the very least, there is such a world of difference between the scoring systems found in Batman Arkham and, say, The Wonderful 101, and how dependent each game's combat system is on it to remain interesting besides that. Given how dumb the Arkham combat system is(simplistic attacks, simplistic enemy approach/types/defense, overpowered defense, no spacing, forced variety, etc.), the idea that you could redeem it with a scoring system that rewards doing the overly flash QTE-like attacks with a extremely high consistency (like 99.9% instead of 90%) is nauseating. Now we want that to show up in "open world RPGs"? Cover shooters with health regen was a healthier trend. People focus too much on making numbers go big and the very worst numbers at that.
 
While I highly doubt that they'll pull it off due to practical reasons, I could not encourage the attempt more highly. Godspeed, Monolith. This game sounds awesome.
 
I haven't really like any of the Lord of the Rings games since the movie tie-in games that released on Gamecube, but this one is definitely on my radar. I hope they can deliver.
 
Given how dumb the Arkham combat system is(simplistic attacks, simplistic enemy approach/types/defense, overpowered defense, no spacing, forced variety, etc.),

This is really a head-scratcher. In Arkham, you're playing the Batman. The combat is set up like a rhythm game, with the tools to fight 50 enemies at once, which of course isn't realistic, but neither is the Batman. It fits perfectly and takes player skill to get an maintain the multipliers by reading and reacting to the enemies animations and attack types.

Would this type of combat work in a Middle-earth game? I'm not sure, but if it is taking inspiration from the films, it would probably fit right in. Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas (the Superhero) fight hordes of enemies, flowing from one enemy to the next. Is it gritty and realistic? No. Is it slow and methodical like Dark Souls? No. But it could fit the "heroic" tone of the subject quite well.
 

BBboy20

Member
You guys think this could be Monolith's return to glory? Because that is more important to me then the fact this is a LOTR open-world title.
 

Riposte

Member
This is really a head-scratcher. In Arkham, you're playing the Batman. The combat is set up like a rhythm game, with the tools to fight 50 enemies at once, which of course isn't realistic, but neither is the Batman. It fits perfectly and takes player skill to get an maintain the multipliers by reading and reacting to the enemies animations and attack types.

That's a poor excuse. Dante, Bayonetta, Ryu, etc. are all way more impressive combatants than Batman, yet offer far more control, have you fight far more interesting enemies (let's say, above average when good, when Batman is far below average), and manage to have options that don't come off as forced. I'd argue it should be exactly the opposite, Batman is just a man who pushes himself to the limit, every superhuman feat earned. That's a big part of the appeal, yet why does he fly around like Superman with a push of a button when you combo meter hits 5. If anything, the game takes away Batman from you and gives you Batgod (but not even Grant Morrison's prep-time Batgod, who's the best). "Feel like Batman" my ass.

"Rhythm game" is another way of saying "sequence of QTEs", while "rhythm" being spoken here itself is not unique to games that have obvious solutions (in other words: increased simplicity in interactivity). The term rhythm is being awkwardly applied to the meeting of tactics and reflexes, except it is so much more obvious in a game like Arkham because the game has, in a sense, "linear" combat at its fundamental level ("tools" are an overlapping system awkwardly placed on top of it). So to explain it plainly you can hear Arkham's "rhythm" because it is a dumb kid tapping on his school desk in predictable manner, while other action games are large-scale symphonies that is constantly changing its tune, keeping you on your feet. I curse whatever game journo that came up with that nonsense.

Anyway, fighting a horde of enemies is not a good excuse to dumb combat down so that a horde isn't really a horde, but cattle for the slaughter. That's how Musou gets made! In any case, there's nothing really unique about your description of combat games aside from the slight emphasis that Arkham games like to drive your character for you whereas that's usually a thing you do in other games by (and perhaps with animation canceling) dodging, dashing, extended attack options, or just moving your character your damn self.
 

Sentenza

Member
This is really a head-scratcher. In Arkham, you're playing the Batman. The combat is set up like a rhythm game, with the tools to fight 50 enemies at once, which of course isn't realistic, but neither is the Batman. It fits perfectly and takes player skill to get an maintain the multipliers by reading and reacting to the enemies animations and attack types.
Well, I thin.k it's an excellent combat system (especially with all the improvements introduced in AC).
It's reasonably challenging, fun, quick and responsive; abusing the "overpowered defense" is actually the slowest and least effective way to fight, the "forced variety" in enemies' patterns (and in the way to exploit their weakness) is a great thing for a brawler and I have no idea what should make perceive it as a flaw, it has what's probably one of the most seamless, impressive systems of contextual animations I've experienced in any game and all this while keeping a (vague) resemblance to a real world brawl, instead of relying in bullshit hyper-kinetic super moves and weapons, with flames, explosions and trails.

That said, I really can't see a system like this fitting a game about a lone ranger in a dangerous land.
It may sound an overdone* request at this point, but if they were actually looking for inspiration in other games, then the Souls series was probably going to be a better pick.

*which, on a side note, is completely fine, as no matter how overdone the request may be, there isn't a single game developer yet who seems willing to catch the hint.
 

Martian

Member
I dont think the creators really read the any of the books. Feel pretty weird. Even if mordor wasnt a wasteland, i dont think it would be that interesting.

I liked TTA though, so if its anything like that I might pick it up
 
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