Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor

[Justin Leego]

Only because the AC games nicked their walk cycle from the Lord of the Rings films. Aha!

[melmer]

This comes out in 7-10 days depending on where you live.

 

I'll give it a shot

 

Hopefully this game isn't to grindy as i'm sick to the back teeth with that at the moment.

[melmer]

Very positive critical reception

http://www.allgamesbeta.com/2014/09/middle-earth-shadow-of-mordor-reviews.html

[Justin Leego]

Oh excellent, excellent. That is really good to see.

[Gwardinen]

I am also pleased because I have been getting surprisingly excited for this.

 

Looks like Destructoid is not on board, though!

[Smart Jason]

No ultra textures for ol' Two Gig Jason.

 

Actual stab in the dark tech question: if my GPU says 4GB Total Available Graphics Memory, but 2GB Dedicated Video Memory, on which texture quality am I going to run this game?

[Gwardinen]

Holy crap! That is a lot of video memory! I have a pretty decent video card but that suggests I could only put this on medium.

 

Even the new GTX 980 doesn't have 6GB!

[Salacious Snake]

People are STOKED TO THE MAX.

I'm pretty stoked myself, for this and smash bros. Games!

[Architecture]

I think I'm going to pre-order this based on the strength of the reviews rolling out today. If any of y'all would like to follow suit and plan to play it on PC, GMG's extended their 25% off voucher through Monday:

 

SEPTEM-BEROFF-ER25XX

 

That knocks the game down to a very reasonable $37.50.

[Murdoc]

Alright, what the hell, it looks interesting enough even if I am so over Jackson's vision of LOTR. 

 

Thanks for the code Architecture!

[Smart Jason]

  On 9/26/2014 at 5:12 PM, Architecture said:

I think I'm going to pre-order this based on the strength of the reviews rolling out today. If any of y'all would like to follow suit and plan to play it on PC, GMG's extended their 25% off voucher through Monday:

 

SEPTEM-BEROFF-ER25XX

 

That knocks the game down to a very reasonable $37.50.

 

Not to undercut you (literally), but Nuuvem has the game for the next three days for a (converted) USD $30. That's where I'll be getting it from; plus you can save GMG's September coupon for something else, if you like!

 

If anyone's unfamiliar, Nuuvem's a Brazilian site that frequently has great new release prices on account of conversion rates. Game keys aren't region locked unless specified and they accept PayPal; no VPN or anything is required to purchase, and I swear I didn't only register on this forum as a viral marketer for Nuuvem. Nuuvem - catch it!

[Architecture]

GMG puts out a similar voucher pretty much every week, and you can use it on as many games as you'd like. They're also offering free games with the use of this specific voucher, so there's that to consider.

 

I've never heard of Nuuvem, but GMG is a reputable e-tailer and I don't mind paying a few extra dollars for some piece of mind.

[Smart Jason]

I've been using Green Man for years and have always thought their vouchers were single use. Good to know. And yeah, I can't argue that GMG has reputation, and it took me a while to be comfortable ordering on Nuuvem, but now it's the first place I check. Nuuvem - where prices come to party!

[Architecture]

It also sounds like buying games via Nuuvem is legally ambiguous (and essentially grey market); unlike GMG, I don't believe Nuuvem is in a position to sell games to NA or European consumers. I'm not trying to ward anyone off from finding a better deal at all, but it sounds like Valve could revoke a user's access to a game purchased via Nuuvem due to impropriety.

[Erkki]

Told you so (that the game might actually be good) you bunch of pessimists. Ok, I haven't played it myself yet.

[Architecture]

Lately, I've found it best to expect an underwhelming experience from high-budget titles. I think Titanfall has been the only $60 experience from 2014 that I bought into, and that had everything to do with the beta.

 

Even Wolfenstein, which I enjoyed well enough, felt appropriately priced at $30 during the Steam summer sale.

[melmer]

I can't help but have reigned expectations of this as I've done the assassin creed style climbing and stalking, I've done the hit shit with swords. All of that will be perfunctory. Where this game will hopefully shine is in the open world and the choose you own adventure style narrative. It'll be the big picture that'll (hopefully) wow is,not the minute to minute gameplay.

I've skipped through the latest video and my still not a hundred percent on how this game works... Which is fantastic! This is something new! Potentially a new genre? This shit WILL be in the next GTA

[melmer]

Cool guy

Here's a comment I've stole off Gaf, sounds fun

After 10+ deaths against the same fucking enemy, I finally managed to kill him today. The fucker was immune to most of my attacks and always had a pack of orcs with him whenever I met him. I've met him several times since the start of the game and never managed to kill him.

I've honestly never held such a grudge against a video game character before. He has leveled from 5 to 20 and caused me so much problems.

I spent 3 hours this afternoon, killing off his captains and leveling up, just to be absolutely butchered when I gathered the courage to attack him again,

Then I interrogated an informer and learned that he fears Caragors (the bear/hound things) and that he's susceptible to stealth kills.

So I tamed a beast and let it loose inside his camp after tracking him there, watched as he fled, and followed him at a distance.

When he was alone on a cliff, I snuck up behind him and slit his throat.

God daaaaaaamn, it felt so good.

I love the nemisis system.

[Badfinger]

Buoyed by reviews being released over the weekend, it getting praise from enough authors I trust, and the GMG sale, I now suddenly have prepurchased a game again. It sure is 35 gigs! I will probably never get used to that! Anticipation has been ramping up though, looking forward to it.

[Architecture]

At least GMG finally got their keys. Really shitty of WB to force them to wait as long as they did.

 

Only four hours to go!

[Badfinger]

First impressions after a couple of hours-

 

I am completely unsurprised that mixing Assassin's Creed, Arkham, and Lord of the Rings is giving me a game I feel compelled to play.

[SuperAttackBikini]

Has there been any gameplay videos that show much variation in the scenery? The few I've seen look pretty generic rolling moorland and crumbling ruins strategically placed in that slightly gamey way. 

 

I'm kinda in two minds about this game. Orcs are right up there with Nazis and Bad Space Aliens for things I enjoy stabbing into bits, and I do like me some Batman-esque combat but I just have never got on with the Assassin's Creed games for some undefinable reason. Watching a video where the ranger guy dove of a tall ruin into a pile of leaves sucked the interest out of me.

 

Perhaps I've just seen the blandest bits of the game somehow?

[Architecture]

I've only played an hour, but I'm confident in asserting that this game is Fucking. Awesome.

[Murdoc]

sweet, I set mine to download last night, it's probably still downloading. But tonight, yay!

 

Hows it running for everyone? The lack of the PC reviews had me a little worried. Stability? Does it look a little better than the console footage?

[Justin Leego]

I don't know myself (and the Steam page tells me I'll need to upgrade my computer's CPU to find out, boo, I hope that's not true), but the PC Gamer review did have a few notes on performance:
 
http://www.pcgamer.com/middleearth-shadow-of-mordor-review/
 
 

  Quote

AMD 2.80 GHz processor, 16GB of RAM, and an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 750 Ti on Windows 7

Somehow I played the entire game on Ultra settings, chiefly for the sake of the screenshots around these words, although there's no difference between that and the High settings unless you download the Ultra HD texture pack that was just released. I wouldn't recommend it if you're in my situation, but oddly enough, most of the time my PC actually fared well despite running hot. However, my framerates would plummet to slideshow rates when Talion was in cramped villages, surrounded by dozens of orcs, and bombarded with many explosions.

These moments aren't that common, and I found the occasional stutter worth it since Shadow of Mordor approaches Witcher 2 levels of beauty when pumped up on graphical adrenaline. I'd hope that Mordor surpasses it with the texture pack installed, but at the time of writing, I don't know. Considering the demands the High setting put on my system, the Ultra texture pack must be a beast, indeed.

But Shadow of Mordor still looks stunning on lower settings...

 

edit - RPS said it wouldn't have a review up until Release Day + Time It Takes To Play The Game because review code for the PC versh wasn't being released alongside console code. I guess PC Gamer got special treatment. Well, huh.

 

edit edit - From the RPS forums: "[Total Biscuit [who rated the game well]] has also mentioned in a few recent videos/Twitter statements, that it was difficult to get review code pre-release without signing a branded "don't say anything bad" deal [which apparently he didn't]. so more than usual, don't trust early reviews." Though Destructoid and Ars Technica managed to avoid complying with that stipulation, if applied across the board.