
#SHADOW OF WAR VS SHADOW OF MORDOR SERIES#
Mechanically they offer up a series of capture points leading to a boss battle, but the sense of driving an enemy army back to its keep is both palpable and exciting. The fortress assaults themselves are also very satisfying, staging the grandest battles seen in the Shadow series. You become an entire court's worth of conspirators, in other words, acting as both mastermind and assassin as you pick away at each region's nemesis tree. Turning all of a warchief's bodyguards against him before setting up a deadly ambush is a very rewarding experience, but so too is deciding that, actually, your army is probably strong enough to take the fort without worrying about stripping away every last one of its defences in advance. Plotting against an overlord is an absolute treat.

As you chew your way through these strata, you can choose to either murder your targets or assimilate them to your ranks - the whole point of Shadow of War, of course, being to build an army big enough to take on Sauron himself. You accomplish this by working your way up the nemesis system hierarchy for that region - starting with the captains and moving onto the warchiefs before tackling the all-important overlord. The game world is split into five distinct regions, four of which you need to capture by conquering a fort. This is largely down to the introduction of forts, the headline improvement for the nemesis system in Shadow of War. Mind your head.Įxploiting the various machinations of the nemesis system - including a number of new nemesis mission types - now feels genuinely productive where before it largely felt petty.

The particular weaknesses or invulnerabilities of each of these captains, warchiefs or overlords have a palpable impact on how each fight is approached, building on Shadow of Mordor to deliver a combat system that's as much about preparation and poise as it is doing someone in with a sword. Enemy types and traits have been greatly diversified, leading to a cast of enemies who are varied, if not exactly nuanced. The core experience of tracking down a named orc and learning every last detail about their strengths and weaknesses before destroying them - or getting destroyed - is very much intact, but it now boasts both considerable depth and greater purpose. The good news is that the nemesis system returns for the sequel in fine shape. Considerable expectations were there to be met and so everything about Shadow of War is bigger, which is good in some respects but decidedly bad in others. It's more that everything about this game is a statement - where Shadow of Mordor was something of a sleeper hit, Monolith Studios went into production on the followup knowing for sure they had something big on their hands. That's not to say Shadow of War is bad, mind you - it isn't.
#SHADOW OF WAR VS SHADOW OF MORDOR PC#

In the music industry, people often refer to Second Album Syndrome - a phenomenon whereby a popular artist sets about making their sophomore record, only this time the stakes are considerably higher due to increased exposure and fan expectation. A greatly expanded and improved action game let down by a dreadful story.
