Middle-earth™: Shadow of War™ Reviews

This is a significant step up from the original Shadow of Mordor. It's landlocked to design decisions made almost ten years ago meaning the game-play is the classic Arkham counter system with a clumsiness that comes with hindsight of playing RPG's of the modern day. It's a very bloated game being almost half a dozen open world areas stuffed with collectables and captains to fight. The content is excellent, however, past ten hours you'll be in a loop of the same combat cycle until the credits. You'll get your value for money when paying full price but the game is very theatrical and enjoys indulging in it's USP. By the end, I would have really appreciated an interrupt button for the speeches as they can rattle on for 20 seconds each and with numerous captains fighting at once, it can really slow the game down. There are some really inspired choices with a few of the perks and I can't think of one game that executes all these ideas so harmoniously. I completed 94% of the content in just under 30 hours. The game is excellent, ran amazingly well (never crashing and running very solid at >140 fps) and has X1X controller support. I would absolutely recommend this game!

- Played the story as normal for a bit - Oh this Nemesis System is really fun, actually - Spend time slaying orc warlords, gaining levels - Run into Folgûm (Folgum? I hardly know 'em!) - Decide to make him my play-thing - Spare his life after every defeat, slowly stripping his sanity - Poor Folgûm eventually lost all logical faculties, now communicates in clicks and whistles - Get cocky - Ambush Folgûm and his goons, style on a few nerds - Taking a lot of unnecessary hits - By the Light of Elendil my health is lo- - Folgûm gets a lucky shot, I'm Warg chow - His thrilled, yet incomprehensible screams are silenced by the sweet sing-song ringing of metal rending my supple flesh - I'm back, given a second chance by Allah or Krishna or whatever elder god watched over me, but with wounded pride - Folgûm got hella promoted, immune to everything, manages a crack team of equally braindead Ologs - With renewed vigor I play responsibly, recruiting as many faithful (willing) volunteers as I could - Manage to take a pretty sweet fortress - Manned by the wheat-fed lads of Mordor - Until one dark day my beautiful fortress was besieged - By the ball sweat of Balin, it's Folgûm - Epic battle ensues, many of my best friends whom I've known about 5 hours fall, bravely defending their assigned home - Here's the real part - We are pushed all the way back to the tower, it's me + 12 - 15 brightlord duders and my foot soldiers vs about 12 - 15 enemy warlords + Folgûm and his troops - The square erupts into chaos, enemies on all sides - It's an absolute meat grinder - Every few seconds, the characteristic slow-motion deathcam pans to a new character - Slowly losing control of the square - I'm mashing all the buttons to fight off every enemy I can - All of my brave generals fall in combat, dutifully taking at least 1 vile traitor with them - The dust settles and rolling heads come to a stop - It's literally me vs Folgûm, our blades drenched in orc blood, him groaning and screeching what I could only imagine were compliments of my men's bravery - Health is low... I walk towards my destiny... - ...except, this wasn't the invincible revenge-seeking arbiter of death that bested me once before - This was a tarnished husk, weak, exhausted... scared - What followed wasn't a tactical and exciting fight, but a merciful execution - He pitifully limped away, never accepting that this was the end... just screaming- drooling on himself. - Tinged with sadness and guilt for what I'd put his brain through with all of the dominations, I made it quick, and put an end to this poor beast's torment - All the hours I spent building my army, grinding my character, killing countless minions, and I was left with an empty general roster, regret, and silence - It was raining... yes, it was raining - I closed my eyes and exhaled.. I had a super cool battle, but at what cost? - Uninstall the game - 4.5/10 The loot boxes are excessive - Rest easy, sweet Folgûm

Great game! So fun to just mess around in. 62h in and only half way through the story because of all the fun things you can do.

RIP Monolith. You released bangers after bangers, and WB did you like that. Rip to the Nemesis system until 2036 when the patent expires.

Good game. Leaving a negative review because Warner Bros killed this company and trademarked the Nemesis System so we're never gonna see a sequel to this game or the Nemesis system in another video game ever again. WB Games is trash.

Ну чтож, спасибо большое такой замечательной конторе, как ворнер бразерс геймс, что после оглушительного успеха такой прекрасной и ахуенной игры как отряд транссамоубийц, они решили закрыть студию монолит, которую до этого долгие годы мучали игрой про чудо женщину. Надеюсь в следующий раз ворнер бразерс закроют сами себя

The nemesis system is awesome, and you can play single-player for hours on end after beating the main campaign. Just keep in mind the multiplayer aspect of the game is iffy, and there's a bunch of people with cheated orcs/forts. EDIT: RIP Monolith, the nemesis system is probably fucked.

Played on Steam Deck on medium settings and it ran very smoothly. Flying around Mordor performing acrobatics like a middle-earth Ezio makes for a very fun experience. The nemesis system makes the journey feel personal, for example: I 'killed' a captain by chopping his leg off and later on he came back with a peg leg for more. Story wise, I had no clue what was going on as I didn't play the first game, however the story didn't seem like the main focus of this game and I still enjoyed the cut scenes. Overall, a fun game with an addictive gameplay loop that definitely scratches that middle-earth itch.

Screw Warner Bros for murdering a legendary legacy developer like Monolith, chasing the live-service golden goose nonsense, and patenting away the groundbreaking Nemesis system only to do absolutely nothing with it. A top contender for the most incompetent publisher these days alongside Ubisoft and Blizzard.

R.I.P. Monolith Productions 1994 - 2025 Killed by the Corporate F*cks at WB and that Sh*thead David Zaslav. This game being an example of their meddling. (had loot boxes at launch before being taken out later) Is this game bad, no, far from it. Is this game perfect, same answer, no. But despite the grindy nature of this game, Monolith really put the effort in this sequel. the characterization of it's orcs, it's world, the VAs (especially the orcs) really don't get enough credit for their performance. You will be sorrowly missed Monolith, I hope the talented devs you housed get back up their feet soon.