End Credits: Middle-earth™: Shadow of Mordor™

I hope you enjoyed the gameplay I uploaded and the time has come for my final part for this game! This is the review of Middle-earth Shadow of Mordor and my personal opinion after playing it.

Middle-Earth Shadow of Mordor is a game that literally blew my mind away the very first time I played it. That's why it's one of my favorite games. It has captured the aesthetics of the world that Tolkien wanted to describe in his books. And I have read all of his books.

The game's story is in between Tolkien’s two books; Hobbit and Lord of the Ring. Don’t forget that a bit of time passed from the time Bilbo got the ring and the time Frodo inherited it; it’s like 60 years. And don’t forget that in the books it’s 17 more years until he sets out from the Shair. So plenty of time to fit in more fantasy in this awesome lore, especially in the land of Mordor.

So, we have Talion, a Gondorian exiled Ranger stationed at the black gate. With him is his family; Ioreth his wife and Dirhael his son. From what I got from the cut scenes and loading screens they were exiled because of the murder of a high-ranking Gondorian Officer and Talion was accused of it. Ioreth’s father helped them to go far away from Gondor, but only to save his own name...

Talion and his family are captured by the Orcs and The Black Hand of Sauron performs a black ritual (you can say he cursed Talion) to call back a wraith from the world of the shadow. Neither dead nor alive. From the world of the Nazgul; the so-called “ringwraiths”!

The Elf wraith chooses to bond with Talion and not his caller, but he doesn't remember his name, his origin, or anything else from his past. The game’s purpose is to hunt down memories that will make the Elf remember why he has become a wraith and eventually help Talion in his quest of revenge. Or is it his initial purpose?

So, that’s how the story unravels. You learn of the past and you travel through time with each item you discover. Your first guide in this journey is the one and only Gollum. The truths you learn about your wraith companion are stunning. One of the legends of the 2nd age of Middle Earth accompanies you on a journey of revenge! The 2nd person who helps you is a former fellow guard of the wall and now a deserter. The 3rd is a queen and her daughter. The game implicates Saruman in its plot in a very clever way, and in a way foreshadows what’s coming. Even the Black Captains give glimpses of your wraith’s past at each encounter.

To reach the point to face the black captains you need to advance and develop Talion's character. To do that you’ll need 3 things:
Experience. Everything you do in the game grants you XP. Killing in various ways, freeing slaves, and gathering intel from the scattered artifacts. Even discovering the world of the game adds XP to Talion’s character. This XP is valuable for unlocking abilities but it’s combined with Power Points. So, the second thing you need is to gain Power points. These points are collected by killing Orc Captains and Warchiefs. That’s why it’s good to enter the power struggles marked as red icons on the map or hunt down Captains in the world. The higher the level of the Captain the more Power points you get. The 3rd thing you need is Mirian points. Mirians are gathered by completing secondary quests, by finding collectibles and by selling runes! They will help you upgrade your attributes. Attributes grand Talion more health, more focus, more arrows, more rune slots for your weapons and the higher you get the stronger you’ll become. You unlock special abilities like the storm of Urfael from the attributes tab.

Don’t rest easy though. Orcs are getting stronger too. More Orc factions show up and it’s getting more and more difficult to get out of a fight unharmed. Hunters, berserkers, Guards, and archers complete a trick(s)y puzzle of vicious Orcs that will either be standing blind while you are passing right in front of them or they will spot you right away and hunt you down like a caragor!

Ah! Caragors and Graugs and ghuls….. The animalistic side of this game. While you can brand and tame the first 2 you can’t do the same with the ghouls. One at a time ghouls are a minimum of a threat, but they never come alone! Be aware of them.

This game is 9 out of 10 for me and it has a very high replayability. Especially if you own the GOTY edition with all the extras.

I hope you enjoyed my gameplay videos and this review. Now I’ll conclude this review with the dark poem of Sauron!

Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
#gaming #blamejohn #shadowofmordor #middleearth