so what is this game in the vein of, playwise?

Assassin's Creed, with the fighting of Arkham Asylum.

ok, couldn't get into AC, but loved the hell out of Arkham.

I don't like Ass Creed much either. I'm not really a fan of open world style games. I do like Shadow of Mordor and Arkham though. They have very small open worlds, which I think is why I tolerate them more than something that is a large open world like Ass Creed. The open world of Mordor is more the size of Arkham City or Origins.

Really the only other thing Mordor takes from Ass Creed is the parkour climbing, and that is pretty minimal too. The combat engine is straight from Arkham which is just completely awesome. I love that combat engine.

I think if you like Arkham, then you will like Mordor. Mordor basically is Arkham City/Origins, just in the LOTR setting rather than the Batman setting.

that sounds fantastic. when i get sick of my FPSers this is the first non-FPS i will put in...

It's more like AC than just the climbing. The stealth mechanics and assassination techniques are also very much like that game.
SoM is a pretty good game though I'm less of a fan of it than most here. I found it too repetitive,the open world too comically small and crowded, and the color palate too dingy. That said, it's still a cool game and the Nemesis system is a really brilliant innovation.

If you have the game and plan to play it, might as well buy the Season Pass before Tuesday because it's on sale for $10 instead of $24.99 and seems like a bargain at that price.

I played through this on the PS4 and bought the season pass on the One earlier today.

Now just have to wait for a deal for the game.

Cool, thanks.

thanks. buying...

I know folks were saying the last battle was poor, but I really wasn't expecting it to be like that.

Fun game, definitely has seemed like one of the better ones last year. I kind of wish the artifacts found and the different sword/bow/dagger missions did a better job on expanding the narrative of the story though, they seemed ultimately pointless other then for experience points.

GOTY edition incoming.

http://kotaku.com/a-50-game-of-the-y...-is-1700915237

I knew it!

But I'm sure it will be awhile before it drops down to the $25 level. (What I paid for the game and season pass)

Yeah, this is the one game I've physically purchased for the One, but for ~30 for it and the season pass I don't feel too bad.

So glad I held off thus far.

Just started playing this, and it seemed like I could play it forever, with all the side quests and things to explore. I was killing captains, and everything was going well. Then I started having trouble with a couple captains, including one with a crossbow who shoots me from a distance and would always seem to show up after I had killed 15 opponents. Sometimes I'd get three captains at a time. So I decided to explore a different region, and they still kept showing up. I tried side missions--same guys again killing me before I could finish.

I did read through this thread, and am looking forward to developing the branding skill. I've also gotten a little smarter about finding the artifacts and such to build up skills. I also realized I've been exploring and neglecting the main mission so I'll have to try getting back to that. I was able to kill a minor captain using stealth--only a 4 strength, but it felt like a major victory after so... much... death.

I'll stick with it and see how it goes. I'm a fan of the first three Arkham games and the LOTR movies so I do like the game. I also already bought the season pass on sale so I'm kind of committed.

Yeah, branding is all kinds of awesome. Get that down and it'll help take down anyone you're having problems with.

Also, take out the bodyguards separately first. If you can kill the 2 bodyguards without dying, those spots will be left open and the bigger captain will be left unguarded.

This seems obvious but I didn't figure it out til halfway through the game lol. Once I did taking out captains became a breeze.

I finally killed off one of the two level-20 captains (yes, I let them get to 20), though this one in particular was more often the guy who was part of the team rather than the guy who was always killing me (when he celebrated after my death, I was often surprised to see he'd been there). He was stupid enough to attack me when he had only a couple allies so I gave him a couple drainings then killed him off.

also, I assume you know this, but if you use Bat-Detective mode on them (or wtf its called in this), you gain intel and can learn their weaknesses (and locations).

Yeah, I've used this on occasion, but, e.g., I still suck at taming carabors so sometimes I can't use that info.

I still call it detective mode.

Hmm, not sure I'm familiar with bodyguards for regular captains. I just got to the reveal of the warchief system--not sure if it's the same thing.

been a while since I played, so may have the names confused. basically, if you highlight someone and they have red lines connected to other chiefs/captains, those are his bodyguards. That's why they attack in gangs of 3. If you take out the bodyguards (gain intel on them and get them isolated), then the main warchief will be alone when you attack him. I rarely tamed Carabors, so dont think you need to do much of that. there's a way to gain an Intel point that you can choose to use on any chief/captain, but don't remember how.

Thanks, that jibes with what I just learned about warchiefs, so now I can use the enemy map to figure out who goes with whom and take them out. I'd like to think that the lower-level captains won't be too bad to tackle. I managed to take out the first warchief among a mass of enemies by blowing up some fire barrels that I finally noticed after I died a few times. Progress!

I'm enjoying this a lot. So far I've ran around and unlocked all of the towers so I can fast travel anywhere. I've only done three missions, I just keep going around and killing everything I come across. I only had to bail once, when I started a fight and by the middle of it there were like 5 or 6 captains and another 15 or so orcs. So far, I've only died once, and that was by one of those huge wolf creatures. I shot it's cage open and it started attacking everyone, including me

I'm a little confused on how to unlock things though. It looks like I have skill points to spend, but can some stuff only be unlocked by progressing through the campaign and side missions?

Yeah, you have to do campaign missions to unlock a lot of the skills