Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor Preview

Those of you looking to pick up a few more details on Monolith’s Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor can head over to WorthPlaying for a demo-based preview of the ambitious RPG this evening. More on the control and stealth mechanics:

One particularly cool feature is that every orc in the hierarchy is randomly generated with a selection of strengths and weaknesses. One orc may be afraid of fire, but he’ll be tougher to kill, unlikely to flee from combat, and good at killing mounted beasts. Another may be cowardly and flee easily but also be battled-hardened and immune to being branded. An orc who lasts a long time gains new strengths or loses weaknesses.

Talion is technically immortal, so he’ll revive after death at one of his waypoints, but death still occurs. If you’re killed by a nameless orc, it earns a reputation and a promotion to elite status. Rather than just being forgotten, he’ll remember that he’s killed you before. It’s tempting to brand every orc you encounter, but killing leader orcs granted us access to runes, which are powerful equippable items that increase some stats.

Stealth is an option as well. Though Talion does not have Batman’s predator-like abilities, he makes up for it with Assassin’s Creed-style climbing and parkour mechanics. You can enter sneaking mode at any time and stealthily kill enemies. You can also do so from a distance with your bow and arrow. This is useful for defeating powerful foes without being captured and for manipulating the orc hierarchy. You have complete freedom to handle these missions however you want. During my hands-on time with the game, not a single bit of it was scripted, and I was able to control how I wanted to tackle the missions and dispatch enemies.