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Author Topic: Middle-earth: Shadow of War  (Read 71729 times)

nenjin

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #15 on: April 19, 2017, 10:55:53 am »

What I'm saying is: expect that format for everything.

Start siege
Ork gives you a speech
Ork probably comes back
Infiltrators do stuff and things and drop a pithy line.
Boss says stuff, other orc captain jumps into the fight.

The game is making way heavier use of narrative elements than SoM. More speeches, more micro cutscenes, etc...I expect a lot of repetition there.
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lordcooper

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #16 on: April 19, 2017, 07:31:11 pm »

Care to name a full length game or two that doesn't have a lot of repetition?

Because I can't even think of one.

Of course it's going to be a bunch of variables mixed up in different ways.  That's how variation in a game works.
« Last Edit: April 19, 2017, 07:33:13 pm by lordcooper »
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Man of Paper

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #17 on: April 19, 2017, 07:34:15 pm »

Yeah, nothing wrong with formulaic. Ultimately, you look at anything long enough you'll see a pattern that suddenly seems so obvious. Just a matter of how fun/engaging it is.
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Egan_BW

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #18 on: April 19, 2017, 07:57:12 pm »

If playing the game feels fun, I'll come back a whole lot of times, even if there isn't much new to do. I like open-world games because it gives me an excuse to play more of the exact same game rather than just do the story all over again.
In short, HYPE! I just hope there's a pretty good variety of ork monologues to listen to.
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Jacob/Lee

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #19 on: April 19, 2017, 08:46:26 pm »

More fun facts about the gameplay (from stream 6, about the first half of it):
  • "You can summon spiders."
  • Orcs that appear as important characters in story missions will be randomized now (counter to Shadow of Mordor where, for example, that orc slaver in the first mission was always the same guy). Orcs killed during story missions have a chance of cheating death or otherwise escaping and making it back into the sandbox to act as normal captains.
  • Orcs now have more options for skills, abilities, weapons, armor, and the like.
  • Each officer can have a tribe and role. Both give some idea of how they will act and what abilities they have. An example of a tribe are savages, who are much more likely to have beasts fighting on their side during battle. Similarly, orcs of the mystic tribe can be expected to have cursed weapons, employ sorcery, and teleport around the battle. A commander is an example of a role: commanders can be expected to have more abilities that buff their troops in place of buffs for themselves, and they can summon new troops into combat. Tanks take a lot of damage and are more likely to keep fighting as they become wounded.
  • Weaknesses come in four flavors. Mortal vulnerabilities cause the orc to flee the battle immediately if used. Dazed by means that an orc will be temporarily stunned by it, e.g. dazed by headshots. Vulnerabilities (normal) are sources of harm that deal extra damage, whether they are element, attack, or creature. Hints are small pieces of potentially useful information that are available, like if the player encounters a seemingly unkillable orc.
  • Named orcs can reach up to level 60 now, as opposed to the level 20 cap in Shadow of Mordor.
  • Every region has an arena in it somewhere. Arena missions include visiting it yourself to crash some event or another, sending your followers to fight to make one more powerful, sending a follower to become a spy, and possibly more options. Of course, the player can fight in it themselves.
  • During a siege, the player can bring their own artillery (siege beasts). A siege beast can lose its weapon on its back from enemy attacks, but it's still a graug. There's ammo options for artillery: cursed ammo, incendiary ammo, poison ammo. Some gems buff mounts.
  • The player is now more mobile and faster at climbing and other acrobatics in order to accommodate the larger and more vertical world. Enemies are more intelligent about chasing and intercepting the player while they climb and some of them are also quicker at traversing obstacles. Graug and caragors can climb and drakes are a threat.

Chiefwaffles

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #20 on: April 19, 2017, 09:16:43 pm »

It's really about the combinations, nenjin.

Sure, you can have games like No Man's Sky where they say they have billions of combinations but it all ends up turning into a same-y soup of familiar components, but the SoM proved that it could create unique and memorable combinations. Yeah, you won't remember the guy who likes fire, but that guy who repeatedly harasses you via fire until you fight your way to and through his fortress, where he nearly kills you before a follower kills him, saving your life another time? It's things like that which create experiences to remember. Adding more content and mechanics like Shadow of War is doing is only going to expand what Shadow of Mordor succeeded at.
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You should really look to the wilderness for your stealth ideas, it has been doing it much longer than you have after all. Take squids for example, that ink trick works pretty well, and in water too! So you just sneak into the dam upsteam, dump several megatons of distressed squid into it, then break the dam. Boom, you suddenly have enough water-proof stealth for a whole city!

Neonivek

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #21 on: April 19, 2017, 09:20:16 pm »

And I am going to give a silly theory... but the first city of the game I am going to be... is unsavable.
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Chiefwaffles

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #22 on: April 19, 2017, 09:31:15 pm »

I guarantee that if that happens, it'll be the last "fortress" you conquer.
Well, probably.
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Quote from: RAM
You should really look to the wilderness for your stealth ideas, it has been doing it much longer than you have after all. Take squids for example, that ink trick works pretty well, and in water too! So you just sneak into the dam upsteam, dump several megatons of distressed squid into it, then break the dam. Boom, you suddenly have enough water-proof stealth for a whole city!

Neonivek

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #23 on: April 19, 2017, 10:05:41 pm »

I guarantee that if that happens, it'll be the last "fortress" you conquer.
Well, probably.

Unfortunately the game suffers heavily from "Nothing you do matters" (because they can't REALLY break Canon)

So... It would be odd to take it wholesale.

Likely that is where you get killed.
« Last Edit: April 19, 2017, 10:15:42 pm by Neonivek »
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Egan_BW

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #24 on: April 19, 2017, 10:31:38 pm »

Alternatively, you get to say FUCK CANON and stab sauron in the face.
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Neonivek

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #25 on: April 19, 2017, 10:33:57 pm »

Alternatively, you get to say FUCK CANON and stab sauron in the face.

Now THIS is what I am hoping happens!
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Man of Paper

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #26 on: April 19, 2017, 10:39:48 pm »

I mean it's not like any of the other games really did well to stick to canon in the first place.
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Urist McScoopbeard

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #27 on: April 19, 2017, 10:46:42 pm »

Alternatively, you get to say FUCK CANON and stab sauron in the face.

Now THIS is what I am hoping happens!

but_why.gif
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Neonivek

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #28 on: April 19, 2017, 11:11:19 pm »

Alternatively, you get to say FUCK CANON and stab sauron in the face.

Now THIS is what I am hoping happens!

but_why.gif

Because we all know how it is going to end. We are going to be killed or disabled and nothing we did really matters in the end except maybe a word that we diminished their forces ENOUGH that the original books can happen now.
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Urist McScoopbeard

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Re: Middle-earth: Shadow of War
« Reply #29 on: April 19, 2017, 11:48:02 pm »

Going full 'Inglourious Basterds' is not the solution to a poorly-connected plot!
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