Middle Earth Ranger Forum

Not sure if this is a duplicate, but there's a short, live action film promoting the latest video game.

http://toybox.io9.com/this-shadow-of-mo ... 229779/all

Wow not a badly made little film! Cool action and effects.
I was discussing this game with my son who had felt the way I did at first about having the bad guy/dark hero/anti hero being so pervasive in our society nowadays. As we had spoken of on the boards when this first came out, but he found out a bit more of the plot which made me sit up and take notice.

You have to give credit to the imagination that can compete in todays markets and still utilize the old lore properly. I hope this is one of them. I think it interesting that as a "shade" very much like a "wight" without the evil animation, this shade that enters the Ranger whose family was slaughtered, is in reality Celebrimbor the Noldoran master smith, the originally targeted slave of the Elven Rings and Alatar the giver of gifts, our good friend Sauron.
They are both bent on revenge and the destruction of Evil and co-habitate the same body so you get the wraithlike abilities to do the mind control and other worldly speed and displacement stuff but he needs the Rangers skill and corporial body (and the ranger is no slouch it seems!) Like I said still rather dark for my tastes, but I could be lured! It came up a notch in my estimation when I learned more of the background plot.

I have posted my thoughts in the thread in GD

Now that the game is out, has anyone played or further investigated this? I wrote it off pretty early on as silly and in no way faithful to Tolkien. While there still are plenty of issues, I have to say that I'm surprised to be reading about how much work went into keeping aspects of the game in line with the lore. Given the huge number of positive reviews on excellent gameplay, this has gone from a must pass to a might buy for me.

Sadly it's not out for the Xbox 360 or the PS3 units, saw it for console however...It really irks me when companies do this.

And in the true spirit of Mordor, it turns out the company that made the game paid people to post 'positive only' reviews on YouTube.

http://kotaku.com/the-messy-story-behin ... 4/+trotter

I love the game so far, and do agree that it is the best console LotR game to have come out. Though getting it and being able to play it was quite dramatic and almost didn't happen. Because of Monolith pushing the release date back for 360/ps3. I ended up buying a ps4 about a week before the game came out, and I have to say, I believe Monolith did an outstanding job! I was a little more than irked when they pushed back the release date for pre-gen consoles, but then I came to understand that a totally different team was working on the 360/ps3 versions of the game and had run into a bit of a mess translating the game over to the older consoles. And that's when I got a little more than irked when I realized the 360 version of the game I was paying full price for compared to new-gen, was watered-down and limited in comparison. Then again, it's understandable that the pre-gen consoles wouldn't be able to hold up to as much as the new-gen.

The story is dramatic, but a little too short (in my opinion), the fighting is great, the stealth mechanics are near perfect.... and of course the biggest topic on the game, the nemesis system is even more complex than I had thought. Oh and their lore is very detailed as well throughout the game.

I am definitely a fan of what they have created.

Well if a fellow ranger brother endorses it I will have to empty my coffer for it I suppose.

Does anyone else have any feedback on the game?

I just picked this up and look forward to playing it till Witcher 3 arrives. Nice to see some Tolkien Ranger focus with games

I'm playing Dragon Age: Inquisition currently, and am pretty immersed in it. I am really looking to The Witcher 3 as well!

Agreed, I find the format of the game for PS3 choppy and stagnant, features such as marking Uraks and sending them to cause trouble in their camps are not supported in this system which is sad but I really love the fighting style Tallion uses and the flips and counters. THAT'S what a ranger fights like in my opinion, stealth, range, quick efficient finishes. Mordor looks odd in this period and moving from wraith world to human is fun and the feat you can put in an orc or urak is great too when say things like it's the Ranger, run and what not

Yeah, they definitely broke the circle of not so good Middle Earth games. A lot of people who bought the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions have mentioned the choppiness and limitations as compared to newer consoles, but it is to be expected sadly.

Glad to hear you enjoy it as well! I have a blast when I play!

Rifter wrote:Agreed, I find the format of the game for PS3 choppy and stagnant, features such as marking Uraks and sending them to cause trouble in their camps are not supported in this system which is sad but I really love the fighting style Tallion uses and the flips and counters. THAT'S what a ranger fights like in my opinion, stealth, range, quick efficient finishes. Mordor looks odd in this period and moving from wraith world to human is fun and the feat you can put in an orc or urak is great too when say things like it's the Ranger, run and what not

I have the PS3 version and yeah it needs a patch for the choppiness and the audio issues. But about halfway through the game you CAN infact brand uruks and send them at your enemies. You just need to progress further in the storyline.

Well I may do that friend. I have been enjoying doing small missions and getting artifacts and being the gray walker that scares orcs. It's a good feeling, I can't be the only person who really uses their own mindset of ranger skills to play the game, what I'd do is what I'd do and so on.