[Aptorian]

16 minute gameplay video released:



I'm not sure what I think of this. It looks pretty rough for a game that comes out in 5 months, I especially think the main characters facial animations and the flow of the movement seem unpolished.

The way the game is shown it seems very scripted but how much openness is there actually in there? They say that every encounter will be unique but the things they showed in this game suggest to me that there has to be very specific scripted scenarios in place.

I'm also confused whether what they show is the end portion of the conquering of an area or if this is how every area is taken over?

[champ]

Apt, on 08 March 2017 - 02:47 PM, said:

I'm not sure what I think of this. It looks pretty rough for a game that comes out in 5 months, I especially think the main characters facial animations and the flow of the movement seem unpolished.

I'd be surprised if this game doesn't get delayed, I think they only came out to show what was on offer because of the store leak. Though it won't take too long to get the edges smoothed out with the experience of the first game that they have.

Apt, on 08 March 2017 - 02:47 PM, said:

The way the game is shown it seems very scripted but how much openness is there actually in there? They say that every encounter will be unique but the things they showed in this game suggest to me that there has to be very specific scripted scenarios in place.

I think it'll be like the first game, the two areas had their own activities going on but the campaign was scripted and you play into that. When they said unique I thought they were meaning that no one player will face the same unique enemy as different enemies can gain rank through what you do, like the first where you took control of some of the captains etc or took some out to promote others into that position.

Apt, on 08 March 2017 - 02:47 PM, said:

I'm also confused whether what they show is the end portion of the conquering of an area or if this is how every area is taken over?

I'm sure they said it was some way into the campaign, I imagine every area will have it's own way to be taken.

I loved the look of it though and cannot wait for the release, I'd prefer they take their time to get it perfect rather than rushing it out.

[Aptorian]

Briar King, on 08 March 2017 - 06:47 PM, said:

How does that look rough exactly? That looks fantastic. The new 💍 still feels to strange to me but that looks fun/great to me. Graphics are sharp, movements are fluid.

If you pay attention to the character interactions, explosions, animations, etc., you'll notice a bunch of bad animations and things that don't seem to mesh. That orc that catches fire for example looks terrible, the background behind the drake and troll fighting, Talion's face is hedious. Generally, maybe because they did a bunch of editing of the trailer, it feels like you're just moving from scripted event to scripted event, instead of actually being in control of the events that unfold.

EDIT: Actually, watching the video once again, the entire game actually looks graphically low quality. I don't know what the game was running on, but the textures and resolution in general seemed very low.

@Champ:

I don't think the leak affected their release window. It's similar to the announcement and release of the first game (funny enough the first game also had a leak before announcement). You don't just release a game because somebody figured out you were making it.


About the openness I read a Tweet earlier that stated that what we saw was indeed the end part of the process of taking over a region. Before what we saw, you'll play the game like Shadow of Mordor with plenty of time for exploration and terrorizing the orcs.

This post has been edited by Apt: 08 March 2017 - 07:34 PM

[champ]

I more meant that them showing the trailers and footage now - in Alpha - was down to the leak rather than the release date. A lot of the big games lately have slipped their original release date, that's why my thoughts leant that way. It does look pretty rough at the minute.

Though as I finished typing that I remember them showing Alpha footage for the first one too... so yeah, I'm probably just talking shit!

This post has been edited by champ: 08 March 2017 - 07:41 PM

[Cause]

Apt, on 08 March 2017 - 07:27 PM, said:

Briar King, on 08 March 2017 - 06:47 PM, said:

How does that look rough exactly? That looks fantastic. The new 💍 still feels to strange to me but that looks fun/great to me. Graphics are sharp, movements are fluid.

If you pay attention to the character interactions, explosions, animations, etc., you'll notice a bunch of bad animations and things that don't seem to mesh. That orc that catches fire for example looks terrible, the background behind the drake and troll fighting, Talion's face is hedious. Generally, maybe because they did a bunch of editing of the trailer, it feels like you're just moving from scripted event to scripted event, instead of actually being in control of the events that unfold.

EDIT: Actually, watching the video once again, the entire game actually looks graphically low quality. I don't know what the game was running on, but the textures and resolution in general seemed very low.

@Champ:

I don't think the leak affected their release window. It's similar to the announcement and release of the first game (funny enough the first game also had a leak before announcement). You don't just release a game because somebody figured out you were making it.


About the openness I read a Tweet earlier that stated that what we saw was indeed the end part of the process of taking over a region. Before what we saw, you'll play the game like Shadow of Mordor with plenty of time for exploration and terrorizing the orcs.

I agree about the graphics but it is alpha footage. Not an expert in game design but I think they dont bother with the graphical polishing until the core mechanics are fully fleshed out and working. So not too worried.

As for the scripting, I think a lot of it was forced so they could show as much as possible about new mechanics and such in a single gameplay trailer. I think everything they showed will be possible but will require more input from the player to achieve or likely be less common or smooth than what was shown. Also note how often in the trailer he was able to trigger executions and how his health constantly refreshed. It was not meant to be a true reflection of gameplay, just to show off as much as possible

It seems like a huge growth of the mechanics of the first game. More powers, more nemesis system, bigger map, more enemies, more mounts etc Im very excited to see how he wields a spectal lance when riding cavalry. Playing horizon zero dawn has made me realise that cavalry is the next frontier for gaming

[Malankazooie]

That creepy, sleazy, mean, smug and ill inducing to look upon him, Conan O'Brien, plays the game with Kumail Nanjiani.

[Cause]

The humour in this game worried me. It seems both out of place and not funny


Reviews all look good though.

[WinterPhoenix]

Game arrived today, played it a little bit before I had to turn it off. It's honestly pretty similar to the first game at this point, just bigger, in basically every way. Talion has access to way more skills and gear has a huge variance that just didn't exist at all in the first game. The fighting styles of enemies already seem more varied, though I would argue that at least from my perspective playing for a couple of hours on normal campaign difficulty that the game is definitely easier than it's predecessor, Talion just seems better able to fend off crowds than he was in Shadow of Mordor until he had access to late game skills. That might just be me though, difficulty is often very subjective as an issue.

They've obviously thrown any idea of canon out of the window at this point, but that doesn't really bother me because I actually find the concept of an alternate Middle Earth interesting anyway. It is weird the way they present Shelob though, I mean just downright strange, there's non-canon and then just plain odd. The game has extensive menu's, I always enjoy the appendices as I love reading the extra little bits off information. Aside from the appendices and the guide (basically a repository of the game's tutorials) I would say the menu's are alright but I wouldn't say much more than that. I can see people believing them to be overly cluttered, it would certainly be a legitimate opinion at any rate.

Overall I've enjoyed my time on it so far, and it looks like they've done a decent job on integrating the continued exploration of Celebrimbor's past deeds (in this non-canon Middle Earth) into the main plot this time, though I barely scratched the surface on that front so that opinion is of course subject to possible change. Immensely enjoyable as Shadow of Mordor was and considering how this one has started out I can't see it being less than an very enjoyable timesink of varying hours depending on story length and playstyles. I don't think it will be challenging for GotY though, not for me any rate, but that's not necessarily a bad thing, not every game can obviously. Plus stiff competition this year, HZD is still breathtaking for me.

[Mentalist]

Started playing last night, on the recommended "Nemesis" (so, "kinda hard") difficulty.

IT. IS. INSANE.

Talion is stuck in Minas Ithil that's half-taken over by orcs. There's a main questline I tried to studiously ignore to mess around and kill captains to level up.

I've encountered, not one, but TWO level SIXTEEN tracker captains (so, they get wind of me, and then start chasing me down through the city, relentlessly).

I've also been killed by a few randoms. The first one took the title "Tark-Slayer" and thought he was hot shit. But it turned out he was mortally vulnerable to stealth kills, so I tracked him down and gave him a good neck stabbing from above.

I've got one level 7 Nemesis who keeps coming back from the dead, but he's a puny Archer, and I already killed him 3 times,

Another orc who killed me was a random spear-toting Assassin type, whose defining characteristic seems to be that he's always drunk. I keep running into him, because he's positioned int eh middle of the city, and he's always drunk as a sailor. I cornered him once, but failed a QTE, so the bastard got away.

I'm severely under-leveled for this, and I occasionally get ambushed by high-level captains, but somehow I spent like 7 hours playing last night.

I guess I should advance the plot to get my Dominate power back, so that I can start (literally) owning these mofos

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 20 January 2020 - 03:54 PM

[Aptorian]

You definitely should continue the story. I think I played like 20-30 hours before the game stopped introducing new powers or management stuff. You have to take over the entire first Zone out of six or seven before you're really rocking.

[Tiste Simeon]

Aptorian, on 20 January 2020 - 03:28 PM, said:

You definitely should continue the story. I think I played like 20-30 hours before the game stopped introducing new powers or management stuff. You have to take over the entire first Zone out of six or seven before you're really rocking.

Yeah this was one of the few games where early plot advancement was very advantageous in terms of abilities (I love the arrow to blow up any fire ability for example).

Plenty of game time to do side quests and just hunt orcs.

And yet I still feel that Shadow of Mordor was just a better game all round.

[Mentalist]

5 hours later....

I have decimated the ranks of the Captains besieging Minas Ithil. It helped that a bunch of them were dumb enough to Ambush me as I was performing a Vendetta mission. As a result, I ended up killing like 5 in a single go, and then proceeded to stalk everyone that was vulnerable to Stealth kills. Then the 2 Epic trackers that haunted me decided to separately Ambush me. Except at this point I'm Level 9, rocking some sweet Rare gear, and kitted up with a number of Lifesteal powers.

Long story short, the Army of Minas Ithil looks like this now:

http://steamcommunit.../?id=1974887601

The top guy is level 10. Everyone on the bottom is below 6.

now then, it's time to do some main questing.

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 21 January 2020 - 07:44 AM

[Mentalist]

Messed around a bit more. Killed a bunch more captains. Basically, the only 2 left in the Minas Ithil Hierarchy are the 2 guys who were off-limits because they were on Nemesis missions. Basically, I was just training up in how to use the poison, and grinding some more gems.

Then I did the story mission, and the map got littered with more collectibles. I grabbed them all (extra skill point!) and then finally moved on to the next area.

The game was trying to teach me about fear vulnerabilities... but the level design didn't include the fly nest, which is what was supposed to scare my target to death. So instead i set him on fire, because he could be insta-killed by fire.

At this point I feel I really need the Dominate power. Killing stuff is not particularly inspiring in and of itself.

Maybe I need to play around with summoning Ghuls or Spiders in the outposts.

Might lay off it for a bit, because this game is really tossing my sleep patterns out of whack.

[Mentalist]

Poison. It is SO, so OP.

My current favourite past time is sneaking into a fortress and poisoning all barrels from above. I have a skill active that causes all poisoned victims to explode into a contagious green cloud upon death, so just setting it off and watching the carnage, occasionally killing any archers spawning on roofs and towers before they can raise the alarm is just brilliant fun.

[Mentalist]

Also, I am definitely over-levelled now. Level 20, with somewhere between 26-28 skill points invested, and I STILL don't have the Dominate power.

I also just discovered Ice powers. Really useful for dealing with trolls, maybe?

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 28 January 2020 - 05:05 AM

[Mentalist]

25 hours in, finished Act 1 and FINALLY have the Dominate skill back.

Act I ends on a rather sad note. might stick with the story as long as it takes to unlock the "Dominate Captain" skill, then I might as well go wild.

[Mentalist]

Yeeeeesssss. I can haz build army brain powerz nao!!!

Put another chunk of hours into the game Mon and yest. Getting the lay of the land in Nurn, recruiting my first captains, learning to ride drakes, and generally messing around.

Got a nice new Nemesis, too-this orc who killed me because I failed a Caragor QTE- he was an Alchemist, apparently. I revenge-killed him, but he came back- as a Machine, apparently, ambushing me during an Outpost mission. I Shamed him, but now I issued him a Death Threat- probably gonna try to recruit him- maybe even get him promoted- it'll make for a good story if he betrays me later on.

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 30 January 2020 - 05:12 PM

[Tiste Simeon]

Which he no doubt will haha

[Mentalist]

Tiste Simeon, on 30 January 2020 - 02:24 PM, said:

Which he no doubt will haha

Yeah, I actually want to groom some super-strong enemies for myself. Right now the game still feels generally easy. I get ambushed by random captains during a fight and I just wreck them. I actually recruited a really strong Captain while doing a Death Threat mission, because he ambushed me to interfere with that. I lured him on the roof of a Fortress, broke & recruited him and then sent him back on the map. He ended up roaming the outpost that I was attacking next and he drew a lot of aggro away from me, by virtue of being a lvl 20 Berserker.

That troll ended up running away, though. And then when I did the repeat of the mission i couldn't recruit him, because he became higher level than me. Hhad to go hunt him in the wild, and I ended up siccing a Graug on him to weaken him before finally claiming him- gave me a Legendary Gear upgrade, too.

I'm gonna start focusing on Warchiefs soon. But first I wanna hunt down the bodyguards and Shame them down to like level 3 or something, haha. Already got one (I killed his Blood brother, because the Execution was too strong. I actualyl wanted to recruit him. oops), and I Shamed him like 3 times, so now he's a Deranged quivering wreck.

Honestly, the story's nothing to write home about, but the Nemesis sandbox is amazing.

[Tiste Simeon]

Yeah I've not come across the Nemesis system in any other games but I love it.