Middle-Earth: Shadow Of War – Xbox One Review

Yet another Lord of the Rings game worthy of your extended time…

Having already come across a mass variety of orcs across a single player campaign that has spanned more than plenty of hours, it immediately becomes clear that Middle-Earth: Shadow Of War is a game that has seen plenty of detail and effort put into it, to the extent that it provides an improvement on its predecessor, Shadow Of Mordor. Here is a game spanning multiple regions and offers up value for money in the essence that you can plough through the hours with a real sense of achievement in levelling up your own character in the midst of enemy orcs doing just the same thing.

And that’s part of the glory of Shadow Of War, the sheer variety emanating from those characters around you. Monolith and Warner Bros have themselves a much improved Nemesis system, with the audacious number of foes who each have their own traits and names, multiplying beyond belief and offering up challenge after challenge with their unique abilities, weaknesses and strengths, as well as levelling up to their own improved positions. Few games offer this challenge and variety, putting the new LOTR game up there with the most impressive open world games currently available on the market.

The story itself, a continuation from its predecessor, is cut straight from the cloth of Tolkien and sees immortal Talion travelling to Mount Doom to forge a new Ring of Power with the help of Celebrimor, only for his partner in crime to be kidnapped and the Ring to be used as a makeweight for Celebrimor’s freedom. Bringing forth various characters and hugely defining battles, your role as Talion has never been so important.

Combining elements utilised in games such as Assassin’s Creed and the Arkham Batman series, Shadow Of War offers up some great free-running, stealth sneaking and executions that, while some may find a tad repetitive, all too often serves up chaos and brilliance in aces. The battles are on a mass scale and frenetic, and the fact that the major orcs your faced against each have their own unique skillset (and amazingly separate voice-overs) helps to keep the game fresh even after multiple hours smashing buttons and swinging your sword.

The landscapes, as one would expect, are also a major plus point for the game, bringing to life once more the pages of Tolkein’s mythology and offering up a great variety in landscapes, from luscious greenery to scorched earths that represent the war-torn battlegrounds you find yourself walking and battling through. Each oozing with their own character, they forge a magnificently spanning world that helps to rack up the hours and also handily provides the player with a fast travel feature that is undeniably invaluable!

Shadow Of War is a worthy follow-up to Shadow Of Mordor and smashes it out of the park in terms of providing an improvement on the first game. The battles are much more frenetic and impressive, given the number of orcs you can tackle in one single fight, and the visuals are an early indicator of just how slick and impressive the new Xbox One X console will be upon its release. Here is one Lord Of The Rings game you’ll want to spend your hard earn money on.