First Hour or So of Shadows of Mordor

I recently got enough storage space for Shadows of Mordor on the XBox 360 (and yes, I know this is more of a next-gen game, but let me know when an XBox One or PS4 is like $150 and we'll talk.) I've barely scratched the surface, only really doing a single side mission to get a new Dagger Legend. I've managed to die twice, though, and that's teaching me something about the game.

From the looks of the game, my closest analog that I'm familiar with is Assassin's Creed (though I'm given to understand it's more similar to the Batman Arkham games.) However, at least so far, the game is much more punishing when it comes to combat.

Fighting Uruks will give you various forms of XP - just killing them will earn you ability points, which can be spent to gain new abilities, but then you'll need to kill Captains and Warchiefs to gain power, which unlocks further tiers of those abilities. There are also weapon Legends which will have various effects on the weapons you use, and some other forms of leveling that increase base stats like health, arrows, and other such things.

You certainly can fight large crowds, and I'm sure that as I get used to the controls and the subtleties of the game I'll be able to do better in these fights, but there's much less of the "Mook Chivalry" you see in AC games.

Out of the gate, I really, really recommend stealth. The Orcs don't seem to be terribly vigilant, but if they do notice you, you're going to have trouble. You're also more likely than I expected to run into Captains, who are pretty serious threats if they've got anyone helping them (and probably on their own as well.)

The game is built around you dying though - the whole premise is actually that you were killed in the prologue, but cursed in such a way that prevented you from actually dying (and bonding you to the spirit of an Elf wraith... and that's pretty much all I have so far.) So your deaths aren't just retconned away like they are in just about every video game. Instead, an Orc - sorry, Uruk (which I thought was just an Elvish word for Orc) - that kills you will gain prestige. A random grunt will be promoted to Captain and will then engage in a power struggle (this might not happen if there are slots in the ranks made "available," but I don't know,) and kill off one of the other captains. The funny thing about this is that you can kind of do "Death Intel" by dying and then knowing that the guy who killed you has risen in rank. Uruks that kill you will gain power, but you also gain a bit of power when you die, so I don't think you can paint yourself into a power corner if you die too often.

I only had sporadic time to play today, so I was only able to accomplish a little. I'm sure I'll have more to share as I explore the game more.