Be Excellent To Each Other

Lots of coverage of this on sites today as the review embargo lifts and it seems to be getting much better scores than anyone thought - due out next week





Joystiq: 5/5

Polygon: 9.5

IGN: 9.3

The Escapist 4.5/5

Gamespot: 8

Eurogamer: 8

GamesTM: 8

Under £18 on PC, too http://savygamer.co.uk/2014/09/24/middl ... -pc-17-68/

Ooh, I like open-world RPGs. I prefer the likes of Elder Scrolls, Fallout, and to a lesser extent, Borderlands. I don't particularly like GTA or Crackdown though.

This time last year, while I eagerly awaited my PS4, I had hoped Destiny would be a next gen game to fill the void left by Skyrim and Fallout. Mr. Flis' boys have it on Xbone but it didn't grab me and seemed pretty linear too.

Might take a punt on this one, seeing as it's my birthday in time for release.

Looks good to me! Will add that to the list.

It's flipping awesome.

one bloody uruk managed to kill me 3 times early game when I had no idea what i was doing, this has now led to him being a massive pain in the arse and him being a Warchiefs bodyguard. His taunts against me are fucking hilarious. The Nemesis system is a great new concept, it individualises every game.

Have found myself going slightly crazy for farming all the side quests also, go to the point where i have unlocked enough skillz to be a total badass. This game makes me feel like I am 10 again

I have ordered this on the PS4, the reviews and comments are just too good to ignore.

Spent a few hours playing this yesterday afternoon, while recovering from a cold and a hangover, so possibly I didn't get the best feel for it... However, first impressions are good and I am enjoying it.

I've never play Ass Creed or Batman so the style of play and combat was completely new to me; I don't favour third person games generally and found Talion getting stuck to rocks or walls a few times when sneaking around. But that could've been my cack-handedness as opposed to an issue with the game.

Combat itself is very smooth and reactive, you block when you want to block and strike when you want to strike - there is no perceivable lag. It is slightly unnerving when you're taking on a dozen Uruks and barely miss a beat, it feels like you could fight swarms of them all day at times. It did feel a bit like button-bashing in the earlier encounters but the more you fight, and more runes/abilities/attributes you unlock, the more your fighting style needs refining. The enemies also adjust to how you fight so it doesn't take many combat situations for you to be overwhelmed and have to learn how you fluked that cool finishing move earlier or what happens when you get your combat streak up past 8x. There are so many different results for each button press too, depending on whether you're sneaking, running, hanging or fighting; to start with, I did find it a little much for my brain to cope with but it didn't take long to get in to, and I expect a lot of that is true of Batman and Ass Creed so perhaps people who played those games will be a at slight advantage from the off. However, the game is paced in such a way initially, that you won't be significantly disadvantaged by having no idea at all what you're doing.

There are the usual ability/attribute trees and weapon upgrades, however, certain abilities can only be unlocked as you complete parts of the main mission. Everything collectable, all side missions, the main mission, any quest or challenge you have is marked either on your world map or is accessed in wraith view. The world is also very compact for me at the moment. You can run around and unlock all the available Forge Towers in no time, which then allows you to fast travel around as you want, and there are Uruks to fight around every corner.

One of the main things I haven't liked about it are how I was killing some of the Captains so they'd disappear from my little chessboard of Saurons Army but others would respawn in the same way Talion does. One of them, I 'killed' three times before realising there is a difference between 'killing' and killing. I don't remember being made aware of that but there are so many bits of information that pop up mid-fight early on in the game, that I could have missed it. Google suggest execution/beheading is the only way but I know when I've exploited a weakness to kill a Captain, I've been rewarded with a rune, and I don't think I chopped their head off doing that. I don't mind killing and re-killing if I know I'm going to have to do it.

I'm looking forward to my next play, I'm happier in what I'm doing and how I can play the Uruk off against each other and kill them in ever more inventive ways. And riding a Caragor has to be done on a daily basis.

They should have made the 'Orcs are fucking tough, if you don't chop their heads off, they may or may not reappear' thing clearer. Because it seems to have tripped up a fair few people. Also cos it's cool, having some guy you messed up reappear with gnarly looking scars, taunting you about how you 'shoulda made sure when you had the chance'

Adds a little tension when you're fighting that one dude who keeps kicking your ass, and you know that he's going to reappear if you don't properly slot him.

Some captains actually have the trait 'hard to kill' so you pretty much have to decapitate them.

Just had a play for an hour or so. Current thoughts are that is it thoroughly ok. It certainly hasn't clicked for me yet, and the amazing combat is just whack x and occasionally press triangle or R2 as far as I can tell?

Did a main mission, got the cutscene, game started up again and all the orcs I had killed had respawned and my first thought was "I can't be arsed" and I turned it off. Not a good sign!
I shall try again another time and see if I get into it.

Dark Souls.

And countless other games with a focus on mêlée.

The combat develops the more stuff you unlock; it's not exactly difficult as long as you're paying attention but you do need to do more than whack x if you want to get your hit counter up past 50. I'm enjoying fighting more than I thought I would; to the point where I go cause havoc in strongholds just to get in a massive brawl.

Accident stumbling into a war chief who has three bodyguards, in the middle of a brawl in a stronghold can be a little tricky though.

Ah, but people squeaked on about Dark Souls having "the best combat system EVAR", which it really didn't.

Arkham had similar combat, and that was amazing.

I assume you mean similar to Shadows of Mordor?

Having replayed Prince Of Persia: Sands of Time recently you can certainly see where Batman got its inspiration.

I bought this on a whim the other day and it's great! Exactly like the new Batman in the way the combat works and I think it's like Arkham Origins in the way that you work your way around, beating people up before you find out the clues you need to carry on the story.

Beheading orcs is very satisfying and the whole thing looks lovely. I like it.

I started playing this last night and I wasn't really feeling it. Technically it's very similar to the Arkham games in terms of combat but it just felt a lot more 'clunky' somehow. I think it's the lack of the grapple which is pretty much a defining feature of the Batman stuff and pretty essential to make the game feel fluid given that Batman isn't really all that manoeuvrable when just walking around. I'll stick with it and hopefully adjust to it but at the moment it just feel like missing a limb when I can't grapple around because the rest of the game design does hark back to Arkham stuff.

Nah, I'm not into this at all; there's just something about the feel of the character and the structure of the game that's not grabbing me. On top of that, the last thing I did there was try some random side quest (clear out a cave of Guls then kill the matron) and it annoyed the shit out of me so balls to it.

That's a shame Bamba. I really enjoyed the game and found the combat most satisfying.