As a massive Lord of the Rings fan, I sincerely believed this game would be a super cheap cash-grab. What a pretentious nonsense idea! An undead ranger slaying orcs across Mordor! Surely the writers and designers simply stringed together a random assortment of words and ideas and hoped for the best.

After all, the game is a mixture of Assassin's Creed with Batman: Arkham City's freeform fighting system while placed in a land that has to do with neither.


And yet, it all works. The story is compelling, the characters are believable, and it feels like Tolkien merely forgot to record the tale of the ghostly ranger instead of the other way around. Shadow of Mordor is incredibly enjoyable, occasionally silly but very reverent of the original lore and characters. Well done! I give 9/10 for this game