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''Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor'' is an open world action-adventure video game set within Tolkien's legendarium, developed by Monolith Productions and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. Officially announced in November 2013, it was released for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One in September 2014 and released for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in November 2014. A Game of the Year edition was released on May 5, 2015. It was released for OS X and Linux on July 30, 2015. The story of the game takes place between the events of ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. The players control Talion, a ranger who was killed by the Black Hand of Sauron. Talion's spirit merged with the wraith of the Elf Lord Celebrimbor, and together they try to avenge the death of their loved ones. Players can engage in melee combat, and utilize some of the wraith abilities to fight against enemies. The game uses the Nemesis System, which allows the artificial intelligence of non-playable characters to remember the death of the game's protagonist and react accordingly. The game's development began in 2011. In order to create an accurate environment and be consistent with the books written by Tolkien, the developer consulted several people from Warner Bros., and Peter Jackson, the director of ''The Lord of the Rings'' and ''The Hobbit'' film series. In addition, the team received assistance from Weta Workshop, who gave advice to the team in creating special effects. Monolith focused on the development of the PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions, while the development of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions was outsourced to Behavior Interactive, and the port to OS X and Linux was done by Feral Interactive. ''Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor'' received critical acclaim upon release. Most praise directed at its solid combat, open-world design, the game's lore, and the Nemesis System, which most critics agreed was the best part of the game. Some criticism was aimed at the game's story and boss battles. The game marked the biggest launch for a game based upon ''Lords of the Rings'' universe, and would go on to win several awards from video gaming publications. Two post-release downloadable content, namely ''Lord of the Hunt'' and ''The Bright Lord'', were released in December 2014 and February 2015 respectively. ==Gameplay== ''Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor'' is a third-person open world video game, where the player controls a Ranger by the name of Talion who seeks revenge on the forces of Sauron after his family, including his wife, are killed. Though Talion is mortally felled in the game's introduction, the wraith of the Elven Lord Celebrimbor is able to use his power to keep Talion alive, along with gifting him wraith-like abilities to exact his revenge. Missions in the game feature main story missions that follow Talion's quest for revenge, side missions that involve following Gollum as to find artifacts that are tied to Celebrimbor's past, missions to free the human slaves that have been captured by the Uruk armies and forced to work for Sauron, and additional quests to help forge new abilities for Talion's sword, bow, and dagger.〔 The player also has the freedom to pursue side quests and roam around Mordor, with special activities to collect specific flora or to hunt certain creatures, or to find old artifacts or Elvish seals.〔 Completing quests earns the player a number of rewards: experience points that are used to unlock new abilities for the player from both Talion's ranger and Celebrimbor's wraith skills, a Power value that allows the player to access more powerful abilities to unlock, and an in-game currency that the player can use to improve Talion's health, wraith skill capacity, or forge new slots on his weapons to add additional runes (as described in the Nemesis System below).〔 In completing missions, the player can have Talion engage in melee, ranged combat, and stealth approaches, with some missions rewarding the player more for completing the mission in a specific manner. Talion's ranger abilities are enhanced through Celebrimbor, allowing the player to mix combat with special focus-based attacks; these latter attacks can be used to slow time down while aiming with the bow, drain focus out of an enemy foe, or, later in the game, brand the foe to become an ally of Talion. The combat system uses an attack-chain system that enables the player to perform special moves after building the chain to a large enough value, such as instantly draining a foe of focus or performing an area focus attack. Stealth is a critical element in some missions; several areas are considered Strongholds and should Talion's presence be discovered, an alarm will sound and more Uruks will arrive to try to kill him.〔 A core feature of ''Shadows of Mordor'' is the Nemesis system. The game tracks a number of specially tagged Uruks as part of Sauron's armies, who will lead the other Uruks in battle. Defeating these leaders will help to weaken Sauron's army, and these leaders will drop a rune which the player can install on Talion's weapons to provide additional buffs in battle.〔 Alternatively, being killed by a leader will cause the current mission to be cancelled and the player returned to a safe point to continue exploring, and the leader will gain additional power, making him more difficult to defeat in the next encounter. Further, such deaths are tracked through online servers, and the player's friends on the various network services (such as via Steam friends for Windows players) will be notified of this death and be offered the chance to exact revenge on the Uruk, which if successful will give rewards to both the original player and the victorious friend.〔 The leader Uruk will have a range of strengths and weaknesses, the latter that can be exploited in combat to quickly weaken and defeat the leader. The player can gain knowledge of these through finding intelligence, either by locating papers with the information, speaking to rescued slaves, or draining marked Uruks for this.〔 Being able to exploit such weaknesses in defeating the leader will gain a better quality rune and more experience points in this manner. Once the player gains the ability to brand Uruks, they can brand these leaders and convert portions of Sauron's army to their side. At this point, the player can use the Nemesis system to trigger infighting within the Uruk forces which they can then directly participate in, helping to weaken the army further. Uruks that survive their encounter with Talion will remember this when Talion combats them again; for example, an Uruk who was thrown into a fire by Talion might want revenge on him for being disfigured.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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