Blockbuster Gaming – The Bright Lord
Occasionally here at Player2.net.au we will play something that deserves your attention but probably doesn’t need a full review written for it. Be it DLC for the latest AAA title, a little indie game or even an Android/iOS title. We play these titles for the same length as the average blockbuster movie (about 2 hours) and report back to you the reader on what we found. So grab your popcorn and settle in for the latest episode of Blockbuster Gaming.
The Bright Lord – Shadows of Mordor
PC, PS4, Xbox One
So I am pretty sure we can all agree that Shadows of Mordor was surprisingly great. Top notch combat, great exploration and the beautiful Nemisis system made Shadows of Mordor one of the surprise hits of 2014. It was however missing one thing, the one thing that Lord of the Rings fans such as myself have always wanted to do in a video game. But that has now been rectified with the release of The Bright Lord DLC. Finally I got to go toe to toe with the baddest of big bads, Sauron.
The Bright Lord is set during the time of the One Ring’s creation and as such I was no longer playing as Talion. No I was now playing his as his ghostly partner in crime Celebrimbor, who was alive at this point in time. Celebrimbor plays a little differently to Talion in that his arrow attacks are much stronger but to offset this he cannot slow time when aiming. Perhaps the biggest issues with Celebrimbor is that all of his abilities are unlocked so there is no character progression at all which is something of a shame.
The DLC also allowed me to use the One Ring for the first time. The One Ring gave me the ability to have a small period of unlimited executions and slow time. It was certainly fun to use at first but it also did take a lot of the challenge out of the game. Captains and War Chiefs were nowhere near as menacing as the base game due to the fact I could negate all of their unique traits just by using the One Ring.
The highlight of the DLC is without doubt the final battle with Sauron. It is a tense affair which forced me to use all of the tricks at my disposal. There were no cutscenes, no quicktime events and no breaks. It was just Sauron and his Uruks against the might of my sword, arrows and wits. I had a blast and it was the only significant challenge during the whole DLC.
The Bright Lord is essentially just more Shadows of Mordor with a few tweaks which isn’t a bad thing at all, I just think it could have been better. Die-hard fans of Shadows will want to grab this straight away but for the rest of us it can probably wait for a sale.
The Bright Lord is available now.
Matt Hewson
