Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor Trailer Reveals Interesting Gameplay

by Sylvie Krekow, Posted Jan 23rd 2014 11:05AM

Here's the newest trailer for the upcoming "Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor" game, and boy, does it look... interesting. In the game, which is set between the events of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, you're a Ranger named Talion who has special Wraith powers. These powers allow you to do several awesome slow-mo-Assassins-Creed-like moves, and you're also able to terrify certain enemies into becoming loyal to you. The game also features a unique "nemesis system" feature, which basically means it remembers your interactions with specific characters and enemies and adjusts the gameplay and storyline accordingly.
Although the gameplay looks pretty fun, however, it remains to be seen how interesting the plot actually is. And even though it's being developed for next-gen consoles like the Xbox One and the PS4 (along with being developed for the Xbox 360, PS3, and PC), the graphics seem a bit unimpressive. Hopefully the the developer, Monolith Productions, spruces everything up in time for release.
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Battleship: The Battle for Earth Begins at Sea review

It’s largely been accepted that the recent Battleship movie was an absolute travesty, though debate still rages as to whether or not it was deliberately quite so bad as it was. The pen-and-paper game the movie was based is a timeless classic, however, so what better time to release an official Facebook version than alongside the movie?

Hasbro’s Battleship: The Battle for Earth Begins at Sea (hereafter referred to simply as “Battleship”) is an advergame designed primarily as a promotional vehicle for the movie, but offering a convincing asynchronous multiplayer version of the original game at the same time. The game offers a few twists on the classic game’s formula, but doesn’t deviate from it so much that long-time fans will have to re-learn the rules.

For those unfamiliar with the basic concept of the original incarnation of Battleship, it is a strategy game for two players that takes place on a grid. Players each place several of the titular battleships on their grid secretly, and then take it in turns to call out grid references to the other player. If the player calls out a grid reference that contains part of one of their opponent’s ships, that is a “hit,” and hitting all of the squares that make up a single vessel will sink it. The objective is for one player to sink all of their opponent’s vessels before the same thing happens to them.

In conventional Battleship, both players have the same ships. In the Facebook version, however, one player takes on the role of the humans and the other the aliens, in keeping with the theme of the movie. The only difference between the two sides is the shape of the largest ship: the humans’ aircraft carrier is a straight line made up of five squares, while the aliens’ equivalent is a vessel which forms a “T” shape over five squares.

In a further twist on the original formula, various islands are scattered around the play area in the Facebook version. It is impossible for players to place ships in these locations, so these provide a few squares that will not need to be fired upon at the start of the game rather than simply presenting both sides with an empty grid.

The Facebook version does not feature some of the alternative rules that have arisen for the original version over the years, such as the “salvo” variant, where players may fire as many shots as they have ships remaining, or the “blockbuster” variant, where players have a “super shot” that covers a 3×3 area to use once per game.

Gameplay in the Facebook version is a simple matter of clicking on the grid location the player would like to fire on. A visual depiction of the battle appears beneath the grid, with splashes appearing in the appropriate locations for misses and explosions for hits. Play is asynchronous, so there is no need for players to be online at the same time, though the game does immediately update without requiring a refresh when one or the other takes their turn, meaning it can be played synchronously if desired. There is no in-game chat facility, but there is nothing to stop players talking using Facebook’s chat system.

The game features no explicit monetization as it is an advergame. It does, however, feature a large amount of promotional content for the movie including unlockable video clips and a link to the film’s official website. To encourage repeat play, there is also an achievements system and a leaderboard showing how a player’s performance stacks up against that of their friends. Players also rise in rank as they play and win games, eventually rising to “Master Chief Officer.”

Battleship is a simple but effective interpretation of a classic pen-and-paper game. The presentation is excellent, with dramatic visual effects, sound and music — although there are a couple of spelling mistakes here and there — and the unlockable video content is sure to please anyone who actually enjoyed the movie. If nothing else, it provides an incentive for progression beyond the in-game ranking and achievement systems.

How long the game will remain active on Facebook remains to be seen, however, as buzz surrounding the movie is already starting to die down since it’s already run its course on the international markets and all but failed at the United States box office. The game will likely get another surge in interest when the movie comes to DVD, Blu-Ray and streaming services in September, but it’s questionable as to whether people will still want to play just for the sake of playing when this second wind dissipates. For the time being, however, Battleship is a good example of a high-quality promotional game that stays true to its source material.

Battleship: The Battle for Earth Begins at Sea currently has 50,000 monthly active users and 2,000 daily active users. Follow its progress with AppData, our traffic tracking service for social games and developers.

Better than the movie.

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Explore the Earth from Home

What the!!?? Google Earth? Has a company taken over our world? No, just mapped it out for you to look at.

I was over at a friend's house the other day and on his computer he showed me his own house as viewed by a satellite in Earth's orbit. It was awesome. The screen started out looking at our great blue planet, then he typed in his house's address (he had programmed it in, as only the USA, UK, and Canada have the ability to find an address automatically so far) and the planet turned to our country. Then it zoomed in further and further until we could see the roof of his house! My genetic father (mother has been married thrice) lives in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, so I typed in his address, the world shifted around, zoomed in, and all of a sudden I could see the roof of his house, the swimming pool in the backyard, driveway and street, trees etc. It was a real mind-blower. One of the best things about www.google.earth.com is that we can now look at real photographs of any part of the world: pyramids in Egypt, Shanghai city, beaches in Jamaica, you can go and look at any place on the globe. All you need to do is point and click your computer's mouse on any spot (address unnecessary), and it's free.

I eventually found my own house (it will be much easier when the whole world has been mapped by street names on the free downloadable version) and I think that the 20$ version has a GPS (Global positioning system) which must make finding things a lot easier. You can also get directions to local areas such as restaurants, parks, hospitals, schools and hotels. The idea is to combine Google's search abilities with imagery and mapping and I think it has great ramifications for the future of location information. You can then save and share your location searches with your friends and colleagues as well as adding your own data, as in my friend's case. Google Earth's users have already saved thousands of personal data points for you to look at and add to: EG: Show people where your business is located.

Another neat aspect of the technology is that you can tilt and rotate the satellite's view to give you a more 3-D perspective on buildings, mountains and landmarks on the terrain. Many people have asked me if the photos are real time and if you run out front of your house will you see yourself? We would need a lot of satellites out in orbit if we hoped to have this kind of 'Big Brother' capability and I'm sure ethical questions would also be raised.

If you are looking for directions the program will actually drive or fly you on the best route to get where you are going. The website has photos of ten of the most popular 'destinations' so you can check out the quality of the high-resolution photos. With the 'Measure' tool you can see how far it is to the local airport or from Paris to London. With the 'Pro' version at $200 (there are three versions) you can also measure area, radius, and perimeter, which can have many applications in professional situations. There are also different layers of mapping information you can click on so all the volcanoes or golf courses will come up automatically if they are what you choose to see in a specific area. If you are searching for places to dine, when a restaurant comes up on the screen you can click on 'more' and information such as hours of operation, menus, reviews, and links to the business website become available.

Pretty cool huh! The only problem you may have is that your computer may not be powerful enough to handle the software or 3-D graphics capability. You also miss out if you own a Macintosh, as a compatible version hasn't been built for them yet. Don't take my word for it, go to the site and check it out. You may find that it has applications that could change the face of your business as well as the way you look at traversing our world, not to mention the ease to which you will be able to locate pizzas anywhere on Earth.

About the author: Jesse S. Somer M6.Net http://www.m6.net Jesse S. Somer doesn't have the whole, wide world in his hands'but he does have it on his computer.

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