Middle-earth: Shadow of War's got a new trailer out today, and it's showcasing all the open-world goodness not seen before in previous videos.
The trailer showcases new locales for the game, including coastal fortresses, a fortress hidden among snowy peaks, and a gloomy forest teeming with wargs. The locales included are said to be the Island of Nurn, Cirith Ungol, and Gorgoroth, although there are no captions in the video to denote which is which. What looks like a segment of a cutscene of the Bright Lord and Talion walking through abandoned ruins is also shown.
The aspect that hooks me the most is the music going along with it. It's not something we've heard before in a Lord of the Rings game. It sounds like a mix of slow pop synthesizer, like something from New Order, and then leads into choir vocals and orchestra that is like the more traditional sound from Howard Shore. I think that the sound, above all, communicates the theme and tone of the game better than the visuals do.
That's not to say anything critical about the visuals of course, because they still do a good job of communicating as well. Around 45 seconds into the video gives the first look at what is probably a huge battle involving Talion and his band of merry orcs. From the look of it, it seems that the main color for Talion's forces will be a cool robin's egg blue.
An unknown voice speaks to Talion, saying that death calls him again. When asked how he will answer he says "We will bring this war to them." Fire and destruction, dark gray skies, decapitations, and the mind-breaking of orcs follows suit.
Other highlights of the trailer include a flying drake (or fell-beast, depending on what part of the lore it's actually from) and plenty of new troll enemy types, including one that looks horned and scorched. The trailer ends with a sweet shot of Talion and his small squad of orc buddies looking out another fortress to be conquered.
Middle-earth: Shadow of War releases August 22nd, 2017. Here's the trailer:
