Early Access - How The Nemesis System Creates Stories
Added 2021-01-26 16:13:57 +0000 UTCHello!
So, I've been a busy bee this January - working hard on a huge video about a topic that I've been meaning to cover for quite some time. I'm talking, of course, about the Nemesis System in Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War.
This system is able to create brilliant and unique stories using procedural generation, systems, random rolls, and lots of clever storytelling techniques. I try to explain it all in this video.
Do let me know what you think! Video link here.
Mark
Comments
It is an absolute joy to see a good system supported at all levels instead of being hung out to dry (*cough*legion*cough) Sadly, the patenting means most developers will steer wide clear of creating any similar system, which means goodbye better systems unless you're rich enough to get a license or poor enough to not care about litigation :( :( :(
Paolo Torelli
2021-01-28 17:12:10 +0000 UTCYes, indeed a huge flaw - it's fixed somewhat in the sequel but I think Monolith could have been more aggressive in amping up the difficulty if you're killing too many Orcs.
Game Maker's Toolkit
2021-01-27 20:12:43 +0000 UTCI didn't play the second game because of the reasons you mention at the end of the video so i can only talk about the first game. My problem with the nemesis system is that it only works if you fail. Because i was careful with picking my targets in the beginning, i only died once to a named orc and only let one escape once if i remember correctly. Later i was so overpowered that i never got close to being defeated. The first game doesn't have the cheating death system iirc, but even if an orc cheated death once or twice, as long as you can easily kill them, nothing will emerge. Even if an orc betrays you (i don't remember if that could happen in the first game), you simply kill them, you never had any meaningful relationship with them anyway. The saving thing doesn't come into play either, because you never need saving. And thus, if you don't fail, if you always kill your enemies or turn them into your subjects, the nemesis system does absolutely nothing, and that's a huge flaw.
Naryoril
2021-01-27 18:21:04 +0000 UTC
