The growing ubiquity of loot boxes continues to stoke outrage. And while concern over microtransactions is warranted, I think the weeks of anger we saw directed at Middle-earth: Shadow of War was focused on the wrong thing.

Yes, it's uncool that loot boxes have oozed into singleplayer games, and yet another of the major games of 2017. That sucks. As Wes argued in our staff discussion last week, loot boxes threaten to homogenize the reward systems of dissimilar games into a samey, randomized mush.

But buried beneath the internet fury about Shadow of War was the fact that, actually, you don't need to interact with loot boxes at all in order to enjoy or complete it, as multiple reviewers made clear. This anger even drowned out arguably more egregious microtransactions, like the two-hour booster 'potion' you can purchase to double the rate that Talion earns experience, pure heresy in a grindy, open-world RPG.

The real reason these loot boxes are repulsive is that they allow people to bypass the most fun part of Middle-earth: Shadow of War: cultivating rivalries. 

When you unbox an orc from a war chest and add them to your army, you haven't had to hunt, fight, and outwit that orc. You don't have a history with them, because they're instantly loyal to you. You don't have to interrogate pathetic orc worms in order to reveal their weaknesses. You don't kill them, only to have them [dramatic camera spin] cheat death and reappear. You don't even get to hear them speak—a huge part of that orc's personality, as we learned last week. 

These moments are what make Shadow of War a good videogame, and Monolith and Warner Bros.' decision to build a way to sidestep them is a self-inflicted wound on the game's design. Boxed orcs are strangers, but Shadow of War forces them upon you as friends. 

Organic, free-range orcs are better for you

The biggest payoff of the mechanics, missions, and orc personalities that make up the Nemesis system is the decision to kill, shame, or convert an orc captain into a loyal soldier. You've dueled with one of these lieutenants and cut down a bunch of their minions, eventually whittling them down to a weakened state. You're holding their fate in your hands—the culmination of possibly hours of gameplay. There's selfish relief in gutting them right there and then, excising them from the map. On the other hand, it's delightful to bring them over to your side, flipping one of Sauron's chess pieces into an asset you'll use against him.

When you buy a boxed orc, you're missing out on this payoff entirely. There's no beginning, middle, and end to your story with that character. It's the same reason that I feel nothing when XCOM 2 hands me a high-level soldier as a mission reward in the late game—why would I make a random newcomer part of my A Team when I've spent hours investing in characters I carefully made myself?

But even worse, Shadow of War's boxed orcs undermine your connection with the rest of your army. Whole systems of the game are built around upgrading your orcs. You can send them on missions to kill other captains, or level them up by making them fight in Pokémon-style arena battles. You do this stuff to prepare for Shadow of War's fortress stronghold battles, for which you handpick a few orc captains to fight alongside you, bringing their unique attributes to bear against an enemy overlord, his warchiefs, and the defenses of the fort.

Fortress battles are challenging and chaotic. Your captains are spread out across a relatively large area, and you can lose track of them as they fight independently. Deciding which orc to bring means weighing whose life you're potentially willing to sacrifice to complete a major mission, a life that you might've invested hours into leveling and bonding with.

But alternatively, you can spend some in-game currency, crack open a war chest, and instantly get an orc that's leveled proportionately to your campaign progress, because the contents of Shadow of War's boxes scale with your level. In this way the the whole system undercuts the fun risks you'd otherwise have to make: I can drop some Mirian and instantly get one or more ready-to-fight, disposable captains. Losing an orc I love is one of my favorite moments in Mordor because you usually walk away with a story of bravery or martyrdom.

The anger at loot boxes is rational, but as it often does, the internet's collective criticism missed the point. Shadow of War's loot boxes aren't bad because they monetize orcs, weapons, and armor, they're bad because they circumvent the essence of what makes the game interesting: being bullied by assholes like Mozû the Blight, befriending them, and then then losing them forever in a heroic castle siege. 

War never changes, as the saying goes, and soon it will never end, either—at least, not in Middle-earth: Shadow of War. Monolith revealed in a recent livesteam that "infinite Shadow Wars," which will provide endless fort defense at the end of the game, will be released alongside the Slaughter Tribe Nemesis expansion. 

Shadow Wars is basically an end-game sequence in which the forces of Mordor launch counter-attacks against fortresses held by the good guys. (That's you.) It sounds like a terrible grind to get the game's "real" ending, but apparently a lot of players quite like it, and they want the option to carry it on indefinitely. Monolith said during the stream that the option is "coming very quickly," although a specific date wasn't revealed. 

Eurogamer said that the Infinite Shadow Wars mode will be released as part of a free update (the Slaughter Tribe DLC is part of the $40 "expansion pass"), but the video clip doesn't specify one way or the other so I've reached out to confirm, and will update when I have a reply. While you wait, catch up with Tim's tragic tale of humiliation, defeat, and rage-quits at the hands of Mozû the Blight, "Fuck this one particular orc."

Let me begin by warning that for the rest of the piece I will be relaxing our usual rules regarding bad language. I am doing so to tell you that Mozû the Blight is a motherfucker. I first meet this orc captain, and absolute scumbag, as part of the Arena quest in Minas Ithril. Mozû is the final opponent, and from his dialogue I think he's actually an undefeated nemesis enemy imported from my Shadow of Mordor save file, which would at least explain his insane smorgasboard of resistances and abilities. These are what makes Mozû such an asshole to fight. 

He's immune to arrows, fire, ice, quickly adapts to being vaulted over, and regularly emits disorientating howls—but that's definitely not the full list. Consequently, landing any sort of blow on the bastard is a nightmare. He also has a metric ton of health, which I swear at one point was regenerating. The only thing that reliably hurts him is poison, which is how I eventually beat him (after multiple failures) thanks to figuring out I have a lower level weapon that randomly inflicts poison on crits.

Making a monster

A few hours later, Mozû is back. This isn't unusual for Shadow of War's captains, as those with the 'Death Defying' perk will keep coming at you, much like talkative boomerangs. Due to his previous poisoning, Mozû's face now looks like the aftermath of a fire in a chemistry lab, but otherwise he's in good spirits. I naively forget about his annoying combination of abilities and enter the fight on autopilot, treating him like the other captains I've been dispatching. Big mistake. More than a dozen orc grunts swarm around us, I can't get his health low enough, and eventually I lose.

Only you don't just lose to Mozû. Instead of getting a quick-time prompt for a saving parry when you're weak, instead you get 'Humiliated', which is another of his infuriating abilities. The upshot of being humiliated is that you get to keep your life, but you don't get the health boost from a successfully blocked death strike. Instead you're thrown back into the fray with a sliver of health, which in my case usually leads to another loss. 

Okay, fine. Next time I'll go in better prepared, use the surroundings to my advantage, maybe blow some stuff up... But if anything it goes even worse next time. Mozû chalks up another win, and I have to listen to him bang on about how great he is and how much I suck, all while his cronies chant "Mo-Zu! Mo-Zu!" Also bear in mind that each time we battle Mozû runs his smug mouth during the intro, whenever he humiliates me, and at the end of the fight. So with all that goading, it doesn't take long before I am, in Hearthstone terms, completely on tilt.

I keep queuing up the nemesis mission to challenge Mozû, keep playing more recklessly, and keep losing. After each fight he levels up and I don't, further decreasing my odds of beating him. It doesn't help that Mozû starts reacting with disbelief that I'm still coming back for more. And, I am ashamed to type it now, but the truth is I probably lose half-a-dozen times in a row before taking a break.

Tilting intensifies

At that point I decide to take the mature approach, leaving Mozû alone for the time being so I can come back once I'm overleveled. In a rare act of patience, I actually complete an entire other region, after which I feel like a confident, independent ranger. It turns out these feelings are misplaced. I return to Minas Ithril only to find that Mozû has leveled up in lockstep with me. No matter. I've learned so much on my travels, and unlocked crucial new skills, which should make for a fairer fight. 

Nope.

Mozû has also learned new tricks. In a bitter irony, despite the fact his sole fear is being poisoned, Mozû has seemingly taken a crash course in poison bomb making at Mordor University and these almost one-shot me. I try a few more times, face flushed with increasing fury, at the end of which Mozû has reached level 31, is laughing harder than ever, and I'm still marooned at level 24. I feel actual shame as I depart for another region.

Once there, it's probably only five minutes before the prick turns up. "Ranger! Didn't think you could escape, did you? I've followed you for miles…" Holy shit, this guy. Let me enjoy my videogame! I go to bed livid, wondering if Mozû is out there online terrorizing anyone else as part of the game's vendetta missions. Perhaps we could form a support society. 

Two things will happen in the next 48 hours. Either 1) I work out a way to finally overcome Mozû. I refuse to recruit him into my army, because of the embarrassment of having him help me, and I certainly won't send a follower to assassinate him, not that I have any powerful enough ones. Or 2) I delete Shadow of War and go back to complaining about card games. Note that this article will be updated accordingly. Meanwhile, feel free to suggest advice in the comments below (on the assumption that I already know I need to git gud). More practical advice is desperately needed. Mozû must die.

One of my favorite things about Middle-earth: Shadow of War so far are its variety of mission types. I've just hit Act II and completed my first fortress siege, a multi-stage battle where you bring your loyal (read: magi-psychically dominated into loyalty and subservience) orcs into battle against a powerful overlord, who is served by multiple war chief lieutenants.

To prepare for that big battle, I commanded one of my orcs to fight the bodyguard orc of one of the war chiefs. If your orc defeats this bodyguard, Shadow of War gives them the opportunity to become a spy, and ambush that war chief if and when you go to fight them.

But these "Infiltration" missions have a catch: you can't participate. It's a contest between two orcs to see who's the better fighter, and see who deserves the job of bodyguard more. Now that I've played a little more, I've also discovered an area called the Fight Pits, where you can essentially level-grind your orcs against one another or enemies.

On my first Infiltration mission, I sent in secret agent Stakûga the Molten against an unknown orc in the video above, hoping that his flaming spear and non-flaming shield would be enough. Infiltrations are timed fights, and you can move the camera around a little, but otherwise have zero control over the outcome. I watched with trepidation as Stakûga absorbed a few shield bashes early in the fight, becoming dazed. I don't have kids, but I feel like in this moment I understood why some parents lose their minds at recreational children's sports games. It's stressful to watch your orc fail to plunge his flaming spear into the gut of his enemy, while the flaming spear sits there, aflame and ready to impale. 

Anyway, the Fight Pits and Infiltration missions are a nice break from Shadow of War's otherwise dense list of things to do, as Andy mentions in our review. Below, a PCG editor and Heat Signature dev Tom Francis shares an Infiltration battle much funnier than mine.

There are a few ways to earn Mirian fast in Shadow of War. Check out the handy video guide above, created by our friends at GamesRadar. It explains the five easiest ways to earn Mirian in the game, none of which are too tricky to do, plus it offers tips on timings to get the most out of your orc army.

The pointers here include selling loot, tracking down orcs who are guaranteed to drop decent amounts of Mirian, sending your orcs to do battle and more. As you get deeper into the campaign, this guide should help you gather all the resources you need to progress. 

If you're right at the start of the game, though, be sure to check out our separate beginner's tips to Shadow of War. 

Amid the divisive loot box trend, PC players have been finding their own way to deal, foremost in Middle-earth: Shadow of War. By using Cheat Engine scripts to give themselves unlimited Mirian, some players have found it's possible to buy a infinite supply of loot and war chests, drowning themselves in uruks and gear. In the NeoGAF thread that tipped us off, members are going back and forth on the ethics of the exploit, and sharing methods for pulling it off. 

To be clear, Miriam is not the premium currency that requires real money to purchase, and the silver tier of chests do not reward legendary uruks or gear—those are saved for crates you need to buy with Gold, the premium currency. But you can still accrue a formidable army and enough powerful gear to take on Shadow of War's greatest challenges with ease. 

[Update: We've been told that silver war and loot chests can reward legendary items and uruks. They're just not guaranteed like the higher tiers, which means with enough persistence, the silver tier exploit can entirely supplant any need for the higher tier, premium boxes.]

The cheat is made possible using third-party tools like Cheat Engine to manipulate the game files, a common practice until the advent of online-everythings and microtransations. It's an especially strange cheat since the ability to give yourself infinite uruk friends and gear makes the presence of premium loot boxes in a single-player game stand out as totally unnecessary. They're there to make money. That's no surprise, but the exploit diminishes the value proposition of the premium crates, which are already a questionable addition.

But is changing the value of a free in-game currency using cheats to earn unlimited digital items wrong if it shares the same market and item pool with the premium currency and loot? Is it theft, or is it up-up-down-down-left-right-left-right-B-A?

With microtransactions effectively tripling the value of the game industry in recent years, I wouldn't be surprised to see publishers take action against such exploits, even if cheat codes and digging through game files are an ages old hobbyist tradition. 

We don't condone altering game files without first considering the effects it could have on your save files and any possible legal repercussions. To get clarification on the latter point, we've reached out to WB and will update if we get a response.

While games as a service doesn’t have the best of reputations, contributing to countless debates over DLC, season passes and, most recently, loot boxes, a recent study reveals that a lot of us have eagerly bought into the model, and as a result, the value of the industry has tripled. 

Monetisation services company Digital River recently published a report titled ‘Defend Your Kingdom: What Game Publishers Need to Know About Monetization & Fraud’ which found that even premium games—as in not free-to-play—benefited significantly from DLC and microtransactions. 

“In 2016, a quarter of all digital revenue from PC games with an upfront cost came from additional content,” the report reads. Though it also notes that consumers now expect more for less, and the model has been a reaction to that. 

"Consumers are less willing to pay $60 for a boxed game and instead choose titles with a steady stream of new content," the report said. "Publishers seek to meet these expectations and have adopted a 'games as a service' model, releasing fewer titles over time while keeping players engaged longer with regular updates and add-ons."

As players are turned into long-term customers, buying loot crates and expansions instead of splashing out on the occasional expensive game, revenue per user is expected to grow twice as fast as the rest of the market, explains the report.

You can read the full report, which also explores the impact of fraud and key resellers, here.

Cheers, GamesIndustry.biz 

Middle-earth: Shadow of War’s fortresses might have strong defences, but the game doesn’t. Monolith’s Orc-slaying open-world game uses Denuvo anti-tamper software, and once again it’s been cracked in a single day, letting pirates get access to it almost straight away. 

Denuvo’s appeal, for publishers looking to protect their game, was that the Austrian developer originally boasted that it made games extremely hard to crack, and at first it was tougher nut, taking a month for the first game to be cracked. Since it appeared a few years ago, however, the time between a game’s launch and it being cracked has shrunk considerably. 

Several high profile releases, including Total War: Warhammer 2, have been cracked in a day as well, so the case for using it has become increasingly flimsy. With it no longer being guaranteed to stop piracy, even temporarily, it’s looking more and more like a waste of money, and player goodwill, since it also imposes several restrictions on legitimate users, like limiting activations on different PCs. 

Last year, Denuvo Software Solutions boasted that some publishers were only considering PC versions of console titles because of the DRMs previous success, when it was still stopping pirates, though the link between piracy and sales is questionable. Indeed, a recently published EU Commission report couldn’t find robust evidence of a link at all. 

If publishers want to keep using DRM, they may have to start looking elsewhere. 

Cheers, DSOG.

The Singer is an orc musician that will hunt you down and sing to you in Middle-earth: Shadow of War. I mean, he'll also try to kill you—but he'll do it with a surprisingly durable lute, grappling with your sword as he delivers this rhyming couplet right in your face:

You may have heard of one like meThat prances, dances and sings with gleeWherever the strife, the Singer is thereHe slaughters and slays with such merry flairI sing this song with all my breathTake heed, for this interlude ends with your death

I know we're all concerned about loot boxes, but Shadow of War players should also be worried about being lute-boxed.

Credit to Gamesradar.com senior news editor Rachel Weber, who tipped me off to the existence of this singing orc this morning in the office. Rachel encountered him in Minas Tirith early in her campaign ("He seems fun, but he is THE WORST," says Ms. Weber). I found the above video footage of 'Shaká' (he seems to draw from Shadow of War's normal pool of orc names) on the Serious Gaming channel, who also ran into him inside the opening area of Shadow of War.

Like other orc captains, The Singer will (or has a chance to) 'cheat death' and make a second appearance at a higher level. When he appears again, he sings this quick encore:

You tried and failed to kill the SingerYou did not get a caragor dinner

(...Is that a PUBG reference? "A character bursting into song is the most lore-accurate thing about Shadow of War," remarks PCG indie channel editor Jody Macgregor.) 

Other than The Singer, PC Gamer associate editor James Davenport says he's encountered at least one more unusual orc captain in Pûg the Friendly, who shows up and wants to chat instead of fight. When you defeat him, he reappears with bandages and even more fearful apologies.

I don't care what Celebrimbor is whispering in my ear throughout Shadow of War—my new goal for my campaign is to recruit one of these weirdos into my personal orc army.

In the Lord of the Rings universe, Shelob takes the form of a huge spider, an evil entity operating outside of Sauron's influence. She's grassroots evil, a simple symbol for something that isn't nice to look at and even worse when she does everyday spider stuff. Webs? Gross. Eating flies? I prefer kale. All those eyes? No thanks.

In Middle-earth: Shadow of War, Shelob crawls out in spider form, turns into a fine black mist, and takes the shape of a beautiful woman in a slim-fitting black dress. No more webs, no more bug food, and six fewer eyes. How is it that such an iconic, grotesque, all-powerful entity in the Lord of the Rings mythos has been reduced to a human with a refined taste for JCPenney’s top rack? Selling a game that features a big spider as a leading character on the box can’t be easy, but of all the creative solutions possible, even of all the possible human interpretations, a sexy evening dinner party outfit is a bit predictable, regardless of any developer claims about  "exploring her character." 

But it also made us wonder, if Shelob can just get sexy out of nowhere, then what about the other creatures of Middle-earth? Why should they be left unsexy? So here we present a list of equally unnecessary but also oddly sexy adaptations to be made to Tolkien’s bestiary. 

Nazgirls 

According to Aragorn, the Nazgul, or Ringwraiths, were "once men, great kings of men." Cool story, Strider, but not a sexy one. Why can't the Nazgul be once women, and also still women? Sexy women! Instead of being corrupted by the nine rings given to them by Sauron, what if instead they just kept it tight and got nice tans? Rather than riding winged Fell Beasts, they could drive around in hot sports cars, pulling up outside movie premieres and stepping out in high heels to the clatter of flashbulbs. And when they stab Frodo at Weathertop, they could all be wearing nice tops instead of those torn and tattered cloaks (gross!).

Watcher in the Hot tub 

Guardian of the West-door of Moria, the Watcher is a misunderstood creature. All the time it gets dwarves paddling at the water’s edge curious about ‘tentacle stuff’ but the Watcher has to stop and explain (and bash and eat) to the dwarf that it just wants to watch. If the Watcher could move somewhere sexier, like a hot tub, the bath adults share and leave on for hours at a time, and if the Watcher could smoke a cigarette and become its true self, the soft glow of an ember in the darkness, then the Watcher would feel close to home. (Nothing will ever amount to the arrangement the Balrog and a village of cave trolls had with the Watcher back in the Second Age.)

Sauron's unblinking eye but with amazing lashes 

According to some Reddit posts I googled, sustained, fiery, omnipotent eye contact is a key component of sex appeal. So what better way to keep people interested in Lord of the Rings than by giving the iconic orb a literal makeover? Frodo and Sam certainly wouldn’t have made it to Mount Doom in time with this unblinking babe casting its horrible (but tasteful) eyeshadow across all of Middle-earth. Wink. Whoops, there goes another village. 

The Great Eagles, but wearing Great Jeans 

Whenever the Great Eagles fly in to give hobbits or old wizards a bird ex machina escape route, it’s hard not to take note of how the sun bounces off their plumage, leaving their other side shrouded in darkness, a blinding silhouette streaking across the sky. I say we add one more bulge to that silhouette. Give our elegant birds some jeans worthy of their stature, and I’m talking nice jeans, a good brand like Levis but custom Levis with raw denim. Wrap ‘em tight too, tight enough to warp their distinct creeeee into something a bit more strained, like the jeans are so tight they hurt, but at the same time they feel so good. 

Balls-rog 

It went by Balls-rog in the First Age—the sweet sex tricks it once pulled off with that whip! Ball taps! Ball pulls! Ball slams! What an age. Back then, the Balrog had a famous catchphrase, and hearing it now really shows how much things have changed in the corrupted primordial spirit monster sex community. "Oh baby you can pass," just doesn’t carry much weight these days. Thanks a lot, Gandalf. 

Sexy Smaug is just Brad Pitt from Fight Club (with horns) 

If Shelob can take human form, why can't Smaug? Like any good weredragon, Smaug in human form would spend all his time in human form shirtless, to show off his impeccable abs. Smoking cigarettes (sexily) would be a stand-in for breathing fire. In other words, Smaug would just be Brad Pitt circa Fight Club, but with some some cute horns on his head.

Also acceptable, for Smaug in human form: Brad Pitt circa Troy. The point is, Brad Pitt should've played Smaug in The Hobbit films instead of Benedict Cumberbatch, whose abs aren't even close to being dragon-worthy.

Mom Bombadil — a MEMILF (middle-earth Mom I'd like to, you know) 

Just change up Mom Tom’s lyrics and call it a day. 

Hop along, my little friends, up the Kissywindle!Mom's going on ahead candles for to kindle.Down west sinks the Sun: soon you will be groping.When the night-shadows fall, then the kiss-door will open,Out of the window-pants light will twinkle yellow.Kiss the alder rack! Kiss the allegory pillow!Fear neighter foot nor boob! Mom goes on before you.Hey now! merry dol! We'll be waiting for you!

Ents 

Is it possible to have wood if you are wood? I asked my philosophy 101 professor the same question and I wasn’t allowed to come to class anymore. Nietzsche turned up jack-all too (overrated!). In my personal research, I’ve simply deduced that Tolkien's gentle, wise treemen just need to carve some big knockers and/or six-packs onto their trunks and grow tiny little moss swimsuits around their treeparts. (As the oldest beings in Middle-earth, you know they’re ‘experienced’, too.) Only then will they be sexy enough for Shadow of War’s sexy take on Peter Jackson’s somewhat sexy interpretation of the beloved, distinctly not-all-that-sexy world of Middle-earth. 

Other sexy suggestions 

Sam GamsThe One Ring could have a nice diamond on itDwarfs, but shaved all smoothStrider? I hardly knew 'erThe two towers, touchingWere-worms, because, you know