Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Monolith Productions has revealed a new eight minute-long footage real of pre-alpha gameplay for Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor for those wanting to know just what it would be like inside the Tolkien virtual universe. Focusing on the main protagonist Talion, the gameplay gives a great look at the comabt style we can expect from the prequel to The Lord of The Rings.

With a dynamic next-gen game environment powered by the Nemesis System, players orchestrate their personal plan of vengeance as they bend Mordor to their will; ensuring a unique experience to all players. Every enemy players face is a unique individual, differentiated by their personality, strengths and weaknesses.

Enemy encounters create personal archenemies specific to every gameplay session. Players must outthink each distinctively different enemy to infiltrate the ranks and dominate within the dynamic world that remembers and adapts to their actions and choices.

Alongside the pre-alpha footage a handful of previews have also made their way onto the Internet, giving a brief taste of what is to come from the development team. Each one definitely shares the same similarity of an Assassin's Creed meets Batman Arkham style mashup, which hopefully can prove to be promising.

Polygon:

...In the process of hunting down Ratbag, Talion uses his Wraith abilities to see into Ratbag's mind, which leads to an important discovery. When players read an enemy's mind, they are able to see the connection an enemy has with other enemies, as well as the hierarchical structure of the orc world. In the case of Ratbag, this mind-reading reveals that he is in fact a bodyguard to a war chief that Talion is trying to take down.

Destructoid:

The developers at Monolith weren't shy to talk about the reputation of movie games, and they were clear to share what their influences were, in particular Batman: Arkham Asylum. In terms of production, the Batman series served as motivation during the development of Middle-earth. "We saw Batman: Arkham City as the model," said director of design Michael De Plater, while discussing influences. "We looked at that game as the way to make licensed properties. It's best to make the best game you can first, before trying to make good movie game."

Joystiq:

In battle, however, the inspirations from Rocksteady's freeflow combat system, first seen in Batman: Arkham Asylum, are clear. Talion has a stun move much like Batman's cape stun, can nimbly leap over enemies to flank and move between targets, and combat overall encourages lengthy chains of successful strikes in order to execute flashy finishing moves. The only real difference is Batman never cut off an Orc's head, though I'm sure there's some choice fan fiction on the internet arguing otherwise.

Check it out in action below.