How the Nemesis System Creates Stories 

Another game that uses clever AI for storytelling is The Sims. Here's a video on how that works - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-9gf2MT-IOsg.html

The nemesis system being patented and not used is one of the greatest sins in gaming history

Broke an Immortal orc once and he got stuck in a loop. I shamed him so much he wanted to die but couldn’t. Then he developed a “fear of the Gravewalker”, so he would show up randomly, beg me to kill him then realize he is supposed to be scared of me and run away.

Small chance to cheat death? In Mordor, I killed a orc named "... the Unkillable" over 7 times and he kept coming back until his face and body were covered with metal plates, scars and others. He really lived up to his name

Ar-Karo’s story sounds compelling, a rise in power, from a simple trooper, to a powerful captain, to an undying monster, to a faithful companion, to an immortal overlord

I guess the real treasure was the orcs we killed along the way.

Imagine if a mafia or gang-related games use this kind of system for the hierarchy. So you climb up from the bottom, intimidate other members or enemy and eventually became the boss.

“Death cannot take you today! Just as it cannot take me…” I legitimately smiled from that

I love the nemesis system. One time i was attacking my nemesis, aka my punching bag, and about t shame him for the fifth time. BUT, then a captain ambushed me to tell me he was betraying me. And then 3 other captains showed up immediately after him to say they were betraying me too. I died by them, and then spend a few hours hunting them down one by one and shaming them down to humiliating obscurity, who all either die by accident or instant mortality weaknesses. Love it.

"Small chance to cheat death" Yeah well tell that Hoshu the Survivor, who has come back so many times I'm convinced he's immortal

player interaction score: aka they turned plot armour into a gameplay stat

You forgot to include that in the opening parts of the game there was a mission where you had to face your nemesis from the first shadow of war game. Meaning that in order to progress the story you had to kill your biggest rival one last time. The fact that it remembers your rival from the last game and FORCES YOU to put that story to rest in order to complete the game is insane. The nemesis system is truly special.

Let's add to the fact that Overlords can get anxious to a spy in his ranks to the point he will kill a captain or warchief thinking he's a spy. The dialogue of one of your orc will be along the lines of "We didn't put any spy there. He just killed one of his defenders."

Early on in the game I let a slave orc kill me just to see what would happen. He became a captain. I thought this was cool. The story took me away from this area for a really long time. When I came back he was overlord. I felt weirdly proud of him. It was the one fort I never took.

The number of voice lines in this game must be truly massive.

The Nemesis System in a Batman game with the “Nemeses” being crime lords of various gangs would be incredible. Imagine starting with Carmine Falcone, Penguin, Black Mask, and others as “Overlords” and as the game evolves, cool new procedurally generated Batman villains and gangsters rise through the ranks.

One of the coolest orc encounters I had was this one orc bodyguard I was hunting down. I revealed a handful of information on him then behind me I heard, “Ranger! Find anything interesting??” Then I proceeded to turn him into my own spy

I really would love to see this Nemesis System applied in other studios, it has so much great potential

SOW had one of my favorite gameplay moments to this date. I raided a fortress and the Orc Warchief taunted me with my "spy" held hostage and executed him in front of our army. Only I never put a spy in his fortress. He killed his own captain and made the takeover easier for ME. It was fantastic. The nemesis system rules

I knew a orc once. First name Tärz. I thought I'd kill him but Instead he killed me. I found his new place and shamed him. He ambushed me later on and I accidentally killed him with poison. He cheated death and become Tärz the poisoned, I proceeded to shame him when he became deranged. I decided I'd tracked him down and shame him again, when I started searching he ambushed me now babbling like an idiot, that was when I he died of poisoning again. I was bummed as I wanted to shame him. Cut to half hour later and he ambushes me again when in the heat of battle I used his mortal weakness against him and stealth killed him. I thought for sure he was dead and joking thought "if he comes back I'll recruit him and make him my overlord." Wouldn't you believe it he comes back and I do exactly that. What a spectacular game. The amount of awesome stories you get makes the price tag worth it.

I'll never forget the orc that gave me the most trouble. Luuga the Wrestler. And the fact that I can remember his name without fail means the Nemesis System is something we need to see more of.

I’d love an orc to be really obsessed with being your nemesis, but he’s super forgettable and he gets really offended when you don’t remember who he is. Konroc the forgettable

Great usage of Stitch and Maku to explain the procedural generation possibilities of the Nemesis system.

10:52 Even though this was a pre-written and pre-recorded line, you only experienced it as a result of a procedural generation system. And yet it gave me chills like it was a major story moment, because of the connection you conveyed through your telling of your playthrough.

I remember being absolute blown away by shadow of war and being convinced that system would show up in loads of games after that. what you've said about trademarking makes alot of sense and is incredibly frustrating

"Design director Bob Roberts says there's a knob we can turn." Yes, please tell me about the Bob Rob Knob.

I still remember in my original playthrough of Shadow of Mordor, there was this uruk called Zunn Blackheart that would always come and fight me. Zunn and I would exchange battles, sometimes of me killing him and other times the other way around. Zunn would ambush me in the wild, and his body parts being replaced with more machines as the days gone by and of me killing him multiple times. Eventually at the end of the story before I fight the Hand, Zunn fought me for the one last time and I finally cut his head off. What a glorious system, this

I think the epilogue is terribly underrated. Spoilers below: The fact that the story there goes on pretty much infinitely, which you could technically say, until Talion joins the Nazgul, is pretty cool imo. The endless amounts of sieges you can play gives it such a real feeling.

The game really does build a relationship between you and the orcs. When an orc first betrayed me, I shamed him over and over into oblivion out of anger. When my Architect died, I nearly cried. Still miss that bearded old olog wearing a Tudor flat cap.

this system would be sick in a dating sim

The nemesis system is so good that I still remember the name of my rival from the first game and he even showed up in the second game because I played both on PC and it used my save file info. Shout out to Nuruk the Painted and his one shot poison throwing spears. You were the best rival I could ever hope for ✊

One of my favorites from this system was in TearofGrace's videos with the Uruk, Prak Jaws. That guy was an absolute menace and the cherry on top was the game constantly bringing him back all the till the base game's finale. XD

I had absolutely no idea about the nemesis system. I always wanted to play Shadow of Mordor. After watching this, I think it climbed a lot of steps in my wishlist.

The research undertaken for this is as mind boggling as the Nemesis system itself.

"The vast majority of orcs will never cheat death" clearly they never had my gameplay experience

The nemesis system was amazing I wish they hadn't patented it.

I haven't played the shadow series in a long time( i should probably finish it one day) but nothing will ever beat my first play through where I killed an orc who was afraid of bees with bees and have that same orc show up 5 hours later covered in bee stings looking for my head. Magnificent

I can't even imagine the amount of work of the dubbing people to record so many lines for a game!

Ar-Karo: Did you really think killing me would be enough to make me die?

I had a Nemeses Orc that, first time we met, had the trope of being made out of poison. Killed him and then went on. Next THREE times he ambushed me, looked more torn apart each time and stated the beauty of death and poison. Left the area thinking he was dead and when i came back to take the Stronghold, he rose up to be Overlord. In the final battle he defeated me and i was saved by another Orc i recruited. That was the Story that could fill an entire Game. Absolutely stunning what they made with such a (technically) simple idea. Of course, the Orc who saved me was promoted to the new Overlord.

I have met an ork on the very beggining in Minas Ithil. He was enraged by everything which made him hard to kill, hard to posess and he killed me a few times, and vice versa. He kept coming back until I finally got him into my ranks, upgraded him, made him a bodyguard. But the nemesis relation must go on, so he betrayed me, I killed him, and he is yet to be seen again Come back Tuka the survivor I miss you

The cool thing about games like this is they are infinitely replayable and entirely unspoilable.

"You can't have improv when your partner is dead" Well, that got dark.

I got this game for Christmas and have been playing it for two months. Now I’m about to take on the final boss but I’m not ready to do it yet because I’ve had such an amazing adventure playing it!

I love this game and you've definitely helped me appreciate it even further. The complexity and scope is almost impossible to comprehend all at once. Fantastic video and your pacing/editing kept it from getting dry.

The nemesis system is literally 'what doesn't kill you make you stronger'

Storytelling is a powerful thing - I know that because I care immensely about Ar-Karo despite only knowing him as an example of how this stuff works!

It’s great to have long relationships with the other characters and a game that remembers your actions. It’s a pity that so many of the interactions are about negative reactions. How would this look like with positive interactions? Eg teach each other something new, exercise together, organise a party together, listen to each others story.

Ar-Karo's story arc could be an entire book by an author, with him as the main character, and Talion as both his rival and his savior that allowed him to rise to such power.

It sucks that the Nemesis System has only been used in one franchise and nothing else. Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War are some of the best action games I’ve ever played, and at least 1/3 of why is because of the Nemesis System. The closest thing we’ve seen when it comes to replication of this system was the bounty hunter system in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, which was just a lazy husk of what the Nemesis System actually was, and Watch Dogs Legion, which was more of a “playable character” system. Here’s hoping Monolith’s next game continues the Nemesis System cause the system is fantastic.

I wish you talked more about the deranged trait. There’s a sliding scale that pushes the orc afflicted to go more and more crazy. It’s really cool and a bit haunting

Thanks for explaining the Nemesis System in detail, it makes me appreciate the two "Shadow" games even more.

This reminds me of this one Uruk I had: Zathra the Glory Hunter. This Uruk was a pain in my ass, always trying to ambush and murder me. He was a slayer savage with a slayer counterattack trait, so he kinda sucked to fight. When this guy stalked me across regions, I decided I was done with his charade, and I recruited him. This guy was a beast, and easily my favorite Uruk ever. He was my bodyguard, saved me several times from near death, and even brought me gifts. He was even at the head of my assault on the fortress. Obviously, I made the man overlord, but occasionally demoted him to captain just so I could go on more adventures with him. Unfortunately, though, during a fortress invasion, Zathra was downed from a crumbling wall, and I couldn’t reach him in time. My army lost a real one that day.

This game is VERY fun to come back to 4 years later with the market entirely removed.

One of the best systems to ever come out of a AAA game.

I recruited an undead Olog from another player's game. He was absolutely god tier. My undefeated bodyguard and the leader of my armies. UNTIL I was ambushed by one captain while hunting a different captain. They downed me, causing my god tier bodyguard to betray me. My greatest ally who I kind of cheesed to even have in the first place suddenly became the ultimate villain of my whole campaign. I kind of hope someone recruited him from my game as well so his legacy never ends.

This is the video I've wanted to watch for a while. The way the nemesis system works in Shadow of War is the sole reason why I've played through the demo at least three times and the full game once as of now. You can easily sink 100 hours into a playthrough with this system.

You forgot to mention that orcs can kill one of their own, that they think are a spy.

"In the future, entertainment will be randomly generated" -VeggieTales

I had an orc in shadow of war named Narug the merciful. He would always humiliate me but never killed me. He would always run. Finally, after many death threats, I killed him. He was the greatest enemy I’ve ever face and, even though he was fun, I was glad to see him go. Later on, I was walking around my fort and listening to the orcs speak to each other. One of my captains were at a bonfire, I went to see what he wanted to say, after hearing it I left through the gate, but, suddenly enemies appeared out of nowhere and then I saw him, Narug the merciful, still alive and well. I was shocked he was still alive. Swiftly, he killed one of my favourite captains, the one at the fire, he was with me since the beginning and helped me the most during the siege of the fort, cutting his head off so I couldn’t resurrect him. I was saddened but, at the moment, filled with rage and revenge. I attacked fast and hard until I finally got him on his knees, the last word the scum said was “You were lucky, ranger” after all I did, he still didnt respect me. Tbh I was happy when my sword penetrated his heart.

Thanks for just being informative and not trying too hard to sound overly poetic or dramatic like a lot of video essayists ive seen out there.

It’s interesting to think of when AI voice acting is perfected, just how far systems like this could go.

"First, it's important that you can actually remember and distinguish between these different orcs" I reinstalled Shadow of War after going over a year without playing it and my save had been stored on the cloud so it was still available. I was very surprised at how many of the orcs in that save I remembered, even when revisiting starting locations.

Thank you for the excellent, easy to comprehend, and balanced explanation (detailed enough but not overly so).

Now imagine a story from the other side as a Nasgul against the kingdoms of men, elves, and dwarves.

I remember doing the arena mission in shadow of war for my first time. I defeated all the other captains and then HE walked in, Grublik the Immovable. Responsible for dozens of my deaths, has killed my favorite captains on several occasions and has caused me to rage quit Shadow of Mordor entirely. So when he walked into the arena with his spear and shield I, no joke, turned off the game for a day because I knew what was bound to pursue. The next day after hours of trial and error I was finally able to defeat him only for him to cheat death and remain in my game until the final mission against sarron and his army. And this is the reason I love the nemesis system. It can create situations like that and can leave an impact on peoples playthroughs.

Finally got the answer to: "why isn't the nemesis system in more games?" and kinda sad and disappointed about the answer. I hope somehow, someway other game devs find a way around this patent and maybe even make something better or WB let the patent expired. It honestly feels like they stump alil bit of growth in the gaming community. But, I guess we'll have to see.

I love your channel so much. You're one of the only educational youtubers in the gaming category. Keep it up 👍🏼

Just so amazing to listn to your videos while working. Good job! :)

I had an obsessive Ork who fell in love with my dead body and he kept escaping or coming back from the dead so I recruited him and he’d fight alongside of me constantly complimenting me and mentioning how he loves me but wants to kill me

Honestly, Shadow of War is a brilliant game, not just the Nemesis system. The combat is fantastic with how much variety and power its willing to give you, the artdirection is superb and only adds on the style of the movies, and the story is suprisingly emotional at times. The ending is one of the few that ever managed to make me shed a tear.

I’ve replayed the second game at least 5 times. This system is such an underrated feature. Don’t know how they could incorporate it a a game like Batman but for shadows it was epic. Think I’m gonna start a new play through.

Very informative video I keep rewatching it!

The video has been out for a while and I am not sure if anyone will see it, but I just wanted to leave the story of Pushkrimp the "Many Titles" here: Upon entering the fourth zone of the game for the first time I was ambushed by an epic level Uruk named "Pushkrimp the Sickly". His body was swollen and green which gave him a unique look so after beating him with relative ease (he was an archer and not that strong for an epic orc) I shamed him to a lower level so that I could recruit him later. Before I even got to do that he fulfilled a mission, which involved killing some Caragor and became "Pushkrimp the Beast Slayer" complete with a nice animal hat that covered his deformed head. I was quite impressed by his quick recovery from being shamed and recruited him for good. Together we killed and recruited quite a few Captains until I decided that it was time to go after one of the Warchiefs. I obviously wanted to take Pushkrimp, my best follower, with me and sent him to infiltrate. The time for the challenge came and we faced the Warchief and his two bodyguards. Things started out well with Pushkrimp quickly taking care of the first bodyguard, a rather imposing Olog, and executing him with his crossbow. However, when the other two enemies were almost down a third orc (that's another story but the guy is a real bastard, believe me) ambushed me and put me in the ground with his "No Chance" Trait. That stung a bit, but the feast held by the Warchief offered me a chance for revenge. When I finally had him cornered Pushkrimp showed up out of nowhere, and betrayed me at the worst moment, calling out my weakness. In his mind, he had already surpassed me when I died in front of him and now he was his own Uruk again. With some trouble, I managed to fight back until Pushkrimp made an escape. After taking care of the Warchief I started to hunt him down. He had been my best guy and I wanted him back. However, as it turned out his betrayal had given him an iron will, which I had to break first. After numerous encounters, in some of which I had to fail the finishing moves to keep him alive, I got my Pushkrimp back, although he was "The Shamed" now. The orc hunt continued for a time with him at my side and it felt just like before. Unfortunately, the good times came to a brutal halt, when I engaged multiple captains in an ambush. The fighting got really chaotic and at some point, Pushkrimp must have gotten killed. I only realized it when looking at the army screen after the battle and it was quite a shock. I had wanted to make him Overlord at some point to reward him for his help, but now he had just died in a manner that was not spectacular at all, hell, I had not even seen it. Luckily it was not my last meeting with Pushkrimp. When I was about to take down another Warchief he showed up on his Caragor, cheating death and betraying me at the same time, because I had abandoned him on the battlefield and now he wanted revenge. His newly revived self was quite over-leveled and we had our most hard-fought fight yet. In the end, I still succeeded and decided to shame him, because I wanted him back in my ranks. That proved to be a bit much and poor Pushkrimp broke, turning into "the Ruined". For now, I am debating what to do with him: I would really like to make him Overlord, although he won't care anymore. At the same time, I would like to see what kind of nemesis he can become for me if I leave him to continue his hunt. And then there is the option of finally delivering his scarred body and soul the mercy he deserves. He always had a point when he betrayed me after all. Only, I am not sure if I can even kill him at this point...

One of my best experience’s in the game was in the early game before I got the ring of power. I kill some no name orc captain with fire and he becomes “the flame of war” (strong and badass as hell). He proceeds to kick my ass multiple times and becomes overlord. When I finally get the ring of power within the story he is now the overlord of one of the toughest fortresses in the game. So through the entire campaign I have this rival I am set on fighting. Three forts later I fight through his captain’s and war lords, Infiltrate spies into his fortress only to finally face him in a epic duel and defeat him! One of the best gaming experience’s I’ve ever had.

Excellent dissection and analysis of the Nemesis System. I absolutely love SoW and the Nemesis System is of course one of the primary reasons for this affinity. I had no idea it even existed until I started playing the game (I went in with zero expectations). The surprise was amazing.

i've always wanted to try this game, & 18:30 has convinced me to buy it. I am a HUGE fan of compelling procedural stories. I can't wait to play it, get inspired, & get sued for trying to innovate making some inspired indie game 🙃

I was going to type "Unless you decapitate them they can come back." WOW. Just wow.

I remember one of the orcs I fought years ago. His name eludes me, but ‘The Machine’ can never be forgotten. He was ruthless, killing me multiple times early on, and even though I did kill him a few times, he always came back to haunt me… to show me that the machine wasn’t broken… for he could always be fixed after defeat.

I remember getting killed early on by one of the orcs due to his pretty op traits in shadow of Mordor. After a few attempts of trying to kill the orc and his followers he only got stronger. seeing him at the final showdown mission felt really impactful after all of that time in game.

I gotta say, it was pretty brilliant how, in a video discussing the way the nemesis system creates stories, you use the stories created to make ongoing stories in the video and keep viewers engaged. Halfway through, I was like "damn that Maku, I gotta see how he takes him down now," and then it hit me

This reminds me, I had a nemesis named Krosh the Machine. The man always came back, he came back five times before I cut off his head and he was dead for good. Then in a later mission, a necromancer revives all your dead nemesises as weak zombies and when I ran into Krosh, instead of the usual zombie gargling, he just. Stared, while the music got more and more intense.

I saw this video last year February. And I am rewatching it now because it inspired me to play Shadow of Mordor again. In fact I just beat the game several minutes ago. I last played it in 2015, got bored and moved on to another game. Man was I missing an experience, the game was good, not part of my favorites but it was enjoyable. Dominating captains, sneaking and stealthing, you name it. Because back then I wasn't used to games where you needed to strategize, I just went in, tried to hit the captain and failed so I stopped playing because I just wanted the mindless mouse clicking while pawning the enemies. Time to move on to Shadow of War after finishing the Shadow of Mordor DLC's!

I have two stories about SoW to tell. One, of my nemesis in SoM. I killed him THREE TIMES and he kept coming back- and he even came back *after£ the scripted nemesis fight in SoW. The second, an Olog who killed me and broke my sword. I hunted him and shamed him over and over and over until he was level 1, and never let him even introduce himself. When I finally killed him? ‘I broke your toy. I guess it really got to you’

The personality of the orcs is probably my favorite part of this system. I love the dichotomy between those orcs that bring a smile to your face with their ridiculous antics, who you can't help but feel proud of when they kill other orcs and ascend the hierarchy, and the orcs who have you swearing up a storm every time they appear or even are referenced, acting as an aggravating stain on the world that you just can't seem to be rid of. It's great.

my favorite part about the nemesis system is the fact that anyone can become a captain, so some insignificant uruk soldier you bump into on your travels somehow kills you, becomes a captain and can become it's own story

Awesome and informative video! I only played these games for a short while on the Ps4, but I totally want to revisit them now! Subscribed! 🙌

I was hoping you made a video on this topic

I never played these games, but all I heard was "Yeah, the Nemesis system is pretty cool." I would've never thought that it's actually this deep, dynamic and well executed. The amount of voice-overs that must've been made for this is just incredible. It seem very underappreciated.

I would fucking love a similar system to this in a Pokemon game where trainers can become actual rivals rather than the often poorly written, non-engaging rivals currently used in the mainline Pokemon games! Fantastic video btw!

Your videos are juste great, interesting subjects, good storytelling and well told ! New subscription ! And a hi from france !

Great video. I knew it was a good system, but i didn't realise how nuanced it is. I could see this integrated with Ai NPCs.

Up until this day, I never knew there was an interaction in which the orc breaks your sword and you lose it!!! This is such a cool detail, quite a marvel. Like this video! Keep it up, I'm loving these!

I had two Nemesis Orcs that were blood brothers that kept saving each other and kicking my butt so I recruited both of them and ended up making them both really strong teammates of mine and they were my best friends because they saved me alot, miss those guys, I’ll always remember you Bûr and Gûrshu

That was beautifully executed sir. Having not played the game but curious how it worked this has certainly pushed me over the edge and eager to make some orc nemesis 😅

I LOVED the ‘Shadow Of’ games. The lore. The music. The gameplay. All of it - going to play it again, thanks. 🙏

Is there a place where one could find a list of patented gameplay mechanics? I've heard of a few, but only from scattered sources. It would be nice to have a list of them, if only to know what mechanics to legally avoid.

That ending, it must be heartbreaking when the orc that adventured together with you suddenly betrays you and you have to put them down for good :(

such a brilliant concept that was fully realized and executed properly within the game! it definitely made this super fun and re-playable.

a youtuber created a ork named bagga and had him rise to overlord so he could raid his fort and recruit him, this created a huge thing in the comunity and bagga became number one, also there was a ork named metal face who my big brother found who never died and most famous line was "i`ll show you how to really kill someone" and had a metal mask and he never came back with any scars