Monolith's innovative Nemesis system was born out of a response to the way players resold one of WB Games' best-selling titles

March 24, 2025 | 03:46am

How GameStop And Used Games Inspired Shadow Of Mordor's Nemesis System

Monolith's innovative Nemesis system was born out of a response to the way players resold one of WB Games' best-selling titles

Fryer went on to explain that this push was behind the Catwoman DLC in Batman: Arkham City that could only be activated by the initial owner of the game. However, Monolith went its own way to retain players by coming up with the Nemesis system.

"With [Shadow of Mordor] we faced the same problem," recalled Fryer. "How do we create a single player game that is so compelling that people keep the disc in their library forever? We knew Monolith's game engine wasn't yet capable of having a fully open world like a GTA and this team wasn't interested in going the multiplayer route, but we still had to solve for the constraint. And this thinking is what led to the Nemesis system--arguably one of the most creative and coolest game features in recent memory."

The prevailing idea at the time was that players would be reluctant to part with their personal nemeses from Shadow of Mordor. That was also why Shadow of War allowed players to import some of their nemeses from the first game. Both of those games were successful, but perhaps not to the extent that they prevented players from reselling their titles. However, the proliferation of digital games, which can't be sold, has put a significant dent in the secondhand games market.

Prior to being shut down, Monolith was working on a Wonder Woman game that would have utilized the Nemesis system for the title character as she befriended NPCs. The game was canceled with Monolith's closure, and the Nemesis system itself is under patent protection until 2036. Theoretically, WB could license out the Nemesis system to another developer. But that has yet to happen.

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