Middle-earth: Shadow of War is shaping up to be superior to its predecessor in every way. While Shadow of Mordor received great reviews, its end-game was more-or-less, the end. You could fight more Orcs, but there wasn't much to actually do. But Shadow of War is adding something to keep players engaged after the story is 'over'.
It's called Shadow Wars. It's a mission type that plays like a mini campaign. It takes place after the story where Talion has taken over all of Mordor. In Shadow Wars, Sauron's army launches a counter assault against the player. Essentially, while the campaign was Talion taking over various fortresses, Shadow Wars is the enemy trying to take them back.
Shadow Wars is basically the campaign, but swapped, in terms of gameplay. Succeeding keeps the fortress under your control. Losing it means you have to take it back in order to advance the Shadow Wars mini campaign. There may even be additional missions sprung from a mission failure where Talion has to rescue the previous Overlord you had installed before Sauron's army took the fortress.
The main campaign has a narrative ending. It will apparently tie loose ends in what would be an acceptable way. Shadow Wars will have an additional true ending that will apparently tie Shadow of War directly into the Lord of the Rings series. It's been known that Talion's story takes place between The Hobbit and somewhere in The Fellowship of the Ring. Will we finally get to see the connective tissue?
Middle-earth: Shadow of War has been highly anticipated since its reveal last year. While very much a single-player game, Monolith has announced a competitive mode where players can attack other player's fortresses in their world without being intrusive to the gameplay and story. They received some pretty negative feedback on their announcement of microtransactions, however.
