Tolkien in General

R:A, well as long as your sister can read what she likes at home, she will be able to let her imagination wander through Middle Earth like you do, encourage her to read LOTR and tell her not to believe the rubbish pedalled at her school, thats what older brothers are for.

I really want her to read the Hobbit before the film comes out, so she'll be able to have her imagination to guide her instead of the film.

If she still hasn't read it as the film release draws near best tie her to a chair and read it to her- might seem harsh but its nowhere near as harsh as letting PJ ruin her imagined vision of the Hobbit for life.

It may come to that
Nah but seriously, She's still got all summer. Hopefully the trailers don't start airing on tv that early

It's sad to think of a generation who will only know the films....

It could be worse. What if a Hobbit video game came out before the movie?

halfwise wrote:It could be worse. What if a Hobbit video game came out before the movie?

I don't know if you're being ironic & hip but the video game always comes out before any blockbuster film?!?! Luckily for everyone concerned, I think the tie-in video game for The Hobbit is lego based so there's probably no reason to ever read The Hobbit ever again! Damn, gotta love that craaazy lego! Lego 4 eva! (Okay, I'm going now... )

LEGO LotR's is on the way- its tongue in chhek approach is perfect for PJ;s material which was a joke to start with.

Ally wrote:

halfwise wrote:It could be worse. What if a Hobbit video game came out before the movie?

I don't know if you're being ironic & hip but the video game always comes out before any blockbuster film?!?! Luckily for everyone concerned, I think the tie-in video game for The Hobbit is lego based so there's probably no reason to ever read The Hobbit ever again! Damn, gotta love that craaazy lego! Lego 4 eva! (Okay, I'm going now... )

In other words....it's worse.

I kind of think this lego business is silly, but I want it. c'mon. I want a LEGOlas!

You guys haven't heard about the Guardians of Middle Earth yet, have you? Google it. The trailer is like if Street Fighter met Lord of the Rings; it's a fan fiction writer's dream come true. I mean the game hasn't even come out yet and I hate. Warner Bros recently got the rights to video game based on lord of the rings and they are not hesitating to shell these games out.
Just last November they released War in the North: another Lord of the Rings game. It was a neat concept with a lot of references only fans would understand, but the story itself was a bad fanfic. It had Orc mages. Yes Orc mages. And goblins with "blasting powder" as the Gimli clone in the game called it.
Financially it was a failure and instead taking that as a sign to stick to the lore or to take some more development time, Warner Bros just releases another game the following year.
Warner Bros is really trying to drive the Lord of the Rings IP into the gutter by giving us these throw away games each year.

War in the North has great coop if you've ever tried it! Otherwise, yes, it is just a action hack and slash with a bit of rp thrown in. As hack and slash games go its brilliant due to the graphics and ME lore that's included, but the story/combat gameplay is nothing special.



Still, its like skyrim when compared to Aragorn's Quest

I agree R.A, I really dont like the idea of classics of literature being turned into blast em games. I dont get the attraction in seeing your favourite characters being sullied and cheapened in this way. ((((call me old fashioned, I dont care!))))

I think Warner Bros sees the appeal in the huge profits they make off games which only share the same name as Lord of the Rings. The style of games they make is pretty interchangeable. I don't want to see Super Smash Bros Middle Earth edition.(By the way Super Smash Bros is awesome).

Also, just about anything is Skyrim in comparison to Aragorn's Quest

Recoveryanonymous wrote:I think Warner Bros sees the appeal in the huge profits they make off games which only share the same name as Lord of the Rings. The style of games they make is pretty interchangeable. I don't want to see Super Smash Bros Middle Earth edition.(By the way Super Smash Bros is awesome).

Also, just about anything is Skyrim in comparison to Aragorn's Quest

As a kids game AQ was fine (it's just Lord of the Rings probably isn't for kids!) The most disappointing thing about War in the North is that it had the pontenial to be more than a sword slashing game tinged with magic. The locations and the graphics were hindered by the linear (you could only travel to certain locations dependent on how far you were along the story) nature of the game which meant the side quests were phenomenally dull and easy to complete along the way. But if you love the films there are a few really neat touches (it also sets up the The Hobbit in Rivendell and you see Bilbo which was really neat!)

The sad thing is that they were making an open expansive RP LOTR game for console (White Council or something wasn't it?) which got axed by EA before they lost the rights. That could have been a great game. But we'll never know.

Have heard of a mod in the works known as Skyrim Merp
A mod for Skyrim that will recreate Middle Earth in a map 9 times the size of Skyrim's map. Rohan is already almost finished.

All new weapons and armor. Very diverse too. No magic. No enchanting. Everything is based on Tolkien's vision of Middle Earth. It's going to be very interesting if all goes according to plan.

It is kinda sad that Ea decided to axe the White Council in favor of Lord of the Rings Conquest. I stand by my opinion that Conquest is the worst Lord of the Ring related product ever. War in the North felt like a game made as a movie tie-in. Linear story and level design as well as pointless tie-ins to the Fellowship. Why were the three protagonists together? The game just started out with three together for no reason other than to draw a parallel with the fellowship. Which trivializes the whole concept of the alliance between dwarves, elves and men. Plus the story is bad fanfiction; where's Nordinbad? What's Nordinbad and more importantly why make such a place up at all?
All are tall tale signs of low quality of writing. It's sad because like you said, there was a lot of potential with that game.

I'm also a little bitter about it because in anticipation for the game, I went and bought the limited collector's edition for twice the price of the standard edition of the game. It came with a quiver, concept art, behind scenes look at the music, dashboard wallpaper, exclusive armor dlc and a nice roll-up map of Middle Earth with Snowblind's own additions such as Nordinbad and Urgost's lair.

Recoveryanonymous wrote:Have heard of a mod in the works known as Skyrim Merp
A mod for Skyrim that will recreate Middle Earth in a map 9 times the size of Skyrim's map. Rohan is already almost finished.

All new weapons and armor. Very diverse too. No magic. No enchanting. Everything is based on Tolkien's vision of Middle Earth. It's going to be very interesting if all goes according to plan.

It is kinda sad that Ea decided to axe the White Council in favor of Lord of the Rings Conquest. I stand by my opinion that Conquest is the worst Lord of the Ring related product ever. War in the North felt like a game made as a movie tie-in. Linear story and level design as well as pointless tie-ins to the Fellowship. Why were the three protagonists together? The game just started out with three together for no reason other than to draw a parallel with the fellowship. Which trivializes the whole concept of the alliance between dwarves, elves and men. Plus the story is bad fanfiction; where's Nordinbad? What's Nordinbad and more importantly why make such a place up at all?
All are tall tale signs of low quality of writing. It's sad because like you said, there was a lot of potential with that game.

That sounds awesome! I remember a few LOTR mod floating around for Morrowind but I never had the whereabouts to get them up and running at the time. I looked about a few years ago to see how it went and they created a few nice items and side quests and a ton of weapons, and a fully functional Isengard and Misty Mountains! But sadly that was about it, and the main quest had so many errors it completely ruined my game and I had to a complete reinstall. Oblivion also had a Middle Earth mod (never used) do you know if it's by the same developers?

Hopefully with the hype that Skyrim has received is a plus for the modding community and yes, it could be a very interesting project! Conquest is pretty awful, played through it in a night. Would make a decent party game though! Voice overs were poor, horrible gameplay. Would have had potential as a decent Battlefieldesque game, but who cares! Money! I think I'll forgive WB (it's a playable game for me) for those valid flaws and hope that they finally make some great LOTR videogames!

I still have a soft spot for the hack-and-slash games that EA made to tie in with the movie releases. They're largely button-mashing games but they're a fairly faithful reproduction of the movie setting. They also have lots of clips from the movies as well as the original actors doing voice work for the games. Still, I realize that I mostly like them for nostalgia; I'm not much of a gamer but they were one of the few games I owned when I was a kid and they were my introduction to the world of Tolkien (believe it or not! ).

Eldorion wrote:I still have a soft spot for the hack-and-slash games that EA made to tie in with the movie releases. They're largely button-mashing games but they're a fairly faithful reproduction of the movie setting. They also have lots of clips from the movies as well as the original actors doing voice work for the games. Still, I realize that I mostly like them for nostalgia; I'm not much of a gamer but they were one of the few games I owned when I was a kid and they were my introduction to the world of Tolkien (believe it or not! ).

I remember reading that on your blog! Return of the King for PS2 was one of the first games I played for that console (got it a few years after so it was a bit dated) but it does have a really satisfying feel to it- especially killing orcs at the southern gate- if only because it was the easier level!

It's by the same team, yes. The creation kit released by Bethesda has allowed them to make so much progress, it's impressive. You should check out their page, they have a lot of screenshots of their work uploaded. Google: Skyrim Merp.

I went ahead and watched the trailer for Guardians of Middle-earth since RA mentioned it but I still can't believe that this is a real thing. It's just such a terrible idea in every way that I don't know where to begin.



I will wait to buy the inevitable crossover fighting games. Marvel vs. Tolkien! Tolkien vs. Capcom! Hell yes.

Gollum vs Gandalf.
If that is not the most one sided fight I've ever seen, I don't what is.

To be fair it is marketed as an arcade game for XBL/PSN and at a reasonable price it could be a decent pvp game. Still would rather prefer a decent LOTR rpg or BFME3. I'm guessing that this won't be the only game that they're gunna cash in with the Hobbit- if you're running out of ideas WB, call me maybe! I have loads!!

Recoveryanonymous wrote:It's by the same team, yes. The creation kit released by Bethesda has allowed them to make so much progress, it's impressive. You should check out their page, they have a lot of screenshots of their work uploaded. Google: Skyrim Merp.

Just watched a few videos on youtube and it does look really good. Hopefully they'll create a more complete LOTR mod for Skyrim than ever before, sadly I've seen more than a few projects fall away as intrest in the game and community fails. Hopefully Skyrim will stay as big as it is and now with this emergence in ME with these Hobbit films the future looks rosy!