Middle-earth, Third Age, an age of darkness looms over the world. The Dark Lord Sauron prepares for war, for the One Ring has been found. The Lord of the Rings is the foundational work of epic fantasy, a novel written by JRR Tolkien that hasn’t passed through video games, though not always with good fortune. Stripped of the bad drink of The Lord of the Rings: Gollum, Remember The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the Kinga fantastic action game that is crying out for a remastered version.
Games based on movies have not always enjoyed quality, since developers have to adapt their calendar to the release of the film in question. Electronic Arts and EA Redwood Shores—later renamed Visceral Games, the original creators of Dead Space— they were smart when it came to choosing the genre of the video game. They could have created an RPG experience or a deep adventure, but they preferred to go for something more condensed, a quality action game that could be realized in the required time frame.
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The Return of the King improves everything on its predecessor, The Two Towers. Designed for PlayStation 2, Xbox and GameCube, the game allows us to embody several different characters. As in the movie and in the novel, the Fellowship of the Ring is separate, so the characters walk different paths: The Path of the Wizard puts us in the shoes of Gandalf, while the Path of the King lets us manage Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli during their journey through Middle-earth. In The Path of the Hobbits, Frodo and Sam head to Mount Doom. Likewise, it can be enjoyed cooperatively for up to two players.
The work of EA Redwood recreate the great battles of The Return of the King and merges scenes from the game with those from the Peter Jackson film. For the time, the graphics were quite amazing, as they perfectly captured the essence and atmosphere of the product on which it was based. Howard Shore’s epic soundtrack gives it unparalleled sound packaging, not to mention the voices of the film’s own actors.
In the playable, the title works like a hack and slash, with great variety of characters and movements. The progression system includes the ability to purchase new combos, abilities, and upgrades. On the other hand, the game comes with numerous extras, also about the movie.
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why play it
- A very competent and fun hack and slash.
- Different paths, different characters, different perspectives.
- It’s like living the movie.
- A great audiovisual section, which fuses cinema and video games.
- It has cooperative mode for 2 players.
Unfortunately, The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King is only available on the original platforms (PS2, Xbox, GameCube and PC), it is not even backward compatible on Xbox consoles. Will there be a remaster? It is possible that the question of rights is the great barrier for this to happen, but more unlikely things have happened in this industry.
