Review by George Bailey
Return of the King is the follow up to the much-liked Lord of the Rings, The Twin Towers, movie franchise game of 2002. Rarely are movie to game products good and the Twin Towers was a cut above the all of the rest. It featured hack and slash game play, lush graphics, voice talent of the original actors from the movie, battles and scenes from the first two movies, and the excellent Lord of the Rings sound track. It was a fun game to play and featured a great
twist--morphing original movie clips into game graphics. The best part was if you loved the movie (and I did) it put you into the heart of the action, which is the many battles that need to be fought. The Balin's Tomb battle was something to be seen and experienced as it completely replicated the action in the movie, besides the interior of the tomb itself. It was a great moment in gaming.
Return of the King follows in the same easy style of game play and presentation.
Playing It
This year's Return of the King is more of the same only the difficulty level has been ramped up. Here you start out with three paths to battle through. One with Gandalf, one with the Three Amigos: Aragorn,
Gimli and Legolas, and the final path with Frodo and Sam on their quest to Mount Doom to destroy the Ring of Power. All of the paths are displayed on a chart on a wall, which appears to be in Minis Tirith. You start out by clicking a path and fighting your way through. You can twitch back and forth between paths, so if you get tired of one you can play the other.
As you go along you get points for kills, which you use later after you have completed a level to buy upgrades. These upgrades can be can be anything from more health, to special powers, to new combo moves for more proficient Orc slaying.
Combat is the name of the game and everybody gets to fight. In the path of the Hobbits Sam will do the majority of the fighting. Surprisingly, I found it fun to play Sam. He can be an Orc bashing dynamo! Gandalf has the best attack with a lighted, plasma burst from his staff. True, not seen in the movie but great for dispatching Orcs from a distance. Gandalf also has a neat powered-up move where he brings his staff down hard and it sends out a shock wave that sends enemies reeling.
He's not bad with a sword either. Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas each have their own strengths and weaknesses but together, represent a formable group. All have ranged attacks from arrows to axes to knives.
Actually, I found the pacing of the levels to be a bit off and not as well implemented as in Twin Towers. Checkpoints are few and far between, and some levels ramble on forever. Since they have ramped up the hardness level, checkpoints should be more liberally placed about. You go through a two or three grueling fights just to get killed off and have to back go through it all over again--it'll raise your aggravation level. You can get through it but it's tough even in the easy mode.
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It Looks Good!
The graphical styling and engine is directly from Twin Towers. The landscapes are huge and intricately detailed. The foliage, rocks, lighting, explosions, and atmosphere are excellent and beautifully rendered. I was impressed and then not impressed. Everything has been upgraded from the original, but only slightly it seems. I don't think you'll see much of a difference between the two, should you have not played the original Twin Towers game and would like to.
One noticeable change is the size of the characters on-screen. In Twin Towers, they were adequately sized in relationship to the environment and interaction with other characters and enemies. In
Return of the King, the camera zooms in and out and sometimes the characters get quite small. (Odd. Why upgrade the character models just to shrink them down in size so the new details can be barely seen? ) Sometimes the good guys get lost in the action when you have dozens of Orcs and so forth running and fighting about. Other times, smoke or falling rocks can obscure the view and you get into trouble quick.
You should never loose a character that is under your control in the heat of battle. This was obviously not a very polished part of the game
What happened in the cut scenes? In the Two Towers when the characters talked in the cut scenes, their mouths moved. Not so in Return of the King. Apparently this part of the game was rushed in the completion process.
On the other hand, it's a great looking game. The animations of every living thing in the game are very realistic and look very sophisticated. Hack an Orc and he'll fall and die realistically. So will your comrades should they fall in battle. The frame rate is rock solid, although I find some rare places with some slow down. Fortunately, I never saw that happening in the midst of a chaotic battle, of which there are many.
Sound
Well, they are after all, using the excellent Howard Shore score from the movie. So you know that's good! The voices are from the actors themselves and the sound effects are almost identical to the ones found in the movie. So the look and feel of the movies even in the sound department is very good.
In Parting…
Return of the King gives you the feel of playing the movie…well the battles of the movies. If you are a fan of movie it's a great game to have to extend your enjoyment of it. I do feel it is a harder game to play than the Twin Towers but worth it when you get though it. Return of the King features lots of nice extras and Orc bashing to keep a
Middle-earther happy. You do get to do some new stuff, like getting to move levers and roll rocks and other objects off of cliffs or walls, but it's essentially the same game gussied up a bit. I recommend you get the Twin Towers game as well to fill out your Fellowship of the Ring gaming needs for the present. Well…till the next LOTR game comes out.
4/5
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