Game Review: LEGO The Lord of the Rings

LEGO The Lord of the Rings is another video game that has eluded for a long period of time.  Developed by Traveller’s Tales and published by Warner Brothers Interactive, the game was released across most mainline seventh generation consoles.  While Traveller’s Tales were no stranger to adapting movie franchises into their LEGO adventure format, LEGO The Lord of the Rings marked the first time the developer utilized dialogue from the movies as part of their in-game cinematics to help portray the narrative of the three Lord of the Rings movies.  While not much is really known about the games sales, it's worth recognizing the game was well received upon release, generating rather favourable 80 average on Metacritic. 

The narrative of this title is adapted from the stories of Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy, that includes The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King. In the fantasy world of Middle Earth, it is the Third Age and a darkness crawls over the land, cast from a shadow from the eastern lands of Mordor.  The One Ring of Power has been at last found and it calls out to it’s dark master Lord Sauron.  An alliance of men, elves, dwarfs and hobbits is formed with the task of couriering the ring back into Mordor so it may be cast into the lava pits of Mt Doom and destroyed. The journey this fellowship must take is fraught with danger however, and there will be many a peril the group will face on their journey. 

A lot of the narrative behind this game is based on the media it’s adapting. The game faithfully recreates and follows a lot of the major cues from the motion pictures which in turn is adapted from the original books by J.R.R Tolkien.  It’s a fantastic story in its own right and it’s nice to see Traveller’s Tales recreate all the best elements of it faithfully.  They also work to inject the cinematics with their trademark sense of humour too.  This for me however introduces a minor issue which Traveller’s Tales faced when adapting a lot of already established movies into LEGO games.  With prior LEGO adventure games, because there was no dialogue, the developers worked extra hard to portray the story in the game with their own humour intertwined.  In LEGO The Lord of the Rings case, because it’s portraying a lot of already established scenes and utilizing pre-recorded dialogue from the movies, it struggles to inject its humour throughout the course of the game consistently. What trademark humour is here is funny, it’s presence just feels diluted in comparison to other LEGO games.

The games major gameplay is pretty identical in formula to other LEGO games, you’ll be playing a selection of characters from the movies in a fixed-camera, third person perspective.  Each of the three movies are represented in six individual levels, totaling 18 levels fully by the games end.  Each of these levels are constructed in a way to require you to use your characters unique abilities to overcome obstacles and progress further.  It’s all standard and recognizable LEGO adventure stuff and it fits nicely within the well-constructed levels Traveller’s Tales have inserted here.  To add a unique spin on the formula here however, an equipment slot is introduced in which characters can collect and store unique items they may require to solve puzzles or progress further in a level.  It’s a nice little concept that gives you more room to think about how to solve an obstacle than your typical LEGO experience.  It does however come off as cumbersome in terms of its implementation at times and I can see why this feature didn’t really come to be a main-stay in future LEGO games.

Part of the fun of these games comes in returning to already completed levels and playing them with different characters. Each level holds in it secrets which can only often be obtained by using a character with a unique ability not found in the standard format of the level.  Again, it’s all typical LEGO stuff but I do have to question the viability of this when you consider the equipment slot. You’ll be able to unlock equipment which allows you to emulate abilities of certain character which in essence means you don’t necessarily require them if you can just pull out the tool you need in that moment.  I for one much more prefer the idea of using a character to overcome an obstacle rather than a piece of equipment.  The whole point of LEGO games is unlocking more characters and utilizing their abilities right? I just feel Traveller's Tales didn’t consider the viability of the equipment slot and the impact it would have on other traditional features. The levels are only one piece of the pie however, the open-world element is the other.  I do adore how well-constructed the world of Middle Earth is in this game.  Obviously it’s not a 1:1 replica of the Middle Earth from the movies, but it does a fantastic job representing a lot of key locations and mapping them out appropriately.  Exploring each location while the trademark score from Howard Shore plays in the background made for the most enjoyable element of the game for me.  Every area is littered with its own secrets and characters to unlock and I had a lot of fun utilizing different characters to overcome everything.

From a visual end, LEGO The Lord of Rings does a commendable job rendering Peter Jackson’s interpretation of this story.  All of the LEGO minifigures easily capture the likeness of the characters they are based on and the LEGO builds of the famous architecture from the movies is so fun to behold.  This was built on the newer internal engine at the time which allowed the team to really push the capability of their rendering and motion graphics.  From an audio end, I can’t really afford Traveller's Tale much credit when you consider all the dialogue and score is taken directly from the movies it’s adapting.  Again, Howard Shore’s score is beyond amazing and its inclusion in this game makes it all the more memorable to play through.

LEGO Lord of the Rings on the whole is another fine addition to the legendary library of LEGO games from Traveller’s Tales.  I think when it comes to capturing the essence of the films and recreating them in the LEGO format, Traveller’s Tales do a fantastic job on that front.  I do however feel it’s important to highlight what holds the game back however.  I never really took to the equipment slot’s implementation in this game and I feel the choice to use solely movie dialogue to portray the games narrative limits the creative scope behind the humour we have come to expect from these games.  Its flaws don’t weigh the game down all that much though all things considered. If you like me, love anything to do with The Lord of the Rings, this game will reward your appreciation for this world considerably