The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-earth

"If you love Lord of the Rings and RTS games then buy this!"

The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle Earth is a fantastic RTS game set during the time of the War of the Ring in the Third age. The object of the game is simple. It has you controlling the armies of Gondor, Rohan, Isengard and Mordor to wage all out war against each other.

Gameplay 10/10
Like any RTS TBFME has you starting in a castle or home base and you must build and upgrade your troops to victory. All of the soldiers and heroes are from the Lord of the Rings. The game is easy for any beginner because the castle starts off with many little circles around them. Click on these circles and it tells you what you can build. No little hassles about workers. Each faction has its strong and weak points. Gondor has got very good defenses and castles and also has the best upgrades for their soldiers with the exception of Isengard. Isengard has the best troop and siege weapons. Rohan are the best for cavalry and heroes while Mordor is the strongest faction with huge monsters and the ability to get powerful very quickly. The game has some flaws though. Gondor and Rohan, the 2 good factions are the only factions allowed walls while the 2 evil factions cannot. In my opinion Isengard, not Rohan should be able to have walls because Rohan is the home of the horse lords and they are best on the open plains, not in castles while Isengard have great building capabilities. Also it would make the game a bit fairer.

There are 4 things you can do in TBFME. There are 2 different campaigns, the good campaign and the evil campaign. The good campaign has you fighting as the fellowship, Rohan and Gondor against Isengard, Mordor and the goblins. Some of the levels you can only play as the fellowship like in the Mines of Moria, while others have members of the fellowship with armies of men against other armies like Helms Deep. After each battle you win you get taken to the world map where you choose an army and choose a land to attack or defend. Each time you win a battle you either get a bonus in population limit, resources of power points. Power points are used to buy special powers to help you, such as call in some battalions of elves to fight for you. The Evil Campaign is pretty much the same with evil armies except you don't get to do any levels like the fellowship only ones.

The 2 other options you can do are multiplayer and skirmish. Skirmishes are battles against computer controlled opponents where you fight on maps to achieve victory. You may have teams as well. A cool extra added is that it does not always be evil vs. good. You can have good teams vs. other good teams or evil teams joining up with good teams in team battles. Multiplayer is just skirmishing but online against other people.

Graphics and Sound 10/10
The music and sound effects are great. The music is from the LOTR movies and all the voice-overs are done very well. Most of the actors/actresses did their own characters. The graphics are great, it all looks terrific and nothing looks out of place from the LOTR universe.

Overall 10/10
I love this game. It has everything a LOTR fan could want in an RTS and recommend buying it if you love Lord of the Rings.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 01/13/09

Game Release: The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-earth (US, 12/06/04)