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

"LotR Fans Will Be In Heaven, Everyone Else… Not So Much"

Back when the Lord of the Rings movies started their mind bogglingly fast ascent to popularity, EA acquired the rights to all licensed video games, no doubt by paying an equally mind boggling amount of money. And say what you will about EA, but they sure are intent on getting the most out of their money because there has been no end to the deluge of Lord of the Rings inspired titles. As was to be expected, there were highs, there were lows and there was garbage EA just kicked out the door for an easy buck.

Battle for Middle-Earth lies somewhere in the middle. It is most definitely not going to be hailed as a great real time strategy game by anyone who has any experience with the genre, but it isn't the bottom of the barrel garbage we've seen before. All in all, Battle for Middle-Earth makes good use of the license, by allowing players to choose either the good or evil side and take the respective army to victory over the entirety of Middle-Earth. Unfortunately the actual gameplay is distinctly average in most regards and has some very unfortunate mishaps that significantly detract from its overall fun value.

But anyone who comes into the game expecting a rehash of the movies may be in for a shocking surprise as the game has a very revisionist take on the franchise lore (but the very presence of an evil campaign should be a good indicator of that). In the good campaign, players will start out guiding the Fellowship through the Mines of Moria where Gandalf will once again face off against the fearsome Balrog. But this time around it's about a quarter the size and Gandalf kills it in close-combat without the famous “You shall not pass!” line (or the self-sacrifice). The real LotR fans (and I do not consider myself one by any measure) will notice all sorts of deviations from the source material and the reaction of these changes will probably be determined by the level of fanboyism inherent in each individual. From a non-fan's point of view, it makes things more interesting as the game has some interesting twists up its sleeve which makes the whole thing a little less predictable. As for the evil campaign, players will command the armies of Isengard and Mordor as they march across Middle-Earth, slaying the armies of Rohan, Ents and those wussy tree-hugging Elves.

Fans of the real time strategy genre might find Battle for Middle-Earth to be too simplistic a game, especially if they're among the legions who cut their teeth on the finely honed precision of Blizzard developed strategy games. Simplistic it might be, but it does add several interesting aspects and tweaks that work to varying degrees.

The most noticeable, and praiseworthy, of these is the non-linear campaigns. After choosing which side to take, players will shown an immense bird's eye view of the whole of Middle-Earth, complete with renderings of Isengard, Mordor and the Shire. The map itself is divided into distinct territories that can be conquered. As the commander of either good or evil, you can move your armies into each area and conquer it. However there is a bit of strategy involved in this as each territory has unique bonuses that conquering it will provide. Some bestow extra command points (basically a unit cap), increased resource acquisition rates or skill points. Once you decide what territory to invade, the game then zooms in and moves to a more typical RTS format.

Another is with the One Ring/Evenstar. Depending on which side players take, they'll have access to a menu that operates much like a tech tree, but grants spells and passive bonuses. To get one of these powers, players have to earn skill points by completing missions and taking over certain territory. As spells are unlocked, the point requirements increase until reaching the ultimate spell. For the good guys, it's the ability to summon the Army of the Dead and for the bad guys it's the ability to summon a Balrog. Schwing!

Once again, there are a few interesting tweaks to the staid RTS formula. The first of these involves base building. Unlike most strategy games which allow players to build a base that sprawls out in all directions, Battle for Middle-Earth uses a more restrictive setup. Each base is confined to a circle that has nodes in it. On each of these nodes, a building can be erected to serve the functions of the base. Around the perimeter of the base, other nodes are present solely for the purpose of building defensive towers. While this might sound as if it limits players options, it really isn't as aggravating as it sounds simply because there isn't a huge number of buildings players need. Basically a barracks, an armory for upgrades and resource buildings are all that is needed to get an army up and running, and indeed most units can be built from this basic setup (not to mention the game has a very small number of unit types for any given army).

Resource gathering is one area that usually slows a RTS game down to a crawl, and thankfully it is most automated here. By erecting a certain sort of building, such as a farm or slaughterhouse, a base will begin to generate a generic form of resource on a regular interval. Build more and you'll gather more resource. This generic resource is then used to build more buildings and create units for the army.

From here, Battle for Middle-Earth really takes a nosedive. Command points vary from army to army but regardless of how many you've got it never feels like enough. Units cost lots of resource and take up ridiculous amounts of command points (usually twenty for a baseline unit). The build times for units are also unusually long. However, these particular problems are somewhat alleviated by the fact that units are built in squads rather than as singular units. This means you can build up what looks like an impressive army in a relatively short amount of time. But when you send them off to war the game really shows its bad side.

One of the first things that might catch your eye when trying to organize an assault is that there is no unit information bar at the bottom of the screen. Though this unusual break with convention might not sound like much, it actually ends up posing a significant problem. Because of this players are left in the dark as to how many soldiers are left in any particular squad, what their overall health is and what unit types are actually selected. But in the end this is actually one of the games lesser problems. Once the army actually makes it to a fight the problems really start to pile up.

For one the intellect of units is highly suspect. In fact, I hadn't been playing the game for five minutes when I found myself musing, “Wow, these guys are really stupid”. Units will mill around and not take action even when they're being fired upon by archers and sometimes will hang back and let themselves be killed even if you directly order them to attack. This has a tendency to lead to a lot of unnecessary casualties, especially given the weakness of each individual unit, which brings up another frustrating issue. Due to the game focusing on squads, having half a squad killed effectively negates any use it will have later down the road. A simple fix to this would have been being able to expend a small amount of resources to bring a squad back up to full strength, much like Dawn of War.

If you can keep them alive until the end of the mission, players can carry over all surviving squadrons into the next mission. You can also rename these squadrons for an added personal touch. I have to admit, this is an absolutely stellar idea that really reflects the idea that you're commanding a true, consistent army and that those who survive carry on the fight.

But keeping them alive is truly a challenge. If their idiotic AI doesn't get them killed, you'll have to contend with some serious balancing issues in regards to unit types. Namely, there are a few overpowered unit types that are basically capable of wiping an entire army of the map with ease. The most common of these is the Rohan, the majority of whose force is made up of cavalry. The problem with cavalry is that they can sweep through enemy squads like a hot knife through butter, instantly killing entire waves of soldiers without suffering a single casualty. To illustrate just how maddeningly effective they are, I once carried over eight archer squads with the fire arrow upgrade from the previous mission. A couple of Rohan cavalry squads showed up and killed them all. The real problem is that in the early going, you won't have any sort of counter to these uber-units so a very small number of them can effectively destroy an overwhelming force.

As is to be expected from a LotR game, hero units play a very important role and players will find themselves commanding the likes of Gandalf, Aragorn, Sarumon and some midgets with beards and some midgets with huge feet (okay fine, dwarves and hobbits). Though they're powerful and potentially capable of swinging a battle to your favor they pose an interesting conundrum. Sometimes getting them killed results in a game over and other times they can just be resurrected. Regardless, putting them on the frontlines means endangering them, but it's the only way they can gain experience and learn new skills. And having leveled up heroes is important in later battles, due to their power.

Most of these combat issues directly result in yet another set of problems for the game. First, strategy ends up taking a back seat. Due to the fact that you're often overwhelmed by forces that have the advantage in terms of power, winning battles often ends up being a matter of throwing as many units at an enemy as possible and hoping for the best. This directly leads to the second problem; most fights come down to wars of attrition. If the enemy can't simply be overwhelmed in one fell swoop (as is often the case), you'll then have to enter in a long series of minor skirmishes that slowly drain the resources of both sides, until one finally gains the upper hand and can then move in for the kill.

Graphically, Battle for Middle-Earth is no longer that impressive. The environments are mostly ugly and bland while units and characters are fairly blocky and it isn't always clear which units are which. In the middle of a battle it's easy to accidentally send Uruk crossbowmen to the frontlines instead of the basic Uruk-Hai because they look so similar.

On the other hand, the game excels in its audio design which might just be the high point of the entire game. Many of the actors return and play their parts as well as they ever did in the movies and hearing Saruman or Gandalf narrate the progress of their respective sides is extremely immersive. The score is also an amazing accomplishment, and works particularly well for the overworld campaign map since you can look over the vast expanse of Middle-Earth which you're trying to conquer (or save… pansies) and hear a subtle, elegant melody playing lightly in the background. It honestly gave me goosebumps, so super-fans might need to break out the rubber underoos to keep from soiling their furniture.

THE VERDICT
The Lord of the Rings fans will undoubtedly love every minute of Battle for Middle-Earth and may just wet themselves several times during the game from sheer overwhelmed delight. Those who aren't so enamored with the franchise will undoubtedly find it much harder, or even impossible, to overlook the games many faults. So, your enjoyment of the game will largely depend on your opinion of the source material – Make your purchasing decision accordingly.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 09/08/09

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