"With only the graphics and sounds as an advantage, this game is still underrated."

Introduction
The Lord of the Ring: The Return of the King, hereby known as RotK, is a cross-platform action game produced by EA Games after the sequel of the film The Lord of the Ring. In this review, the game will be scored in the following areas: 1) Control, 2) Gameplay, 3) Graphics and Sounds, and 4) Replay Value. At the end of this review, a final score will be given. All the scores range from 1 to 10 in which 1 refers to the worst, and 10 refers to the best, and so and so.

1) Control 2/10
The default control scheme requires rapid tapping of the left mouse button to launch speed attacks. That may not work well in all mouses. You somehow have to manage to change it into using your keyboard or joypad instead.

The combos of the characters are difficult to remember. The way to cast them is always to follow the sequence of a bunch of buttons, say for instance, fierce attack, speed attack, speed attack, and then fierce attack. The game does not allow you to customise those combos into simply-pressing-one-single-button-to-launch in order to get rid of the confusing combo controls. This is an action game but not a fighting game that needs us to memorise a set of commands.

Even the game itself sometimes confuses the controls. Quite often I cast one of the combos Orc Hewer unintentionally because the game mixes up my speed and fierce attacks, and registers me as having launched the combo. The game, however, has an awkward way of calculating the success of a combo. This will be discussed in the Gameplay section later on.

The camera angle of the game is annoying as well. Toggling the video option Alternate Camera ON/OFF, you may still encounter difficulty in judging the direction. Particularly in the Co-op mode, you and your partner will learn that the Alternate Camera option is never valid. The camera tends to rotate to a weird angle, say for example, if you are pressing S (down) to climb down a ladder, the camera will move to the other end that is opposite your direction, and register your S as moving up. Same goes for the directions left and right on the side paths.

No wonder in the Co-op mode the camera is locked up easily if you and your partner are staying not close enough. If you go to the further end, your character will become too small to see. You will remind your partner to catch up with you, or else you will not be able to judge the distance between you and your enemies, and you cannot see when and how your enemies attack either.

The camera will clang you at the edge of the screen if your partner is moving away and if there is an obstacle besides you. This reminds me of those action games in the 80's.

2) Gameplay 3/10
You will gain experience points along with the number of enemies you have taken down, and your charcater will eventually level up. You need to use the experience points to purchase the upgrades which either increase your ability or grant you combos.

As for the combos, they are special moves that are intended to let you become more versatile in combats. As aforementioned, however, some of the combos seem to be never successful. Even a fierce attack will fail if an enemy hits you before you swing your weapon. To cast a combo, it needs a space large enough with no enemies nearby. Your enemies will always hit you faster than you hit them.

I am very frustrated with those equipped with shields. You must use fierce attacks to break their shields before you can injure them. Worst still, if you leave the shielded enemies alone and decide to kill the unarmoured ones, those shielded enemies will come close to you and cancel out your speed attacks. That is, one shielded guy can defend 10 unshielded guys.

When you are about to launch a firece attack to break the shields and armours, you are actually buying time for your enemies. Again, they always hit you faster and your fierce attack is slow and defenceless. What you have to do is to parry until a chance arises.

Beating the game, you will unlock some hidden charcaters with nothing speical but only a skin change. I do not want to take away the fun and excitement for those who have not yet finished the game but I guess you will be disappointed by the so-called unlocked characters once you rally them.

Besides, you will also unlock a stage which is nearly impossible to beat. It seems to be pointless. The true test of a player's skills is already revealed in all the overly difficult stages.

The 100% completion of the game requires you to level up all characters to the maximum of 20. A repetitive re-do in all stages is needed to get the experience points which takes a lot of time and is not worth it. It is a bit strange to have the Co-op mode finished as a requirement of 100% completion. If you cannot find a friend to play the game with you or if you cannot find a joypad to customise player 2's controls, you will never get 100% completion.

3) Graphics and Sounds 7/10
They are good. They are good providing you have a fast computer with a decent display card and a decent pair of speakers. It is not a good idea to judge a PC game this way since all games can get an advantage from a brand new and high-end computer.

Extracts from the film are included in the cutscenes of the game. If you take a look at the CD and the RotK directory installed in your computer, you will see that all the film extracts are in the highly compressed avi format that does not alter the quality. This is a good thing to mention.

Replay Value 3/10
The game is overwhelmingly difficult and the AI gets unfair advantages. If you are a huge fan of The Lord of the Ring, you may want to replay the game to make fun of altering the storyline: originally-someone-was-there-to-do-something-but-I-managed-to-alter-the-character-in-the-game.

The strength of the game is that it allows you to randomly replay any one stage with any character once after you go through the entire Single Play mode.

Final score 3/10
Produced and named after the film, RotK is an action game that resembles the characters in the film. Unless you like the film, you may quit halfway through the game because of its difficulty. If you like the movie extracts, you may have to consider buying the DVD movie instead. As for hardcore action gamers, this game will definitely be rated down in comparison with those action games by some other software producers.

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 08/25/05