The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

"Bland and Frustrating"

The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King is a frustrating game, at least until you've beaten every level once, and use the invincibility cheat. At the beginning, the levels are well designed and thought out. However, the further you get, the sloppier they become, and the more annoying and repetitive they seem.

There might be some story that I haven't discovered, but I doubt it. The only form of story are direct movie cut scenes, which aren't so impressive now that you can watch the whole movie at once on DVD. The sad thing is, three quarters of them are from the Fellowship of the Ring and the Two Towers.

Another thing that Return of the King suffers from are incredibly aggravating camera angles. By the time you've finished the first few levels, you'll have heard "You're going the wrong way!" at least 50 times, which becomes incredibly annoying as you advance through the game. Every time you touch the joystick, the camera angle spins, which really turns you around. The graphics are quite good, even though they are often blocked by the stupid camera angle. There are unique graphics for each of the characters, and most of the enemies, but seeing 50 identical Orcs come running towards you detracts from the experience. They do, however, identify the game as Lord of the Rings, which seems to have been the whole point, instead of making an immersive and enjoyable game.

The only bad thing about the sounds is that there are practically none. The most annoying however, is when there actually is background music. The song that plays is completely random. When you die, you can expect to hear anything from Happy Birthday, to Gandalf blabbing on and on. The sound effects are incredibly generic, such as swords clashing and Orcs yelling.

The voice acting is much more dependable than the background music. It's consistent in the fact that it's never playing, except for when you are playing as either Aragorn or Frodo, both of which are difficult to control. If you are playing as any other character, you'll hear one side of a conversation. This is confusing because the only way to beat the level is to have help from your character, which you cannot hear.

Even with all those errors, this could still be a good game if the gameplay wasn't so flawed. Sadly, that isn't the case. The controls are too simplistic, and the combos are all useless, excluding Helm's Hammer and Swift Justice. All you have to do to beat the levels is stand in one spot and press the A and Y buttons continuously. Doing this makes you invincible, and ruins the potential challenge of the game.

The game itself is incredibly short. You can easily beat the entire thing in less than two hours, and there's absolutely nothing to do after you complete it besides watching the cut scenes you have unlocked.

Pros

+ It's Lord of the Rings!
+ It has okay graphics
+ The first few levels are okay, until you get used to the game

Cons

- Ridiculously easy
- No story whatsoever
- Poor voice acting
- Terrible camera angles
- Bizarre and completely random background music
- Too short
- Impossible last level that doesn't explain how you kill Gollum
- Sound effects are bland
- Very boring

Rent or Buy?

I suppose if you're a die hard Lord of the Rings fan, you could rent it and see what it's like, but I can almost guarantee that you won't enjoy it. Otherwise, it's safer to back away slowly. Under no circumstances should you buy this game!

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 11/21/06