The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

"Good, but definitely not for the Casual Gamer"

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King is a solid action game, beautifully executed, that gets bogged down by a bad camera, an overpowering difficulty level and very unclear mission objectives.

Graphics:
The game looks fantastic. The character models are all fairly detailed (though their lips do not move during cutscenes,) with smooth and varied animations. Gandalf taps his staff on the ground as he walks, Aragorn has a flowing cape, and Gimli swings his axe like a dance partner. The environments are gorgeous (excluding the Paths of the Dead, which is a cave like any you have seen before,) and the look and feel of the cities is very faithful to the films.

The camera takes a number of fixed positions, and while these are generally placed well, there are problems at times. In a few places, it takes a ground-level view, and if your character is in the back of the room, you will have a hard time seeing what you are doing with a horde of enemies between you and the camera. Characters blocking your sight in this way become partially transparent, but when there are a whole lot of them, this effect is useless.

Sound:
Bows twang, explosions roar, swords whip around and clank against each other. The effects are what you might expect, and get the job done. Music is taken directly from the soundtrack (some from the previous movies,) and each piece feels appropriate to the moment when it is used. Voice is generally good, with most of the talents being lent by the actors themselves. Notably absent from the list however is Orlando Bloom as Legolas, and the replacement actor they used for his voice sounds like he has something stuck up his nose.

Gameplay:
Hack. Slash. Parry. Shoot the archer. Repeat. Which is great, really, if you are into that kind of thing. There certainly are a lot of things to kill, and they come at you from all directions, in varied formations and groupings. Some levels are just following a linear path and killing, while others introduce more complicated objectives, which become rather troublesome.

These objectives are explained in the span of one sentence, and you are then thrown into the level. A meter at the top of the screen will track your progress relative to the objective, but there is no explanation provided as to the mechanics of that objective, or what exactly you should be doing. There is a lot of trial and error involved with simply figuring out what you are supposed to be doing, which will annoy veteran gamers, and incredibly frustrate those with less experience.

And then there is the overall difficulty of the game itself. On your first time through the game, you may only play each level once with each character. There is no going back to build up additional levels or look for missed secrets until after you have completed the entire game. Combat is incredibly difficult, with swarms of enemies who always seem to be heading straight for you, regardless of how many other friendly targets there are on the screen. They hack and slash as fiercely as you do, and if you let up for even a moment, you are going to lose a large chunk of health, if not die outright. It is also hard to distinguish between enemies. Those with shields and those without require very different approaches, and when there are ten of each in a circle around you, it is not an easy task to make the right attack connect with the right enemy, though all of theirs will hit home while you try. Even when you eventually gain half a dozen levels and go back to a level for some fun, one wrong move is still all it takes to end up dead.

The game offers a co-operative mode. Gameplay progresses in much the same fashion, but camera issues and timed objectives become even more problematic, as your partner has to be next to you in order for the scene to change. If your friend knows what they are doing, the difficulty will drop a little, but if he or she is new to the game, the experience will not be very much fun.

The Bottom Line:
Unless you are a big fan of action games or a huge fan of the film, rent this before you but it. It looks great, it sounds great, but if you are not able to cope with a game being very, very difficult, you are not going to have a good time.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 12/30/03