The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

"You can beat this in the same amount of time you need to watch The Two Towers then return it..."

But don't.

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers for the XBOX is a fun, exciting and great game. Fans of the movie will want to pick this up and gamers who like playing good games will want to rent it. Basically, if you want to know the plot, go watch the movies, because the movie will explain it a lot better than I can.

The game features many levels and 3 characters to choose from: Legolas, Gimli and Aragorn. My favorite happens to be Legolas, so I chose to play as him! When you first start the game, you are greeted with a cinematic introduction from clips of the first movie, which includes the creation of the Rings. It thrusts you into battle from the first movie was Islidur. Here you can practice your moves on the enemies around. Cutscene after cutscene you are brought throughout the first movie (including a playable level as Aragorn to protect Frodo). After the 2nd level, you will be able to go on as any character you like. The levels themselves are very, very colorful and bright. The action is large and the backrounds are very nice. The game is a basic, BASIC entirely linear beat-em-up. The levels are short and the battles can sometimes feel less spectacular as in the movies.

GRAPHICS: 8/10
-The character models are very nice. They move smoothly and look exactly like their real-life counterparts. The environments are bright and very detailed. Especially some parts where you can see familiar faces, like Treebeard in the Fangorn Forest. Water runs very realistically, and the outdoor levels are VERY, VERY beautiful. It actually feels like you are in the movie, which is what all of us want to do right? In Balin's Tomb, you can actually do what YOU wanted to do when you saw it in the movie. Every level is detailed and matched exactly like the movie.

SOUND: 8.4/10
-The sound is great. The score is not Oscar worthy like the movie is, but great nontheless. The voices are acted out by the actual cast, which adds a depth of realism to it, like the cast of BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER does for that game. The sounds of weapon's clanging, Urak-Hai's roaring and battle cries are very realistic. I have 5.1 speakers and the sound was booming from each one, and the surround is great. One problem I had was the soundtrack skipped on EVERY level, the cutscenes and when playing.

CONTROL: 7/10
-There are very basic movements, and basic combos. The controls are easy to learn and you can hack and slash your way through the game easily. Sometimes though, the controller is slow to respond, and your speed of your finger doesn't match the actions on the screen.Besides that, and when you can fully take control of your character, the control is nice.

GAMEPLAY: 7/10
-You hack and slash, hack and slash, hack and slash and hack and slash. Basically, thats all you do. No puzzle solving at all, just objectives for each level which consists of : protecting Frodo from dying, keeping civilians from dying, and guarding something. The action is relentless, and your fellowship doesn't really help. One thing that really, REALLY bothered me was during the Helm's Deep levels, where your friends just stand there and block you from getting to where you need to be! On the last level, I couldn't even get down the stairs becuase one of the soldiers kept blocking me, left to right I couldn't get through. Sometimes you wish friendly fire was on so you can kill them and move on. The leveling up of the character is good. Although I don't really notice a difference as I leveled up. When I bought new moves and weapons, it did help a lot. There are a lot of levels that take you from the first movie to the end of the last (so if you don't want to know what happens in the 2nd, well dont play the game). One thing I missed from the movie that wasn't in the game was Legolas sliding down the stairs! Man, I wanted to do that! And Smeagol, my next favorite character, doesn't make one appearance. Overall though, the gameplay is simple and a good rental for non fans.

EXTRAS: 10/10
- I beat this game in about 4 hours, and I have NEVER EVER thought a game was short before, until now. But luckily, I didn't return it because it's fun, and because this game is loaded with extras, just like the DVDs. You can commentaries and behind the scenes looks, photographs and more. You can unlock commentaries from all 3 fighters, Legolas : Orlando Bloom, Aragorn : Viggo Mortenson, and Gimli: John Rhys-Davis as well as Frodo : Elijah Wood and Gandalf: Ian McKellan. For me, the extras are great, and very fullfilling!

OVERALL : 7/10
-A short romp but loaded with extras, great graphics and good sound. For non-fans of the series, rent this, for fans of the series, GET IT.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 01/08/03, Updated 01/08/03