This spring, I've been reading a lot of J.R.R. Tolkien. It all started when I got accepted into the Lord of the Rings Online (aka LotRO) closed beta in February. I was excited about the game in a way I really haven't been about others in recent memory. I played it day and night; I thought about it at work; I even dreamed about it a few times. And I felt an undeniable urge to re-read every bit of Tolkien that I could get my hands on (which is quite a bit!).
For those who don't know me, you should be aware that I not only love to read, but I especially love to read Tolkien. I'm one of those crazy fans. You know the ones! I've read nearly all of his works (the few that I haven't yet read drives me nuts). I have large parts of the history and names and lore memorized. I can practically quote the Hobbit or the Lord of the Rings to friends and family. I haven't yet learned how to speak or write Quenya, but I have considered learning it from time to time. I even used to have Tengwar and Angerthas fonts on my computer (don't ask me why!).
When the opportunity to try LotRO came to me, I was both elated and nervous at the same time. I was elated because this was an opportunity to become more immersed in the world that I love than previously offered in any game set in Middle Earth. But I was also nervous because I was afraid this new world might not live up to my own expectations of what an MMO set in this particular world would have to be. So, I made a decision to enter the world with an open mind, trying hard to objectively evaluate the game play and the mechanics for what they are - a game - while evaluating the lore and the world separately.
There I was, playing LotRO for far too many hours each day and then closed beta ended. No worries, I had pre-ordered so I played some in the open beta, but then got busy with work and other stuff and didn't touch it for a while until release. April 24th arrives and the game comes out to a relatively smooth launch and wide acclaim. I wait a few days and then login and start playing again. And its every bit as fun as it was when I first started back in February!
According to Bartle's Interest Graph to determine what type of MUD player a person is, I am primarily (and overwhelmingly) an Explorer type player, followed by Socializer, Achiever, and then at the bottom Killer. LotRO does a great job of offering game play to satisfy the first three. (I can't say for Killer as I haven't had a chance to engage in Monster-Play as of writing this review). The game offers great locations to explore, with some stellar views, hidden surprises, and no small amount of danger over nearly every hill. It also offers deeds which, much like badges in another MMO in a galaxy far, far, away, are a great way to encourage exploration while at the same time satisfying that achiever in many of us. Sure, some of them require a bit of grinding (especially ones like Enmity of the Dourhands or Web-Slasher), but the fact is that many show up and can be completed while going about your normal routine of exploring ruins, killing monsters along the way, and even completing a few quests. It is really hard to top that kind of game play for downright great entertainment.
But what about socializer? Well, the game offers plenty of that, too. There is your standard group (called a Fellowship); and guild (called a Kinship); as well as your chat channels (which like most other MMOs can sometimes be crowded with the undesirables or all-too-often the player that is impatient to "win" rather than enjoy the journey and sits asking questions like "Where is this" and "How do I do this" and "Someone give me this"… Okay, that last one isn't a question).
As one of my good friends pointed out to me, this is Turbine and they made Asheron's Call. So what, you might be saying! Well, that statement was meant to remind me that Turbine has a history of making story-rich games that work to draw their players into the on-going story of the world and its inhabitants. While the overall story for LotRO is of course well known, there is plenty of room for side-stories which allow Turbine to flesh out the parts that the original author himself did not. And from what I've seen so far, they have done a masterful job of it.
It would have been easy to go wrong, especially with so much story and lore and world to deal with. Turbine decided to focus on the story of the Fellowship itself. In LotRO (and in the parts of the story I've discovered so far) you are working with the Rangers to protect the Fellowship on its journey to Rivendell. This involves investigating the movements of the Ringwraiths, tracking them and even confronting them from time to time. Along the way you discover that others are helping the Enemy, some of their own free will (others at the point of a very tainted sword). And you are trying to stop them! This takes you into all kinds of interesting places and you meet lots of interesting people from the books, including favorites such as Barliman Butterbur, Tom Bombadil and Strider.
And it is these figures along with hundreds (maybe thousands) of other names and references that Turbine put into the world that were mentioned only briefly in the books that help flesh out the world and help make it feel as if you are truly there in Middle Earth, fighting against the Dark Lord and the Servants of Mordor to protect the One Ring on its journey south. I was able to find no lack of areas that were amazing to explore and enjoy. These included the Old Forest (truly maddening until you figure out the pattern… it's so easy to get turned around!); and the Barrow Downs (hands-down my favorite location for its enemies that crawl up out of the ground, and the mist hanging over everything); and The Shire.
As you can probably tell, I spent a lot of time thinking about and enjoying the lore and the feel of the game. But I can assure you that I did spend time evaluating and considering the mechanics as well. After all, you can have a game with great lore and great art and level design, but if the game play stinks it won't save the game one bit.
I must first state that I have not yet played all of the available classes. To date I've managed to try out Guardian, Champion, Minstrel and Hunter. For those of you who aren't familiar with the names, Guardians are tanks, Champions focus on Area of Effect abilities (AoEs) and are truly offensive monsters, Minstrels are your healers, and Hunters are your nuker. The others: Captains (buffers, debuffers), Burglars, and Loremasters (crowd control). My favorite? Guardian, by far. To be more specific: Dwarven Guardian. I just love the battle cries and sounds the character makes during attacks. It really helps me enjoy playing the character and I get into the moment in battle.
But what makes these different or better than any other MMO? For the most part they are your typical fantasy-MMO class; warrior, cleric, mage, rogue, druid, etc. However, one aspect that I have found to be interesting is the use of ability-chains. That is, abilities that activate based on the use of other abilities, which open up even more abilities, stacking them on top of one another. For example, as a Guardian you have two methods of reactive combat; parrying with a weapon or blocking with a shield. When either occurs in combat, the player has a "primer" ability that lights up. If you use that ability then others light up allowing them to be used, which opens up even more abilities that can be used, that opens up even more abilities, and so on.
The ability-chain setup allows the player to become more involved in combat, forcing them to make decisions quickly and not just about what button to mash because it lit up, but also about which branch of the ability chain to use. Do you react to a parry or a block? If you react to a parry, then you can potentially activate a whirlwind (AoE) attack, but if you react to the block then you might activate a stunning attack.
All of these combat actions tie directly in with the graphics and the animations of the game. And they are superb! The graphics are in-between the ultra-realistic and cartoony, but I feel that they reach a good balance between the two. On the highest settings the game does chug a little in more populated areas like Bree, but out in the wilderness and during combat it runs just fine. In fact, on the ultra settings the game truly has some amazing views.
One of the really nice aspects is that even on the lowest settings you can still see landscape in the distance. There might not be much detail and it might only be a barely visible bluish mountain range, but that aspect alone helps add to the feel of the game. Rather than just focusing the appearance around the player, Turbine focused on what you see in the distance and they did it really well.
A shocker for me was the night sky. In most other games I've played the night sky was nothing special, but with LotRO there truly appeared to be more detail in it than at first glance. I have found myself standing and looking up at it in wonder from time to time and even trying to find constellations. In fact, the first time I played it was a shooting star that caught my attention and then I found myself standing there for ten or fifteen minutes just staring at the sky and really feeling immersed. That was really something special!
With regards to character appearance and graphics, there is a decent amount of detail, but LotRO does not excel at this area and unfortunately most characters look pretty much the same. It's a personal peeve of mine as I like to watch my character from all perspectives during battle so looking unique is important to me. I don't spend most of my time in third-person perspective. There is a decent variety of stylistic choices of face, scars, hair, eyes, etc but you do invariably see yourself running around once in a while. There is also a distinct lack of armor and clothing choices which I found rather disappointing so I often find myself running alongside another Dwarf who is wearing the same cloak, helm, and sometimes even the same weapon as me.
One very well-done aspect of LotRO in my opinion is the quests. There is no lack of quests offered by various NPCs throughout the world and most are not one-off quests (that is, quests that have no follow-up or tie with any other), but rather most are linked in chains. In addition, there are quite a few quests that tie into or at least relate to the main story of the region which I find nice. If you do the majority of the quests in the area, you will most likely find yourself exploring the majority of the locales within a region and along the way often completing deeds for exploring (and combat).
The piиce de rйsistance of LotRO is the Epic quests. These quests tell the main story of the game and are apportioned into Books with each quest representing a chapter. The epic quests let you participate and follow the journey of the Fellowship as it travels from Bree to Rivendell by performing side-quests that are related to the main quest (such as tracking the movements of various Nazgul around Bree). Along the way you receive quests from well-known characters from the books such as Strider, Gandalf, Tom Bombadil and others.
The Epic quests are also often fellowship quests, meaning that they require friends or a pick-up group in order to complete. Even if the quest is blue (in difficulty) or lower to you, it may still be too hard simply because of the number of enemies (rather than the individual difficulty of a single enemy). In addition, most if not all of the story quests are instanced, preventing you from having to worry about camping and even travel in some cases. This allows you to experience the full story and scripted events that can occur in the instance.
Like many current MMOs, LotRO shipped with a crafting system that allows the player to harvest resources in the field from nodes or from corpses and process them into intermediate stages and then further into finished products. Unfortunately, LotRO's crafting system like so many others fails to contain any compelling or innovative elements and is in fact a retread of the same system used in other popular MMOs. The system works, but there is nothing to draw the player to it, to excite someone, other than the thrill of grinding the same products over and over or endlessly running through fields hunting the ore or wood.
I had hoped, initially, that it might have promise with the Historian class and the collection of relics and aged text, but aside from the method by which the raw resources are obtained, the system was as plain and straight-forwardly boring as the rest. Another aspect that the crafting system suffers from is that the products are often over-shadowed by the looted variety, creating a situation in which crafters cannot charge enough to make a profit on their goods. At the lower levels, crafted products are sometimes useful for filling the gaps between levels of looted equipment. But later, the system fails to adequately keep up with the higher end looted items and the crafting system stagnates and the grind really takes its toll.
I have mentioned deeds (and traits) more than once earlier in the article, so I felt I should talk about them specifically because I have mixed feelings about them. On the one hand, I like the concept of deeds, chronicling the places you explore, the great things you do for people of a region, and even the number of enemies you have slain. And I like traits, acting as a secondary layer of equipment that you earn instead of purchase. The problem I had with the system was that the two were tied together so you had to do certain deeds in order to get certain traits.
At the later levels, the traits become harder to get. More is required for exploration, for kills, and at the same time you reach a point where the traits themselves are needed for the bonuses they provide. Combining the two brings about a situation in which you are required to grind deeds for the traits to continue questing and playing the game as you have been. This type of game play sets a bad precedent and should really be avoided unless the goal is providing content for the hardcore power gamers.
One final aspect that I wanted to touch on was the community. Turbine has done a great job so far in interfacing with the community, providing feedback for bugs and issues of concern to players, and even relaying information about changes or upcoming features. This community interaction as well as the strong launch population has helped build a vibrant and interactive community. The lore of the game, having so much background and depth that even Turbine can never fully explore it all, has created a situation where players can debate other aspects of Tolkien's works on the forums. One on-going game, for example, and one of my favorites, is the Celebrity Deathmatch (Tolkien-style) that can be found http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.php?t=60694 as well as another based on The Hobbit, the Riddle Game.
I've touched on quite a few parts of the game, but I have barely scratched the surface of all of the interesting features and very cool things I have seen (and done) in the game. And if I tried to talk about it all in this review, it would be like adding another book to the epic! Nevertheless, I've tried to cover what I consider to be the most important parts and I hope I have imparted enough information to you, the reader, to give you an idea of what the game is about and why it is different than others on the market.
It has an excellent story and a dragon's treasure trove of lore to draw from, excellent graphics and sound, and while some aspects like the combat and class system might not be revolutionary, they do have aspects that are fun, and there are few (if any) bugs to frustrate players. With a free expansion coming out soon and likely more on the way, players can rest assured that there will be plenty to do for months if not years to come.
I'd encourage anyone who is a MMO fan (whether or not you are a Tolkien fan… or even if you haven't read the trilogy!) to check the game out. It's been a fun experience for me and it's been a while since I had a MMO that I truly enjoyed. Sure, it has its negatives (what game doesn't?), but there is enough positive that I find myself enjoying the game and putting in far too many hours. And ultimately, having a good time is what gaming is all about.
