The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-Earth Review

By Rob Fahey Published 22 December, 2004

Laud for the Rings.

Version tested: PC

Order yours now from Simply Games.

"How many times do I have to kill you, dammit!"

It's two o' clock in the morning, and I've just killed him for a third time. You'll have to excuse my frustration. It's not that I haven't enjoyed killing him each time; it's more the crushing disappointment when he cheerfully appears once more at the start of the next mission. In the revisionist fantasy of The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-Earth, death has lost its meaning.

Improv

'The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-Earth' Screenshot 1

I'm sorry, I should explain. There is... Hmm, how to put this delicately. There is a certain character in the Lord of the Rings whom I wouldn't mind seeing being turned into stew for an Uruk-Hai raiding party. Or into a lollipop for a giant spider. I won't say which character I'm talking about, because I've been assaulted by rabid fangirls before and I still occasionally grieve for the children I will probably never be able to have. However, I've taken a certain degree of sadistic pleasure in sending him to his death - three times, now. But he keeps on coming back.

That's not all, though. Earlier on, I rescued Boromir from his death on the shores of the Anduin, and he's been bravely fighting alongside the forces of Gondor ever since; and Gandalf never fell to the whip of the Balrog in Moria, because Aragorn stuck the bugger with his sword first. Saruman is running around with a group of orcs somewhere near Minas Tirith casting powerful battlefield spells, Sam had the assistance of a number of the guards of Gondor when he handed Shelob her arse on a plate, and oh - that Balrog I mentioned? I just summoned it to kick about some foes in the fields of Rohan.

If you're not getting the hint yet, what I'm saying is this: if you're a Lord of the Rings purist, look away now. If you complain loudly at the removal of Tom Bombadil from the films, or have ever been known to make a statement like "the removal of the scouring of the Shire ripped the narrative and moral heart from Tolkien's vision!" in the pub, then do not seek out this game. Seek professional help instead. If, on the other hand, you just loved the epic fantasy of the trilogy and think that the idea of leading the armies of Middle-Earth into mortal combat sounds like your cup of tea - step right up.

General improvement

'The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-Earth' Screenshot 2

Basing a real-time strategy game on a movie is a concept which looks fraught with difficulty, but as the above examples probably make clear, EA Los Angeles (reportedly including at least some of the team behind the piss-poor Command & Conquer Generals [now now Rob, it wasn't that bad -possibly misguided Ed who actually really enjoyed Generals, but hey], thankfully seeming rather more on form this time around) has been given a surprising amount of freedom to play around with the story and characters, with the focus being on what will make a good game rather than on fitting in exactly with the plot of the trilogy. That's a good move. Freed from the restrictions which seem to be imposed on most other movie tie-ins, Battle For Middle-Earth does throw up some peculiarities such as suspiciously resurrecting heroes and fictionally unlikely Balrog summoning, but in return it offers a genuinely compelling game which benefits hugely from its epic setting and the player's familiarity with the universe and characters, rather than being held back by it.

Four unique sides are playable in the game - the kingdoms of Rohan (which has incredibly powerful cavalry, as you'd expect) and Gondor (great defensive capabilities), and the evil axis of Mordor and Isengard, which are largely focused on swarming the enemy with wave after wave of orcs, and also have access to powerful siege units such as those bloody great elephant things. Aerial support is provided by giant eagles on the allied side and by Nazgul on the axis side (which are the convenient monikers I'm going to be using to refer to the two sides from now on, gasps of horror from Tolkien fans opposed to the concept that his book was an allegory for the world wars notwithstanding), and each side has a menagerie of hero characters at their disposal, most of whom are indeed disposable, and whose influence can often swing the progress of a battle.

The campaign game is played out on a large 3D map of Middle-Earth, which is divided up into a set of provinces. You move your armies (up to three of them) around this map, dropping into each province individually to fight through a battle - leading to the capture of the province, and effectively giving you control over the course of the campaign, although occasionally you'll be called upon to fight through a specific part of the plot. These plot-specific parts (including the Fellowship going through the Mines of Moria, or fighting the Uruk-Hai at the Anduin, or the climactic siege of Minas Tirith) will sometimes give you control simply of a small group of heroes and task you with keeping them alive - an odd departure from their normal expendability, and arguably one of the weakest elements of the game. When will RTS creators learn that taking a couple of units through a mission simply isn't as much fun as controlling an army?

Neatly helmed

'The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-Earth' Screenshot 3

The overview map itself is very simple, so don't arrive expecting something on the level of Rome: Total War, but it serves its role well and as a plus point, it's beautifully modelled and animated. Each province that you capture boosts your power, giving you special abilities such as the ability to summon Elvish allies in battle, boosting your production rate or simply raising the cap on the number of units you can have at your command. In one of the nicest touches in the game, the armies you create are also persistent, so the force you end one battle with is by and large the same as the force you start with next time around, and normal units as well as heroes level up and gain experience. You can even rename your regular units, giving your army that rather more personal touch.

This aspect leads to some of the finest moments in the game - such as the level where you defend Helm's Deep from invaders, up to the point where you are rescued by the appearance of Eomer's army of horsemen - the very army which you've just spent several missions assembling on the plains of Rohan. It also gives rise to a particularly gruesome aspect of the evil forces in the game - when playing as the forces of Mordor or Isengard, you can order your own units to kill each other in order to boost their experience, which is a cunning way to exploit the tendency of the unit production cap to leave you with far more resources than you can possibly spend.

It would be fair to say that the unit cap is an annoying aspect of the game. You can see the logic behind it, but it continues to be frustrating right throughout the campaign. That downside to the gameplay, however, is largely made up for by the various right decisions made throughout - such as the incredibly simple resource system, which eschews the usual nonsense with peasants running around mining gold and cutting down trees which every other fantasy RTS relies on in favour of a single resource meter which is generated on an ongoing basis by your farms (or slaughterhouses if you've gone over to the dark side). The game tries to prevent battles from descending into resource races, although it does this with limited success - even though it heavily restricts where you can place buildings and how resources are earned, many battles in the campaign will still come down to wars of attrition as you inch across a map fortifying each new region in turn.

Lord of the RTS?

'The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-Earth' Screenshot 4

Thankfully, it doesn't prevent the game from being incredibly spectacular once it gets going - although this is no Rome: Total War, the clever decision to make each unit into a group of five men (or ten orcs for the swarm-happy axis of evil) means that you still end up with epic scale battles, and watching a set of siege elephants bearing down on the gates of Minas Tirith is a scene to stir the heart of any RTS player. Graphically, Battle for Middle-Earth is one of the best looking strategy games out there; it can strain a little when there are too many units on screen, but in general it's an impressive feast for the eyes, with every major location from the movies recreated in loving detail.

Material from the movies themselves is used slightly unusually - Electronic Arts obviously had permission to use movie footage and was determined to do so even though it doesn't fit terribly well. Rather than using entire cut-scenes from the film, you get clips of film played in the game interface at key points in the game - which is an interesting approach, but ends up feeling slightly tacky. Much more successful is the use of the actors from the movies to provide voices - both Ian McKellen and Christopher Lee were on hand to reprise their roles, as were the likes of Elijah Wood and Andy Serkis, and the stand-ins found for other actors such as Viggo Mortenson are excellent. Much more than the movie footage, it's the voices and the design of the units and locations which tie this game in to the films - a genuine example of a solid game being elevated significantly by the intelligent use of a great license.

While EA's use of the Lord of the Rings franchise to date has largely been fairly impressive, the direct movie tie-ins have all been quite shallow and this Christmas' console offering, The Third Age, was so blatantly ripped off from Final Fantasy X that you half expected Auron to pop up at any minute. Battle for Middle-Earth, however, would be an impressive game even if it weren't based on Lord of the Rings. It's a clever and well-constructed strategy title with plenty of innovation of its own, and a genuinely great use of the franchise. Easily the best of the Lord of the Rings games to date, it also comes well recommended as one of the best PC strategy games of the year.

Order yours now from Simply Games.

8 / 10

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Picture of Rob.

About Rob Fahey

Rob Fahey is a former editor of GamesIndustry.biz who spent several years living in Japan and probably still has a mint condition Dreamcast Samba de Amigo set.

Read more articles from Rob by visiting the Rob Fahey archive page.

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Comments (48) Latest comment 7 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Hicksy #1 7 years ago

    \o/

  • UncleLou #2 7 years ago

    I am a little bit shocked. I bought this, and found it so lacking in everything but presentation that I brought it back the very next morning. A 3/10, judging by the 3 hours or so I tried it.

  • SanktePer #3 7 years ago

    Surprised by an 8!

  • lost_soul #4 7 years ago

    The average on gamerankings is 8.

  • Pina Verified Producer, Seed Studios, Lda. #5 7 years ago

    I wonder how many people stayed until late hours in the night to get this baby out?

  • GordonJ #6 7 years ago

    So the ability to kill Legolas repeatedly isn't a good thing then? :)

  • krudster #7 7 years ago

    Given Rob's irrational hatred of Generals (on politcal grounds as far as I can make out) I'd say his 8 is on solid ground. He's not easily pleased, so bear that in mind before the tired old score questioning gets wheeled out for the 212th time this year.

  • UncleLou #8 7 years ago

    So it's not allowed to disagree with a review anymore? I am genuinely surprised as I thought this game lacks everything that usually makes RTS games fun, its game mechanics seemed to me like they were from 1997, and I usually agree with Shinji's reviews of RTS games almost all of the time.

  • UncleLou #9 7 years ago

    Guess what, I completely agree, Fruit_Salad. And this is why there is a comments section here, to discuss the game and/or review, no? Which I did. I didn't say Rob was wrong, I said the game is, imo, crap, and that is surprises me Rob didn't think the same, especially as I usually share his views on RTS games.
    Edited by 2 at 22/12/04 @ 16:02

  • masterson #10 7 years ago

    Hmmm, i'm still not so sure about this. I'd been looking forward to it, but it seems a little basic after W40K-DoW. The units all look pretty similar and do not have the personality of those from DoW. Once it gets going on a big MP map it's fun mind you.

    Incidentally, I thought Generals was great! A real sense of scale and destruction allied with it's amazingly funny political incorrectness worked for me.

    "Preserving Freedom..." - Top stuff! :)

  • marilena #11 7 years ago

    /hands Lou his anti-stress pills.

    I don't think anyone tried to stop you from expresing your opinion, mate.

    As for myself, I usually disagree with Rob's opinions on RTS games, so I'm not surprised at all that he likes Battle for Middle Earth, although I don't.

  • YoYo #12 7 years ago

    Well its on my Christmas list so I hope I find it to be an 8!

    As a recent purchaser of Rome:TW I am deeply in love (or should that be deeply addicted to) RTS at the moment so the chance to do some of the same in the LOTR world should be good.

    As a new RTSer, rather than an experienced campaigner the fact that LOTRBFME (this is getting ridiculous!) is perhaps 'light' compared to some of the genre may not bother me as much as it might others, as i've little to compare it to.

  • UncleLou #13 7 years ago

    /hands Lou his anti-stress pills.

    Heh, cheers. :-) Sorry, don't know what's wrong, but wherever I turn my head today, someone or something annoys me. ;-)

  • UncleLou #14 7 years ago

    Not to mention that you can only build on pre-defined structures, and that the unit variation and tech-tree for each faction is very humble. Whoever is buying this instead of the excellent Rise of Nations, or Rome, is making a big mistake. In my humble opinion. :-D

  • tengu #15 7 years ago

    Can't be worse than Third Age... that sucked.

  • Aga #16 7 years ago

    /sticks to Rome Total War

  • asphaltcowboy #17 7 years ago

    PC Gamer really didn't like it... Some major holes in game design so we're told...

    Ahhh, BfME... you had such potential...

  • Dynamize #18 7 years ago

    People should just stop making RTSs after Rome.
    Seriously, stop. There's no point. You've lost, Creative Assembly has won. :)

  • Nemesis #19 7 years ago

    Huzzah!

    Got this as an Xmas pressie. I'm so glad it's not $hite.

    /hugs LOTR pillow, drinks from LOTR mug.

  • Daryoon #20 7 years ago

    The Third Age, was so blatantly ripped off from Final Fantasy X that you half expected Auron to pop up at any minute

    That would have sold me the game.

  • Royal Fool #21 7 years ago

    I'm just waiting for The Boromir Chronicles: The Massacre at Gondor Bay. ;)

    Oh yes... just you wait...

  • sephy #22 7 years ago

    Those were anime fangirls then Shinji?

  • Khab #23 7 years ago

    "Financial Analyst" my arse!

  • Shinji #24 7 years ago

    I guess I can see why some people don't like this. I honestly came to it with pretty low expectations - I hated Generals (partially because it was so repulsively juvenile in its handling of its subject matter, mostly because it was a shit RTS game regardless of political leanings), and I'm not the world's biggest fan of the whole licensed game concept.

    Thing is, I played it loads, and enjoyed it a lot. It does plenty of stuff right, and is great fun to play - sure, it's not got the depth of something like Rome, but it's not aiming for that marker, and bear in mind that for a lot of people Rome was TOO involved (myself included - I love the game, but it requires waaaay too much commitment for me to be able to play it much).

    Without the LOTR license it would probably be a six, maybe a seven. Solid, fun, but unremarkable. Judicious use of the license really elevates it though - for a fan of the books or movies, running around fighting battles in Tolkien's universe is a big draw, and this game executes that concept perfectly.

    End of the day - I had fun. Thus the game is good :)

  • Shinji #25 7 years ago

    visitor - What you mean is that the reviewer came back and defended his review rather than saying "oh sorry, damn, you're right, how could I have been so stupid!?"

  • Artemus #26 7 years ago

    I loved the films and thought Generals was actually pretty good. I was holding back until I read this review though. Unfortunately, Mrs Xmas had to go shopping the other day so I added it on my list without seeing it. Looks like I won't be taking back on the 27th now. I don't mind the odd light strategy. More chance of me completing it.

  • jumpdeveraux #27 7 years ago

    An 8 is somewhat generous in my opinion, a solid 6 or a a lucky 7 perhaps.

    Rather than an RTS this should be described as 'RTS-Lite'.

    * Inability to assign a squad/hero to more than one group.
    * No hotkey to select a specific hero.
    * You can't sub-select in mixed squads to activate upgrades/powers (as in WC3 'tabbing')
    * Enemy AI is set to 'spam units only' I've yet to see some real cunning tactics.
    * You can't reconfigure keys in the setup.
    * No key to reset the camera view.

    It's good but in an 'average good' way. EA have applied plenty of gloss but the underlying mechanics are somewhat lacking.

  • ave #28 7 years ago

    @jumpdeveraux

    Sounds like every game EA has developed in the last 5 years.

    Last truly good EA game I remember playing, was on the MegaDrive.

  • elvenearth #29 7 years ago

    I have had the game for a week and I'm loving it...

  • thebuzzard #30 7 years ago

    8!!! Ive found this to be very average so far. I suppose 8 is okay IF youre a huge LOTR fan though. Its just very average compared to Dawn of War which has raised the bar for squad based RTS games or comapared to Rome Total War which has a proper campaign map and bigger battles. Despite this I am enjoying it though, but if it didnt have the LOTR element it would be a 5/10 tops and I would have stopped playing after about 10 minutes.

    Id say 5 or 6 out 10 depening how much you like RTS games then an extra 1 or 2 depending how much you like LOTR.

  • marilena #31 7 years ago

    For what it's worth, I don't think that the EG staff is agressive in defending the reviews. I always found it nice that they bother to offer further explanations and apologies for obvious mistakes (wrong developer name and stuff like that).

    I still think that Generals is a great multiplayer game and a great game overall, in spite of the rather bland single-player campaign. And I still think that Battle for Middle Earth sucks and reviewers everywhere know it, but are afraid to say it out loud, because they fear the fanboys.

  • krudster #32 7 years ago

    There's a big difference betwen defending your opinion and being arrogant. I've spent a long time carefully explaining my point of view and have never been accused of arrogance. If anything, in the face of often intolerant baiting I stay pretty calm. We're all entitled to our opinion, and our regular readers usually know exactly where we're coming from. It's the occasional readers that are used to much higher scores that we get the most flames from, but, well, bleh.

    In this case, I was just explaining that Rob's usually a stern critic of games, and if he thinks it's worthy of an 8, I'm liable to take that as a good indicator. If you disagree, fine.

  • Dizzy #33 7 years ago

    yeah guys.. this game cannot touch Rome, but the 8 is quite fair. It is a basic RTS in many ways but I guess the reason it is pretty good (just as W40K was) is because you can jump into the world of Middle Earth. Fight in Moria. Attack Gondor.. etc.
    W40K was also nothing new... but it had SPACE MARINES!

    If you want a killer RTS.. get Rome, but if you want to dive into LotRs, this game is pretty ok. 8/10? Yes.

  • UncleLou #34 7 years ago

    I'd never compare it to Rome, which is a bit a different beast anyhow. But it's fair to compare it to Warcraft, AoE, RoN, etc., and it falls incredibly short in this respect. Take away the LotR shine, and there is a game left that is way below average, in my opinion. But go see for yourselves, fools, just don't come back crying that it's crap. ;-)

  • symmetry #35 7 years ago

    Jeez people, lighten up! I'm sorry, but it's Christmas and there are far more important things to do than squabble about the score of a computer game on a website.

  • Sponz #36 7 years ago

    darn it, i was gonna get this, but im not gonna bother now...

    excellent review, but as its an RTS "lite" im gonna pass on it.

    /loves Eurogamer for a few reasons, very good reviews not based on free-lunches, ability to debate reviews after, and above all, from the same town as me... Brighton for the win.

    :D

  • MaTTy_P #37 7 years ago

    personally...allthough after r:tw it is a bit 'lite'...its enjoyable. Im not normally a fan of RTS, normally get 'owned' by the AI, but this is set at a quite refreshingly easy pace, is well presented, and is great for those who normally stay away from this genre.

    As for 'reviewers not defended', being a site i have browsed (allthough not commented on much) since around 2000...maybes even earlier. I have found that the reviewers are normally spot on and therefore dont have to backup their reviews. At the end of the day, an opinions an opinion :)

  • Smugglarn #38 7 years ago

    Not that impressed. They could have had even more sides in the game or as a possibility for expansions. Easterlings, Southrons and why not the elven army led by Celeborn*?

    *which defended Lorien - a great battle that should have been in the rather tame extended version of ROTK

    Anyway, GOD JUL! :D
    Edited by 1 at 23/12/04 @ 15:39

  • masterson #39 7 years ago

    "darn it, i was gonna get this, but im not gonna bother now...
    excellent review, but as its an RTS "lite" im gonna pass on it. "

    What were you originally expecting from an EA produced movie license then?

  • MaTTy_P #40 7 years ago

    pass what?

    Go? and dont recieve 200 pounds?

    hehe :)

  • kissoon #41 7 years ago

    Visitor hit the mark the first time. This is also why I don't bother with EG text reviews. I just come here to read the general comments of users about games I'm interested in. But even so you got to be careful with all the ass-kissers.

    Really, the worst part has got to be the kiss ass remarks when someone actually disagrees with a review. It's like EG has their normal, working staff and then there's a myriad of minions just hanging around to tap on their backs or praise them on cue.

    Think about it, it's quite ridiculous sometimes.

  • Shinji #42 7 years ago

    Either that, or shock horror - there might be people here who actually agree with a bunch of the stuff we write. I know it's a difficult concept!

  • sephy #43 7 years ago

    Shockingly I bought Tales of Symphonia based on shinji's review and OMG I actually agree with pretty much most of it :o

    /can't be arsed with other examples because shinji summed it up perfectly

    Apparently people aren't allowed to have opinions any more....

  • Shinji #44 7 years ago

    Er... We're sucking up to developers? I've never even met the people who developed this game. All I know is that some of them worked on Generals, (a game which we made no bones about calling a pile of crap). If we were going to start sucking up to EA /as a whole/, do you think we'd have given GoldenEye Rogue Agent its richly deserved 2/10?

    I liked this game. I accept that it is flawed and that many people, especially more hardcore strategy game fans (for all that I play these games a lot, I do not consider myself a hardcore fan of the genre by any means) will not get along with it. However, I found it a lot of fun, an excellent use of the license, and a pretty damn good way to spend a fair number of hours. I couldn't care less if it was developed by the Pope, the Dali Lama and the Queen of England in a secret development studio funded by the Illuminati and a race of giant space lizards; I reviewed a game and liked it.

    If you feel that that somehow devalues our reviews as a whole... Well, you're entitled to your opinion. I just can't give it much weight when it boils down to "I disagree with this reviewer THEREFORE he must not be being honest."

  • tengu #45 7 years ago

    What is it about this review that seems to be bringing in the 'Lets criticise Eurogamer' crowd?

    You don't like what the review says? Go find one that tells you what you want to hear.

    Some people...

  • thebuzzard #46 7 years ago

    Been playing this a lot over xmas and it really does get very dull and repetitive after a bit. Think Ill stick to the Extended Editions Boxed set for further LOTR fixes.

  • kb #47 7 years ago

    Jethco, i have no idea how to do this either. in fact its got to the point where i dont know when im gonna got any more than 200 command points in skirmish at all! does anyone know when the command points in the skirmish and the LAN games increase? i know this game wasn't to be the same scale as Rome (as most of you have put) but only 200 command points in a skirmish! it gets even worse when theres more than 2 teams, say 8 then all you get is 80 command points! if thats not false advertisement from TV and the internet wat is it? (also, whilst I have started) notice that in the siege missions, the cut scenes just before the start of the mission shows hundreds if not thousands guarding the castle, and then the game starts with around 30 troops guarding the castle, its stupid. and thats the bit that EA advertised on TV and the internet, the cut scenes.
    generals was ok and nothing special, BFME is slightly better but far from classic. my only wish is that westwood in 'red alert 3' just use 'red alert 2' with improved graphics (3D obviously) and alot of various units/buildings, and no restrictions on building areas oh and the greater use of the player having to be strategic would be nice too.
    i feel im getting off topic, but EA are stepping in the wrong direction in RTS games.

  • #48 7 years ago

    This game is the biggest load of PISH ever! 8 my testicles. Theres almost to stategy .. and you just build and send and build and send.. thankgod I got vouchers for Virgin and wasted someones else cash instead of my own.

    I find the game badly balanced too. Fucking EA crap. I should have known.