Survey suggests LOTRO for 360

By Oli Welsh Published 14 May, 2009

New evil storyline and races hinted at.

A consumer survey turned up by GameDaily suggests that an Xbox 360 version of The Lord of the Rings Online is in the works, and that developer Turbine is considering both subscriptions and micro-transactions as business models for it.

The survey also includes a game description that mentions the possibility of playing through a plotline as an evil character serving the Dark Lord of Sauron, something that's not included in the current PC game. It mentions eight playable races, where the PC game only features four: man, elf, hobbit and dwarf.

"Fight for the Free People of Middle-earth as you battle against the forces of the Dark Lord, or serve Sauron as you seek to obtain the One Ring!" runs the description. "Play as any of 8 races and set out on your own epic adventure within the world created by J.R.R. Tolkien."

It continues: "Two Epic Stories allow you to serve the Fellowship of the Ring or the Dark Lord Sauron! More than 600 quests will mould you into an unstoppable force for good...or evil. The choice is yours." It also describes the game as "the largest virtual world ever built on console".

The survey asks gamers if they would be prepared to pay a USD 12.99 subscription for the game. But it also asks what players would expect to pay for various in-game items and features on a microtransaction basis: currency, cosmetic clothing, equipment, pets, expansion packs, regional maps, transports, henchmen (another feature missing from the current PC game), themes, PVP maps, and new character classes and races.

Turbine has said that it has a console MMO in development, but despite persistent rumours and indications that it's a version of The Lord of the Rings Online, the developer has yet to confirm this.

In a recent interview, lead designer Alan Maki said, "The next step [for LOTRO] right now is a trade secret... ome of the things we have planned for the future are going to be evolutionary probably even in the way that MMOs are handled. We're really looking forward to it, but that's all I can say at this point."

Turbine didn't comment on the survey, but did tell GameDaily that ""Turbine has always been focused on the customer and one of the ways we do that is through extensive consumer research."

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About Oli Welsh

Oli is Eurogamer's acting deputy editor and reviews editor and likes to take things one word at a time. He is among the best dressed people in South London.

Read more articles from Oli by visiting the Oli Welsh archive page.

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Comments (20) Latest comment 3 years ago

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

  • Jonny5Alive7 #1 3 years ago

    If it's as good as the PC version then that will be awesome, I think it could really work providing they get the interface etc right.

  • ZuluHero #2 3 years ago

    i dip in and out of LOTRO all the time, and i would love to see this on the 360. It would be cool if they could intergrate the 360 and PC servers though (like FFXI)

  • Dizzy #3 3 years ago

    LOTRO is great.... and bringing it to 360 fills a gap on consoles.

    But people with a PC sub should be able to play the 360 version IMHO without paying extra. Also it looks like this version of LOTRO will not be the same as the PC version. In some ways reduced and in some ways expanded. I like the idea.
    Edited by 1 at 14/05/09 @ 09:27

  • login_name #4 3 years ago

    I hope it's a different game altogether, it sounds like it is. The current game wouldn't work well on a console and I'd hate to see it ruined just so it fits on the little white box. I'm also not keen on seeing the community being diluted with the usual loud mouth moron I meet on Live! (that's what WoW is for :p).

  • mariona #5 3 years ago

    The game hasn't enough bugs and now they say that will be for xbox???? I leave the game if this will happen! everygame that its shared with consoles becames a total cahos..... NEVER with Lotro. take example: Tomb Raider, Call of duty... all this games that could be great, are a damn shit cause of the console!!!!!

  • Azgarth #6 3 years ago

    I do believe they might be refering to the total of playable races, including the Monster Play (used for PVP) ones. That would make about that. Also, the Monster Player characters are on the Evil Plot side. So this might be all included for marketing reasons.
    I do wonder if that version, should it exist, will be cross-platform. Would make sense.

  • CHAZBIGPOTATO #7 3 years ago

    It wont come out on 360, MMOs never come out on Xbox

  • login_name #8 3 years ago

    I do believe they might be refering to the total of playable races, including the Monster Play (used for PVP) ones.

    That was my initial thought, but there are 5 monster characters to choose from, making the total 9, not 8.

  • Darren #9 3 years ago

    I bought LOTRO for the PC hoping it would be another WOW but I found it a disappointment in comparison and quickly cancelled my sub. I haven't played the game since. Mind you, the game ran terribly on my old PC with constant hitching as I walked around, which was really offputting. I think that killed my enthusiasm for the game more than anything else. In the four months I played it, despite numerous patches, it was never fixed.

  • Dizzy #10 3 years ago

    >I bought LOTRO for the PC hoping it would be another WOW

    ROFL

    It is much better. Your loss.

  • systems #11 3 years ago

    Will be good to have another MMO but I'm not 100% happy about paying a Live fee and a Codemasters fee. I'd consider half the fee the PC chaps are paying though.

  • miiiguel #12 3 years ago

    Yes, please. Never played a MMO.

  • CHAZBIGPOTATO #13 3 years ago

    Yeah Ashen Sugar I played that. It doesn't count though. :-)
    It took about 24 hours to prepare my console for the Playonline viewer or whatever it was called.
    Xbox live still hasn't had a decent MMO though as FFXI was through squares thing.

  • MaxiSleep #14 3 years ago

    >I bought LOTRO for the PC hoping it would be another WOW

    ROFL

    It is much better. Your loss.

    Erm how?

  • Triggerhappytel #15 3 years ago

    Sounds good, but please bring it to the PS3 as well!

  • Fleisch #16 3 years ago

    More to the point, will my lifetime sub to LOTRO still work on the xbox version!?!? Will be a crock to have to pay sub fees to an MMO again! :D

  • Darren #17 3 years ago

    @Dizzy - Well I certainly didn't think it was better so stop being so high and mighty about it. LOLing indeed! /rolls eyes

    WOW was the first ever MMORPG I'd played, compulsively over a period of a year so LOTRO had a lot to live up to. Unfortunately for me it failed to live up to my expectations and, as I mentioned earlier, it ran poorly on my PC despite the machine way exceeding the recommended specs. I found LOTRO hard to get into and the performance issues didn't help. If you like it, fine. I didn't. :p

  • Avaloner #18 3 years ago

    @ Darren

    I tried LOTRO in the past and while I saw potential I quickly returned back to WoW. I tried it again recently (with Eurogamer's help I might add) and I am hooked. Playing on an ancient rig will diminish your enjoyment of the game since it is so reliant on creating the LOTR atmosphere. On a current PC the game is just beautiful and really puts you in the mood. I think its less hardcore than WoW too which is not necessarily a bad thing.

  • Blacknimbus #19 3 years ago


    Let me play something other than Humans, Hobbits or Elves and I'll be back.

    And no, I don't want to play a Dwarf either.

  • Dizzy #20 3 years ago

    "@Dizzy - Well I certainly didn't think it was better so stop being so high and mighty about it. LOLing indeed! /rolls eyes "

    The ROFL was that you are looking for another WOW. Just stick to WoW if you want another WOW.