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Lord of the Rings: Conquest
This never happened in the movies. As we were escorting Frodo through Minas Tirith, he was grabbed by a troll and thrown through the air like a pebble. Seeing his lifeless corpse bounce off a rooftop was actually quite amusing. Being forced to replay the level from the start — for something we barely had a chance to prevent — was not.
A capture-the-rally-points and do-other-lovely-chores snoozer that’s extremely reminiscent of the Star Wars: Battlefront series, Lord of the Rings: Conquest is full of frustrating moments like this. Though you’re given a generous number of lives with which to complete each campaign mission, many scenarios cause missions to end instantly. The most common one is being killed when you’re protecting a key location: the time it takes to choose your character and respawn means that the positions are often overrun before you have a chance to fight back.
Battling Olyphaunts and siege weapons at Pellenor Fields is also a headache. You have to be in precisely the right position before you can attack them, or else the context-sensitive buttons just don’t appear.
Theoretically, engaging in epic pitched battles like Pellenor and Helm’s Deep should be a thrill. But sadly, we’ve seen bigger and more exciting fights at the mall during post-holiday sales. Conquest lacks drama because at the most, you’ll see about 20 to 30 enemies onscreen at a time. There seem to be hundreds of foes off in the background, but they’re impossible to get to and might as well be cardboard cutouts.
Playing as the ranged character classes — the mage and archer — is reasonably similar, although the aiming seems a little twitchy. It’s when you play as the hack-and-slash classes — the warrior and scout — that frustration digs in. Cutting through orcs and uruk-hai is easy enough, but it’s nearly impossible to do it without suffering tons of damage in the process. You have lots of useful combos but no lock-on options, and the blocking system is so vague that it’s hard to tell if you’re actually defending yourself. Most fights involving the warrior are a war of attrition, relying on having enough lives to see you through.
Campaign mode is also a disappointment, even when you get to play as Sauron’s orcish horde. Summoning the Balrog and riding an Olyphaunt are highlights, but the game just fails to create any drama. The battle between Saruman and Gandalf involved shooting lightning bolts at each other for five minutes. Sob.
Multiplayer is a slight improvement, mainly because it feels competitive and you don’t have to worry about tedious objectives that seem like they’re shoehorned in. These 16-player matches go back to conquest and flag-capturing basics, and with twice the number of players, they actually could have been quite impressive.
It’d be too easy to say that Conquest will appeal only to diehard Tolkien fans; in fact, they’re the ones most likely to hate it. The next time we go back to Middle-earth, we really, really hope it’s because the epic RPG that this license so richly deserves has finally been made.
On Xbox 360
+ Multiplayer passes the time; plenty of levels.
- Battles are too small; frustrating mission failures.
- Combat system is poor.
? Was anyone really just sitting forlornly by their 360, hoping for a new Lord of the Rings game?
4.0
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SquirrelOfRock
January 25, 2009 at 3:09pm
I know the campaign can be bad at some times, but this game isn't that bad.
djpotatohead
January 21, 2009 at 10:51am
Thanks for the good review. I did try the demo and did not like it so much. Thank you for saving me some money!!!
SuperPowers762
January 18, 2009 at 5:29pm
Everyone this guy does not know what he's talking about this game is great. The Reviewer is someone who has probably never played battlefront. he has no idea what he is talking about and you shouldn't listen to him. This game is not a 4 is a 7/7.5 still very good if your interested. This magazine need to pick the right people for the job. Ben you have no idea what your talking about
FreestyleLemons
January 16, 2009 at 9:29pm
Wow am I the only one who likes this game? Yeah campaign is hard, but it still remains fun and addicting. Multiplayer isn't the best and should hold more people, but I liked Battlefront and this is LOTR Battlefront. I personally would give it 7.5-8.0
jgibson75
January 15, 2009 at 12:29pm
Ouch. I bought this game on day one, but I haven't had a chance to even open it yet. Looks like I'm glad I didn't... this isn't the only bad review this one has got... the highest score on GameRankings.com is a 7 out of 10 from IGN, the rest are even worse... looks like I'll be returning this bad boy and saving my money for something better. Keep Violence Virtual. Play a Video Game Today!
BlitzGear
January 14, 2009 at 11:13am
Darn it. I was hoping that there would be some Two Towers' sized battles. I better go put my Ring back in the collection...sigh.
BallDontLieDP
January 14, 2009 at 10:53am
Dallas, don't sweat it. I've had my 360 since launch, and although I've never gotten the RROD, I did have my GPU die on me. I sent it in to MS. Not only did they replace the faulty part, but they gutted my 360, replacing the DVD drive, CPU, and adding more heat sinks, bringing it up to the specs of the current off the shelf systems. Waiting the 2 weeks for the process sucked, but now I have full confidence in my rebuilt system.
dallasquake
January 14, 2009 at 5:31am
It is clear the Ben did not like this game. I am a HUGE fan of the Star Wars Battlefront games and the Demo was just like it. I am definitely willing to pay full price for this game and will! This will hold me over till Star Wars Battlefront 3 for the 360. Though Lucas Arts will be looking for a new developer as the one working on it was just shut down! The VERY sad thing is that I just got my first RROD on my 360, So I will be buying this for my PS3. I Took care of my 360 like it was a baby, never tipping it on its side nor leaving disc in, and it worked well over 2 years...so now my baby is off to be repaired and I doubt I will get my exact console back..DOUBLE SIGH!!!
Spybreak
January 14, 2009 at 3:27am
It's Pandemic, a used to be great studio. I played Mercs 2 and couldn't stand it and I loved Mercs 1. I was skeptical when they were going to release the lotr game while Mers 2 still had plenty of bugs and issues. Just bad timing, I just read EA said take it easy to Pandemic.
BallDontLieDP
January 13, 2009 at 10:13pm
After playing the demo, this review is no surprise. I actually couldn't wait for the demo to end. As a huge LotR fan, this was a major disappointment, but at least I can save myself $60 by not buying it.
ThePorject
January 13, 2009 at 6:51pm
I think this game deserves more,from what Ive played of it, it doesnt seem bad,at least a 7.5
Paul OXM
January 13, 2009 at 5:46pm
Really? I'm the biggest LOTR fan I know in an office full of serious nerds -- replica of Sting proudly mounted in my bedroom! -- and I'm not. At least, not waiting for another weak hack-n-slasher. A LOTR RPG would be most intriguing, but sadly, Conquest is just not a well-executed Battlefront clone.
blackkfox
January 13, 2009 at 5:37pm
"Was anyone really just sitting forlornly by their 360, hoping for a new Lord of the Rings game?" Um... yes? I think a lot of people were. For a Lord of the Rings fan, this game is great -- one of the best yet. If you like Battlefront and you like LOTR, then you'd love this game. Don't let the review fool you. Btw, IGN gave it a 7 out of 10.
Allanon6666
January 13, 2009 at 5:23pm
NNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!! You've got to be kidding me, I was waiting for this game and simply praying it was going to be epic.........
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