Generally speaking, past LOTR games have been excelent, but what happened with Gollum?
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum just launched a few days ago, on May 25th and since then it sparked some controversy over the internet. From small publications to gaming giants, the game received hundreds of reviews some of which were quite pointy. At the moment, the game has a 40/100 score on OpenCritic and 41/100 on Metacritic and the overall situation does not look so good for Tolkien’s character. Let’s see how the biggest critics rated the game and why.
The story
The Lord of the Rings Gollum’s story seemed rather interesting from the trailers and some critics agree with this. God is a Geek’s Chris White claims “that there’s a great story at its heart”, rating it 5 out of 10. The same goes for Hardcore Gamer’s Kevin Dunsmore: he says the game has a really compelling story with a great performance from Smeagol/Gollum rating the game 2/5. Both agree that the good story is completely ruined by the gameplay, but we’ll get there too.
On the other side, we have the critics that did not find The Lord of the Rings: Gollum’s story the same. Aaron Bayne of Push Square says the game has a really dull story, rating it 2/10. The story is described as disjointed by Rock, Paper, Shotgun. The really disappointing fact about the story is that for most of the game, you find yourself in the Mordor prison and critics and fans really hated that.
I, for one, completely agree with the good reviews, because the story of the game isn’t that bad, it’s just the way it is presented. The game had great potential being in such a loved universe, but sadly the way we get to see and feel this Middle Earth plot is not what we need. The story might not be enjoyable at all if you are not a hardcore LOTR fan, hungering for anything from this universe.
Gameplay and mechanics
Diving into gameplay, every level has three phases, which might be anything from bland to downright awful. The chores phase involves Gollum travelling from one waypoint to another to finish a boring task. The scenarios are usually conceptually novel, such as crawling through tight spaces to detonate explosives, but practically speaking, it’s just a series of marches through the same regions. Gollum has an impressive sprint speed, which makes running entertaining, but his stamina meter quickly runs out and takes a long time to refill. Attempting to move forward means moving too slowly, waiting excessively, and hearing Gollum gasp for air frequently. Joseph Yaden of Inverse rated the game 3/10 and said the game is straight-up a bad stealth game.
Although more interesting, the platforming stages still lack good design. Large rooms with handles to climb, walls to sprint against, and leaps to make speed up the action, but the bad movement of Gollum and the clumsy mechanics give it a PlayStation 2 vibe. Spaziogames mentioned the mechanics and gameplay formula make this game “feel too old to be real in 2023” and rated it 5/10. The routes are well laid out and frequently entail blind jumps or educated guesses as to what the next intended handle will be. It seems more like an unhappy copy after the Prince of Persia series, as GGRecon’s Dani Cross calls The Lord of the Rings Gollum an “amateur stealth adventure” after rating it 2/5. The same comes from Guardian’s Nic Reuben, calling it “A derivative, uninteresting and fundamentally broken stealth action adventure that fails to capture anything interesting about Tolkien’s fiction”, which we might say is a bit too rough, but somehow describes the reality of the game.
On top of all this, the game also has numerous technical issues, with the game crashing often and randomly, and controls just not working right. This is backed up by IGN Italy’s Angelo Bianco, rating the game 5.5/10 and Anna Koselke of PCGamesN rating it 3/10.
However, the sound design is excellent. Both Gollum’s trembling, nearly choking speech and Smeagol’s clearer, more timid side are convincingly performed. It sounds just like what one would anticipate after watching Andy Serkis’ portrayal in the films. Even minor aspects stand out as realistic, with excellent attention to detail, such as the sweaty sound of Gollum’s hands slapping on various surfaces as he climbs or sprints, or the echo of ringing bells in specific areas.
An unexpected review comes from Dominic Tarason, straight outta PC Gamer’s furnaces, beautifully describing the game: “For all its many flaws, LOTR: Gollum is an oft-beautiful and oddly endearing adventure”. He rated the game with a whopping score of 64/100. Hats down to Dominic for seeing the good things in the game.
The Lord of The Rings Gollum devs are apologising
There is no surprise that the developers apologised for the not-so-precious release. The developers mentioned: “We would like to sincerely apologise for the underwhelming experience many of you have had with The Lord of the Rings: Gollum upon its release. We acknowledge and deeply regret that the game did not meet the expectations we set for ourselves or for our dedicated community”. Check the full tweet here:
A few words from the " The Lord of the Rings: Gollum™ " team pic.twitter.com/adPamy5EjO
— The Lord of the Rings: Gollum (@GollumGame) May 26, 2023
To sum things up, we mainly agree with most of the reviews because let’s be honest, The Lord of The Rings Gollum has severe issues but we also hold on to the thought that the game still has potential and with some hardcore patching and improving certain elements like the mechanics (maybe a total rework) even this game can be beautiful. The same as Gollum and Smeagol, the game has two faces. Maybe this is what the developers wanted from the beginning, right?
