The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age
Tags: good versus evil, violence, action, romantic

Plot synopsis:
Although the main narrative of the game runs parallel to the narrative in the film trilogy, the plot is not intended as an original canonical story to fit into the plot as developed in the films. This is primarily seen insofar as the party are present during certain battles which in the films are solo fights, such as when Gandalf faces the Balrog in The Fellowship of the Ring or when Éowyn faces the Witch-king of Angmar in The Return of the King. The game also features events which don't take place in the films at all; such as a battle between the party and Gríma Wormtongue in Snowbourne, and another against the Eye of Sauron atop Barad-dûr. Throughout the game, Gandalf 'speaks' to Berethor by means of "Epic Scenes"; film clips which the player can collect and which feature original narration by Gandalf. These clips give context to much of the plot and serve to offer advice to Berethor of events in the wider world.
=== Background ===
The game is presented against the background of the history of the One Ring. At the dawn of the Second Age, after the defeat of the Dark Lord, Morgoth, the elves of Eregion forged the nineteen Rings of Power to help themselves, the dwarves and men rule Middle-earth. However, the elves were unaware that Sauron, Morgoth's closest ally, had survived his master's defeat, and in the guise of Annatar had been the one who taught the Elven-smiths, led by Celebrimbor, how to forge the Rings, whilst, in secret, he forged his own One Ring in the fires of Mount Doom, a Ring far more powerful than any of the others. However, in order for the One Ring to be powerful enough to control the other Rings, Sauron had to transfer most of his power into it. As soon as he put it on, the elves became aware of his ruse, removing and hiding their Three Rings, which Celebrimbor had forged without Sauron's aid. Sauron waged war on the elves, conquering much of Middle-earth and killing Celebrimbor. Thus began the Dark Years, when Sauron took possession of the remaining sixteen Rings, giving seven to the dwarves and nine to men in an effort to corrupt them. The dwarves proved relatively immune to the powers of the Rings, acquiring only a greed for gold, and becoming unconcerned with events in the wider world. Men proved less resilient, and the nine kings given the Rings become the nine Ring-wraiths, or Nazgûl, led by the Witch-king of Angmar.
In his ongoing efforts to conquer Middle-earth, Sauron regained the allegiance of many of Morgoth's servants from the First Age, and successfully corrupted Númenor. However, in doing so, he expended a great deal of his power, and lost the ability to ever again assume a pleasing disguise. Returning to Mordor, he regained his strength, eventually capturing Minas Ithil. However, realizing that if they did not join together, Sauron would destroy both men and elves, Elendil, High-King of Arnor, and Gil-galad, High-King of Noldor, formed the Last Alliance of Men and Elves, and attacked Sauron in his fortress, Barad-dûr. The alliance was victorious, with Isildur cutting the One Ring from Sauron's hand. However, although presented with a chance to destroy the Ring forever, Isildur, already beginning to succumb to its corruption, chose not to do so. As such, although Sauron's physical form was vanquished, his spirit, bound to the Ring, survived. Some time later, Isildur was attacked and killed by a band of orcs, and the Ring was lost in the river Anduin for over two thousand years.
Meanwhile, during the Third Age, a still weakened Sauron covertly established a stronghold at Dol Guldur. In response to this undetermined evil, the Valar sent five Maiar to Middle-earth. Taking the form of wizards, they were led by Saruman. Unsure of the origin of the evil power in Dol Guldur, the wizard Gandalf was sent to investigate. However, Sauron hid from Gandalf, waiting for four hundred years before returning. Around the same time, the One Ring was found by a Hobbit named Sméagol, who became utterly corrupted by it, living in the caves of the Misty Mountains, and physically transforming into a creature known as Gollum. For five hundred years, Gollum was consumed and corrupted by the Ring. Eventually, Gandalf was able to determine the evil presence in Dol Guldur was indeed Sauron. Gandalf reported back to the White Council, but Saruman dissuaded them from moving against Sauron. Only when he learned the One Ring may be in the vicinity of the Gladden Fields did Saruman agree to attack Sauron, hoping to find the Ring himself. The Council drove Sauron from Dol Guldur, unaware that he knew the Ring had been found. Just prior to Sauron's departure, the Ring passed to another hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, who used it to assist in the victory of elves, men and dwarves at the Battle of the Five Armies. Sixty years later, Gollum was captured by orcs, and taken to Mordor, where he was tortured into revealing the owner and location of the Ring; Bilbo Baggins of the Shire. In the meantime, Bilbo had left the Shire to live in Rivendell, and upon the advice of Gandalf had (very reluctantly) given the Ring to his nephew, Frodo Baggins. With the information given him by Gollum, Sauron, still unable to take physical form, thus sent the Nazgûl to the Shire to retrieve the One Ring. Frodo, and his friends, Samwise Gamgee, Peregrin "Pippin" Took and Meriadoc "Merry" Brandybuck managed to escape the Shire and make it to Bree, where they encountered the ranger Aragorn, the last surviving descendent of Isildur, and rightful heir to the throne of Gondor. Aragorn protected the hobbits on their journey to Rivendell, and upon their arrival, Elrond formed a Fellowship with the goal of bringing the Ring to Mordor to destroy it. The Fellowship is composed of Frodo, Sam, Merry, Pippin, Aragorn, Gandalf, a silvan elf from Mirkwood named Legolas, a dwarf from Erebor named Gimli, and a man from Gondor named Boromir, son of Denethor, Steward of Gondor.
=== Plot ===
The game begins with Berethor (voiced by Rhys Lloyd), a captain in the Citadel Guard of Gondor, travelling to Rivendell to find Boromir at the behest of Denethor. On the outskirts of Rivendell, he is attacked by the Nazgûl, but is rescued by Idrial (Lori Phillips), an elf in the service of Galadriel. As they travel through the forest, they see a murder of crebain and Idrial deduces Saruman (Christopher Lee) has betrayed the elves leaving Middle-earth for the Grey Havens. Seeing her convoy under attack by Isengard orcs, she and Berethor intervene. They then head to Caradhras to seek any further survivors, and there meet Elegost (Chris Edgerly), a Dúnedain ranger hunting wargs. They learn the Fellowship tried to pass over Caradhras recently, but were prevented from doing so by a snowstorm unleashed by Saruman, and so they instead elected to pass through the mines of Moria. Elegost explains he was hunting with a dwarven companion when they were caught in the storm, and separated. The three head towards Moria, soon finding the dwarf, Hadhod (Lewis MacLeod).
Upon entering Moria, Hadhod learns the rumors regarding Balin and the dwarves are true; they have been wiped out by orcs. They pursue the Fellowship, finding themselves on the floor below them, and seeing a Balrog ascending from the depths. They follow it, eventually reaching the Bridge of Khazad-dûm. There they join Gandalf (Ian McKellen) as he faces the Balrog. They help him to victory, but are unable to prevent him falling from the bridge. However, unbeknownst to the Fellowship, Gandalf is resurrected by the Valar. Meanwhile, the party exits Moria and follows in the footsteps of the Fellowship, passing through Lothlórien.
They soon learn that Boromir is dead, that Frodo and Sam have headed towards Mordor to destroy the Ring, and that the rest of the Fellowship have gone to Rohan. They too head towards Rohan. However, Saruman has used his agent, Gríma Wormtongue, to corrupt Théoden, King of Rohan, manipulating him into banishing Éomer, captain of the Rohirrim. Saruman plans to use the division caused by this to destroy Rohan. The party meet the resurrected Gandalf, who tells them they must assemble Éomer's men and head towards Helm's Deep, where Rohan will make a last stand against Saruman's army. In the meantime, Gandalf will attempt to release Théoden from Saruman's curse. Soon thereafter, they meet a woman named Morwen (Lori Phillips), who joins the party on the road to Helm's Deep in the hopes of finding her family. Having assembled Éomer's scattered forces, the party begin to make their way to Helm's Deep. On the journey, Morwen reveals she is originally from Minas Tirith, and the party receive word that Théoden has been released from Saruman's spell. On the road, they meet Éoaden (Charles Martinet), a member of Rohan's Royal Guard, who joins them. Soon thereafter, they find the bodies of Morwen's family, killed by wargs, before arriving at Helm's Deep.
Inside the fortress, they prepare for battle. Soon, Saruman's army of 10,000 Uruk-hai arrive. They breach the outer walls using explosives and overwhelm the inner defenses. As Berethor fights, he suddenly hears the voice of Saruman telling him he shall be punished for his betrayal. Gandalf and Éomer arrive with the Rohirrim, attacking and decimating the Uruk-hai army. Meanwhile, the Ents, roused to war by Saruman's partial destruction of Fangorn Forest, lay siege to Orthanc, ending Saruman's involvement in the war. Gandalf then explains to Berethor why he heard the voice of Saruman - Berethor was captured by Saruman, who put him under a spell. Saruman believed Boromir would take the Ring from Frodo, and Berethor's job was to take it from Boromir and return it to Saruman. However, Boromir did not take the Ring. Knowing of Saruman's plan, Gandalf and Galadriel sent Idrial to find Berethor and stay by him until the spell could be broken, and with the destruction of Orthanc, Berethor is freed from the spell.
Gandalf tells the party that Sauron will now turn his eye to Minas Tirith. Gandalf rides on ahead, and sends the party to the ruined city of Osgiliath, to stand alongside Boromir's brother, Faramir. As they await the arrival of the army, Berethor muses that Osgiliath seems familiar to him. Éoaden remembers a Gondorian warrior who fought under Boromir during the defense of the city some time ago, but who fled the battle in fear. The party realize that Berethor is that man. He vows he will never flee again, and the party join Faramir in a fight against Gothmog. They defeat him, but he flees before they can kill him. Gandalf then summons the party back to Minas Tirith. Before they leave, however, Berethor learns the reason he fled Osgiliath was because he was stabbed by a Morgul blade, the tip of which is still within him. He and Idrial face the Witch-king, but Idrial explains he cannot harm the Witch-king whilst the blade is still inside him. He cuts it out and they attack the Witch-king, driving him off. The party then head to Minas Tirith.
They reach the city just after the Mordor army has breached the main gate, with orcs rampaging through the streets. Meanwhile, the Witch-king confronts Gandalf, who is joined by the party in the fight. During the battle, they hear the horns of the Rohirrim, and the Witch-king flees. The party head to the citadel at the top of the city, where they witness the death of the insane Denethor at the hands of Gandalf. They then learn that Aragorn is on his way with the Army of the Dead. The battle moves to the Pelennor Fields as the Rohirrim charge the Mordor army. The Witch-king attacks Théoden, and Éowyn comes to his aid. The party join her as she fights and they are able to defeat him. Soon thereafter Aragorn arrives with the Army of the Dead, who wipe out the Mordor army.
As the party celebrate, the eight remaining Nazgûl attack, stabbing Morwen. They defeat the Nazgûl, and Aragorn is able to save Morwen's life. He then tells the party the entire army is to march on the Black Gate to distract Sauron from Frodo's approach to Mount Doom. At the same time, the party attack the Eye of Sauron itself. As they fight, Frodo successfully destroys the Ring, and Sauron is defeated. In the aftermath of the victory, Gandalf tells Berethor he will face more adventures, saying "Your tale has hardly begun."

Review: Doesn't break the LOTR licence trend one bit. In other words, the game is based around unbalanced play, annoying repetition, an over-reliance on the power of recognition, and little else. This is especially sad, given that the game had so much potential to be more. Unfortunately, EA Games has long had the attitude of "who cares if it is good? It has Brand X on it, it will sell!". They killed the Command & Conquer franchise with this attitude, and it looks as if they intend to milk every last drop from The Lord Of The Rings without changing it one little bit. To its credit, the Final Fantasy-style combat structure does manage to engage the player for the first couple of realms, but it all goes downhill in a hurry after that. This is not surprising when one considers that the game was made by EA, who have long shown no interest in what happens to the player's sense of enjoyment once they have money. It is difficult to believe that this is the same company that produced such innovations as California Games.The Third Age's plot, such as it is, revolves around a party of adventurers who follow something of a similar path to the Fellowship depicted in the film trilogy. Therein lies the first mistake of the game. By following the films too closely, it inherits all the mistakes. Gone are all the truly interesting aspects of Tolkien's universe, only to be replaced by long, tedious strolls through very linear mazes, or equally tedious battle events, which pop up so frequently during the aforementioned walks that it is a wonder epileptics haven't shown violent reactions. More interesting to note is the promise of authentic footage from the films to pick up as a bonus during the game. It would have been nice if this had meant footage that viewers of the films in any form have not seen at least three times already. Sadly, it does not. Not only is footage from the film all they show, so little is used that one can expect to see each segment, in different edits, at least a dozen times.But the real evidence that EA Games did not do their homework lies in the battle sequences. The biggest problem with them, in a nutshell, is balance. Early on in the game, it is possible to win the most difficult combats if one keeps their head on right and focuses on strategy. It is not until we get to Rohan, however, that the balance problem really comes out to attack. I would be willing to bet generously that if one were to take a couple of hundred hours worth of footage of people playing this game, then edit everything out bar the missed strikes, missed strikes from the player characters would outnumber those of the CPU characters by a factor of at least ten to one. I realise it is hard to program a margin of human error into an artificial intelligence, but this goes way beyond unbalanced. This is what those of us who remember the good old days when games had only gameplay to rely upon call rigged. I am going to keep saying it until either I die or they listen, but between making a short game and making one that feels rigged after a mere few hours' play, making the short game is the smarter choice.Unfortunately, this rigged feel just keeps building and building until it reaches truly ludicrous heights. It is possible to even reach situations where all of your characters are low enough on health that a singular blow may kill them, but the enemy has stolen enough health from your characters that it is as if they never received a scratch. Couple this with the aforementioned miss/dodge ratio, and you can see that this game has big problems. Indeed, it is only because I kept my temper and purchased an Action Replay program in order to swing the balance back to something that approximates fairness that I have not thrown this disc at a nearby road. During the Minas Tirith sequences, it is utterly impossible to win combats without doing this. The use of blows that take the balance of turn sequencing away doesn't help, either.All of this would be forgivable if the characters were likable enough to make the player care about their personal quests. They accomplish this to some extent. While the lead hero gets boring, even childish after a while, the saving grace with the characters is Hadhod, the Dwarf. Perhaps EA were trying to atone for the appalling racist Dwarf caricature of the film trilogy by proxy. Either way, if they had focused on this character during the game rather than the beaten-to-death Men or Elves, this might have made the story vaguely compelling. As it is, the rest of the cast have about as much depth as an episode of Neighbours, and often a delivery to match. I realise that voice actors for video games almost always record their voiceovers before they get to see any game footage, but even if they have to deliver the most stilted of dialogue, they could at least try to sound like warriors in combat rather than a bunch of excited schoolchildren.After playing through the game in about 45 hours, I have to say that I am incredibly reluctant to approach it again. It just doesn't work, and that's simply appalling. Tolkien adaptations in the digital realm have not progressed one inch since the days when The Hobbit was first rendered as a text-based adventure for the Vic-20. Licensors such as EA Games should hang their heads in shame for that.. A long LOTR game that's fun and will pass the time nicely. Lord of the Rings: The Third Age hasn't gotten some bad rap from some who have played it. They said the game was to slow, the voice acting was bad, or anything else the could think of. I've read the books, seen all three films, an played most of the games released since 2001. LOTR: The Third Age is more RPG-style then action game and this hurts it on some levels and strengthens it on others.Instead of being Aragorn or Frodo you're the Gondorian Knight Berethor sent by the Steward of Gondor to find the ring and his son. Along the way you're confronted by Gandalf and told that the Stewards mind is corrupt and Gandalf gives you a new mission. To help the Fellowship in its quest. From here you'll meet an Elf of Lothlorien, a Dwarf of Moria, and various other characters to help you in your quest. You'll go from the Mines of Moria, to the plains of Rohan, to the White City. Intersecting with the game are about a hundred or so cut scenes from the films all featuring the voice of Ian McKellen. The thing I liked about this film is the way it takes you around all of Middle Earth. You go to Moria, Rohan, Rivendell, Gondor, it's quite an adventure. The creators could have thought up a little better story line then just some random guy helping Gandalf. The voice-acting is fine and the graphics are top-notch bit one problem I did have was enemy difficulty. Even if your on easy it is nearly impossible to kill some bosses, the Balrog above all others and the way that characters just randomly join you was not well-planned. The game is fun though and you will most likely enjoy yourself. Some parts are weak but the visuals are stunning and the outline of the game flows well with the characters.The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age. Featuring the voices of: Christopher Lee, Ian McKellen, Lori Phillips, and Chris Edgerly.Flow: 4/5Difficulty:2/5Design: 4/5Overall: 3 1/2 out of 5 Stars