Bumblejinks Reviews: The Lord of The Rings Online
The penultimate masterpiece of MMO's.
This is it. The big one. The one I've been meaning to get to ever since I first started doing this segment on this website. Few games have ever had such a lasting impact on me as Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO for short). Just about everything I've ever loved about an MMORPG is captured perfectly in this game. And now it's finally time to explain to the world why I feel this is the best MMO of modern times, and why it deserves to stack up to games like World of Warcraft.
The game begins on a pretty high note compared to the last two games we've seen: The entire tutorial segment is one giant instance as your character fights for his/her life against the forces of Sauron, the "Lord Voldemort" of the Lord of the Rings franchise. And that's counting for all three parts of the tutorial sequence. You have the first part where you gain your first couple of levels and learn the very basics of the games combat, then the second part where your free to run around a small boxed area, racking up money, experience, and levels at your leisure while completing a few sidequests, and then there's the third and final part, which consists of a slightly larger then average instance where you put everything you've gained and learned to use before being turned loose into the massive overworld. And when I say massive, I mean MASSIVE!!
The game world of LOTRO is big. It outweighs Wizard101 and Age of Conan easily in it's sheer size, and the world itself is full of things like optional side dungeons, sidequests and even the occasional odd boss to give newcomers a reason to go off the beaten path and explore. And usually, your efforts are rewarded. Not only are things like special armor and weapons up for grabs, but you can also get things like maps to other areas in the game, stat tomes that provide a permanent boost to one of your stats, or even rare lootboxes and sturdy steel keys, which have the potential to shower you in rare and expensive goodies. Or you can just sell them for a little pocket change, if your in to that kind of thing.
The main thing that sells this game for me, however, is the difficulty and challenge balancing. Unlike Age of Conan, this game doesn't feel the need to pile on all of the challenge right out of the gate. For the first 15-20 levels of the game, the challenge is fairly scarce, and the game is very easy and enjoyable because of this. It's not until your around level 30-ish that the challenge begins to ramp up, but by then, your already good and equipped for the challenges that await. Because of this, the game feels fair in terms of it's difficulty and challenge. Whenever I mess up and die, it feels like it's my fault and not because the game is actively trying to beat me down at every turn. Can I say the same for Age of Conan, and it's outright TERRIBLE difficulty curve? Eh, moving on...
If that wasn't enough to sell the game for you, how about the optional content? I've already mentioned the fact that the world is full of things like sidequests and the like to give players an excuse to explore the world, but there's so much more to be had. TONS more, as a matter of fact. Fishing is in the game, but in all honesty, it's nothing you'll lose sleep over if you miss out on it. But things like instances, skirmishes, and even epic battles that you can take on solo or with a team of up to 11 other players, these in themselves can add HOURS to the game. And some of them are a lot of fun.
Then there's the characters and their design, and overall customization. Each race and class has specific advantages and disadvantages that you have to work around in order to progress and succeed, but at no point does it ever feel like your being unfairly overshadowed by the other classes. While the Guardian is universally accepted as the all-around "Tank" class, they are capable of doing some serious damage if you play it right. The fact that you can customize your characters appearance with cosmetic armor and weapons serves to further increase the amount of fun your bound to have just designing your character. And that's not even counting the fact that you can pay LOTRO points to further increase their potential, or just make life easier in general for them. You can even customize the on-screen display if you so desire.
Of course, while the game is magnificent in almost every degree, it's not perfect. I can count a few times where the controls ticked me off, and the LOTRO points system needs a serious overhaul. In the game, there's no limit to the amount of characters you can create, farm LOTRO points with, and then delete and re-roll over and over again, meaning it's possible to unlock everything this game has to offer without ever paying a cent. While I understand that this was probably done on purpose for the sake of the player, I can't help but feel that game design like this is going to end up costing Standing Stone Games tons of money in the future, and that usually spells bad news for me.
In addition, there are also enemies called "Roving Threats" wandering the world past the first four areas. These enemies are usually at the maximum level, and sometimes they can show up and destroy you without any warning. I suppose if you keep a vigilant eye on your radar, you might be able to avoid them, but seriously, why are some of these enemies placed right in the middle of major roads and routes players use to get to and from their quest objectives? I wouldn't call this the best game design idea ever.
Speaking of the first four areas, it's worth noting that everything in these starting areas ( The Shire, Erid Luin, Bree-Land and the Lone-Lands ) is available to everyone who creates a new account, but everything that isn't a main story quest or a shop/vendor is locked in the later areas unless you pay $14.95 a month for VIP access or buy the area with a large sum of LOTRO points, something that I'm sure is bound to drive hardcore free-to-play players completely nuts. There are workarounds available to help curve the frustration for some of those players, but it can still be annoying for those who don't have a somewhat large pocketbook on hand.
That's another thing I really love about this game: Every area looks absolutely BEAUTIFUL, even to this day! The Shire is playful and even somewhat cartoony in it's design, Bree-Land looks just like it did in the movie, except five times better, and of course, Angmar looks and feels downright threatening. It really is amazing what they were able to do with this game, considering it's on a 32-bit engine. And like Wizard101, no one theme overstays it's welcome, and every region in the game looks vast and different from the area that came before it. Sure, there are a couple of areas where some of the plant life is recycled from earlier areas, but every area still looks different from the one that came before it. Absolutely no regrets here.
If there's one other thing I got to credit this game for, it's the fantastic soundtrack. Many of this games songs are composed beautifully. How about that epic opening theme when your on the character selection screen? How about those dramatic, emotionally moving themes you sometimes hear in epic battles like Retaking Pelargir? How about that catchy bagpipe song you hear in the Trouble in Tuckborough skirmish? This games soundtrack is practically perfect from my perspective, and it's by far the best one out of any MMORPG I've played to this day. Toontown Online and Wizard101 come close, but they can't quite seem to keep up with this games beautiful and enchanting music. The sound effects are all top-notch, to, even if there's the odd moment where they fail to play at the right time, like the sound of your weapons hitting when fighting the female brigands in Bree-Land. It's honestly not something I would have noticed if someone hadn't told me to listen for it.
Of course, like any other MMO of this scale, there are guilds ( Kinships in this game ) and parties ( Fellowships ) to help you get through the more challenging portions of the game, or to give you a means of hanging out with friends and having some fun between areas and major quests. The amount of "Just-For-Fun" content in this game probably outweighs World of Warcraft. There's special emotes to collect, items to find and buy, and all sorts of other goodies to be had. Heck, you can even get different frames for your character portrait in the upper-left corner of the screen. The amount of festivals and special events in this game is also incredible, and while they may become nothing but boring or even tedious grind fests to older players, new players are sure to get a kick out of them. Tee-hee!
And last, but most certainly not least, we have the PvP. Unlike most MMORPG's, LOTRO takes a very different approach to PvP. While it is possible for players to spar with one another in the regular game world, there's an entirely different area set aside for what's known as PvMP, or Player VS Monster Player. Upon reaching level 10 with a regular character, players unlock the ability to play as a monster in service to Sauron. These Monster Players are then turned loose into the PvMP map to go about and cause trouble for the Free Peoples, all while the non-monster players attempt to stop their progression. What makes PvMP interesting is that the open-world PvP is always "ON", meaning at any moment, a player from the other faction can show up and murder you, and players from both factions LOVE to group up to crush their opponents. Some servers have little to no activity in the PvMP area, but in some others, the PvMP battles never seem to end. While many people complain about the balancing between the classes in PvMP, there's no doubt in my mind that it will serve as a suitable distraction from the main game. Oh, and did I mention that this game has working voice chat? AWESOME!
In the end, Lord of the Rings Online is a beautifully crafted game, and one that, in my opinion, even surpasses World of Warcraft in terms of it's sheer scale and scope. The areas are amazing, the background music is top notch, the games story goes together with the books and movies perfectly, and the PvP is by far some of the best I've ever seen in an MMORPG. Add in the inclusion of several dozen different events and holidays that promise to keep you busy, a massive game world to explore, numerous sidequests to complete, and the inclusion of things like scalable instances and skirmishes to test your skills against, and you've got what is probably THE best MMORPG in recent years. This game, on top of delivering a fantastic experience in the world of Lord of the Rings, fine-tunes the ever popular problem of difficulty and challenge balancing, while adding in tons of other features to keep players coming back for more.
Besides a few minor nitpicks that I would like to see addressed in a future update, I really don't see how this game could get any better. Standing Stone Games has a mega-hit on their hands, and it's obvious that people love it. I just wish that more people would get online and play it. I do recall having to move to a new server because the one I was playing on had mostly dried up of all the good players, and what the few good players like myself were left with afterwards, as far as finding people to do skirmishes and raids with and the like, was rejected sloppy seconds. Honestly, do some asking around before you start playing, and find out which server is the most heavily populated. This is the one you want to play on.
Unfortunately, however, it's worth noting that an amazing MMORPG can only be good as another one was lackluster. And to me, that's unfortunately the case with Age of Conan: Unchained. While I do respect that games legacy and all the new ideas it brings to the table, I don't think it's an especially good game worth playing today. That is why I can feel confident in saying that I will never play that game again. Lord of the Rings Online has simple surpassed it in ever aspect, and I look forward to replaying the game with all the classes and races to learn all the little tricks and show off my skills in the PvMP. To this day, LOTRO is still the game I use to compare every other MMORPG I've ever played, and really, can you blame me? This game has established some pretty high standards for me. Standards that no other MMO I've ever played to date has ever been able to match. Give this game a try if you ever get the chance. You won't regret it.
**WHAT'S THE SCORE?**
PLOT: What else would you expect from something based on The Lord of The Rings? This games plot is next to none, and it's by far one of the biggest reasons why I love this game. You just never know what's going to happen next! ( 10 )
GRAPHICS: This is, without question, the best looking game I've ever played. Every area looks beautiful, breath-taking, and even downright terrifying at times! And have you seen this game running in 1080p widescreen HD? Skyrim, eat your heart out! ( 10 )
SOUND: The music is amazing, and pretty much every track in this game is a home run hit. While the sound effects do have the occasional hiccup here or there, like Toontown Rewritten, does it really need to be pixel-perfect to deliver an excellent experience? ( 9.7 )
GAMEPLAY: While there are a couple of errors scattered around that could be addressed in a future update, they're not enough to derail the entire experience, which is practically overflowing with content. The PvP is by far the best I've ever seen in any MMO to date. This game WILL keep you busy for a while. ( 9.6 )
REPLAY VALUE: With so many classes and races to choose from, as well as a massive world to explore filled to the brim with more content then Age of Conan and Wizard101 put together, no one playthrough will ever be enough to experience this games full potential. This games got replay value to spare. ( 10 )
FINAL SCORE: 49.3/50