A quick take one again, as opposed to my usual amazing, long picture filled reviews, which are obviously world renowned at this point, well maybe not. This is due to some changes within my life mainly with swapping my jobs over, and other things getting in my way of playing my games, it’s a real shitter to be frank with you. So I went with an absolute banger, that really I’m sure most people played at some point during the life cycle of the 6th Gen of consoles.
A game that really brings back the memories of playing on my PS2. For me this is a double whammy of goodness, being a great game and being part of the greatest film series of all time, and I’ll have no one say otherwise on this matter. With the battle of Helms Deep, being the highlight part of the trilogy for me and of this game, it ,makes for a truly underappreciated classic.
Graphically, it isn’t the best, not bad by any means, with the game flicking through pre – rendered CGI cutscenes that blur seemlessly to actual snippets from the films. Albeit a little bit dark in places making it more difficult in certain places than it needs to be, like the second part of the cave troll fight. With levels designed straight from the films as well, with audio either captured by the actors themselves or new lines added in, makes for a faithful adaptation of the first two films. As this game covers bits from the fellowship through to the two towers. Each design differs massively to make the linear levels all feel different, from the harsh mountains leading to the Mines of Balin, the sprawling forrest laden battle field for Amon Hen, and the choatic battlefield of Helms Deep.
The gameplay of the levels allow for multiple replays with different playable characters, the main being Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas. For the most part, the game plays the same, a bit of sword fighting, or axe if you are Gimli, with the addition of archery or throwing axes, which can be triggered by the L1 button, with either random health drops, or arrow resupplys from downed enemies. If you are lucky, you’ll find a crate that when smashed does the same.
Each character levels up to a max level of 8, which with every second tier comes new, combo moves, health increases or damage upgrades. This is obtained via how well you do during the missions, as every action is tallied up from a gauge in the bottom left. This ranges from; fair,good,excellent and perfect. The better you do the more exp you gain. All of which prove to be helpful, as the missions go on. Surprisingly I found this game harder than I remember, nothing too bad, probably just in the middle ground of where it needs to be. This makes it all the more miraculous that I finished it when I was younger and I’m admittedly awful at most games.
Overall I’d certify this game a solid 6/10 so some Tasty Gaming.
Six may seem a little low, considering it’s a fun game, but the missions are fairly short, taking only like 5/6 hours to do the main missions and with some multiple replays using the different characters. Combat is a but clunky, and oddly misses out certain big parts of the first two films like the Balrog fight. As the missions go along you unlock some nice behind the scenes stuff from the actual films, to peruse at your leisure. This being only short snippets so are some good bitesize fun, unless you are like me and have relentlessly watched the extended editions with a fuck loads of extras which obviously I have watched. But it just always feels like little bits were missing or were snipped out during development of the game.
Sony PS2, 21st October 2002
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