Considering that I've never turned more than a combined two dozen pages of all of Tolkien's works, what should've been an enlightenment course has really only convinced me to just stick to the Peter Jackson interpretations. Many scenes there were excised from the film come off as cheesy affairs, halting the game to a standstill, and the game especially hits the pavement with the Tom Bombadil character, who was gracefully thumbed past in the movie. Is it because he doesn't represent well in the 21st century? Or because of Surreal Software's motionless camera and clumsy direction? But honestly, how can anyone make a fat guy singing to an ugly tree and a withered monster of privation seem exciting? Also, the final battle, in which Aragorn fights a Ring Wraith on a dragon, is so anti-climatic that it's impossible to tell the game's over until the credits start rolling, partly because the game's very short in length and the last fight was strangely easy (I don't think I took in more than a few hits). Needless to say, the movie's modified ending is much better.

"Stop, stop comparing it to the movie" may be the outcry, but that actually brings up an important point. Why release this when the movie(s) are still so freshly etched in our minds, so that when inevitable comparisons arise, the fight that the game puts up is entirely laughable. What imagination this game could've sparked is slaughtered by its doublet's 100-million-dollar splendor of CGI, top-billed actors, and elaborate set design. The recent trend is to make spin-offs or pseudo-sequels to dodge the comparison bullet and, in a sense, adding the film-excised scenes does create a few original dimensions but, as said before, they're all very cheesy. This is an unfortunate case of a game that should've come a few years earlier or a few years later than when it did.

Gameplay is so full of problems and mercilessly betrays Surreal Software's supposedly earnest intentions, that if it weren't for the top-drawer voice acting and the tinges of atmospheric radiance, I don't think I would've been able to prevent myself from giving a grade that starts with the sixth letter of the alphabet. First of all, the most paramount rule of a combat game has been broken: Combat is practically unnecessary. Whether you're Frodo, Aragorn, or Gandalf, thanks to a frighteningly large design cleft and loophole, all the work on your part constitutes herding a pack of enemies (which are all too slow and stupid to attack you during movement) to your invincible comrades, who will make short work of them like they're a walking, breathing slaughterhouse. Maybe it would've been for the best to turn all the spiders, orcs, and goblins into sheep and give Aragorn some golden curly locks and a staff. Admittedly, perhaps I should've made more of an effort to get the full experience of the game, but that doesn't ignore the fact that this is an inexcusable flaw and I'm most definitely not going to go out of my way to make a bad game seem any better than it really is.

The second rule broken is a law of basic gaming staples. For some reason, there is no button that snaps the camera back to the behind-the-shoulders view. Instead what we get is a manual camera that rotates so slowly the game just might as well come with a miniature slattern pushing a giant wooden cog. The first- person camera is beyond useless, because instead of zooming into the eyes of the character, it zooms in the direction the camera is already facing. In all the years I've been playing video games, I don't think I've ever seen anything so lacking in common sense.

The final rule of the Gaming Decalogue so rudely sneered at is that vague one about how all video games should be fun and entertaining or something to that effect. While most of the adventure is colorless and boring, the sneaking segments with Frodo tiptoeing past Ring Wraiths is an exercise in vein-popping consternation. With the useless and supine camera, and no map of the surrounding area and no room for errors, it's just the right mix of invidious frustration and trial-and-error to let a desire of fracturing the disc into pieces boil in the pit of your stomach.

Licensed games, for reasons most apparent, often attract the usual assortment of gaming proletariat, miserly hacks, and peanut galleries of developers. So it was to my surprise to see Surreal Software's name stapled to this nonsense, which I guess it goes to show that they're only one-trick ponies (and even then, Drakan is more of a really good idea than a well-executed game). No other logic can explain this unfortunate potboiler and its restricted level design and numerous, unsightly flaws in design that leads to its ruination. And all this coming from the company that Next Generation Magazine once called "an ambitious and talented group"?

Discuss this game in our forums

· · · Sqoon