With the release of the new Lord of the Rings film “The Desolation of Smaug”, we take a look at the free-to-play fantasy MMORPG Lord of the Rings Online. We wonder what fascination still emanates from this game of a completely different kind.
It can’t be a game to enslave us all, can it?
The strongest backstory of all MMORPGs?
Lord of the Rings Online had a strange starting position from the beginning. While the backstory of competitors often grew from the history of offline computer games (Warcraft, Ultima, Everquest), no source material in the fantasy sector is as prominent as the story of the Lord of the Rings.
This posed a difficult question for the developer: If we set our game in a world where legendary heroes already exist, what should the players do?
Fantasy role-playing games of this time were full of archers named Leegolas or Darklegohlas. Did one really want a Lord of the Rings game, where in the starting zone twelve atrocious spellings of Legolas meet eighteen variations of Gandalf? And above all – what should these heroes do? Destroy the Ring?
That was hardly feasible. After all, millions of moviegoers would have noticed if behind Frodo and Sam there was an army of backup heroes.
Furthermore, hardcore Tolkien fans already found Peter Jackson’s interpretation too daring and quick. A version of the Lord of the Rings tailored to the modern wants of moviegoers with ADHD. The purists wrinkled their noses. The fantasy fans, to whom such things did not matter, were already playing WoW.
Another problem was that almost every inhabitant of Earth has precise ideas of what the world of HDRO must have looked like.
Every village where hobbits lived had to look exactly like the one from their imagination or at least like the village from the film. And how could one still surprise the player when the key points of the storyline were so clear?
If, in a fantasy game, the player’s usual goal is to be the hero of that game and to change the world for the better – how should that work in the Lord of the Rings when that function has already been taken over by other characters?.
Down to earth, grounded and gruff: The Gimli among MMORPGs?
Lord of the Rings Online had a completely different flair from the often brightly colored competitors from the beginning. While in most competing games, it was normal for a fifth-level wizard to hurl fireballs, a warrior could glow in the dark by level 22, as if he had to serve as a guide for nighttime dragon landings, and where no NPC considered that wild demons were being summoned before their eyes, the developers of Lord of the Rings Online chose the opposite approach: Low-tech, for deceleration.
Even today – after five expansions and in the seventh year of the game – there are still only the four starter races: hobbits, dwarves, elves, and humans. And when a character is created, led through the Shire, and finally finds his way into Bree, he might look up in surprise: Nothing is glowing at all.
Even today, this remains the strongest fascination:
[pull_quote_center]Lord of the Rings Online is pleasantly grounded and low-tech.
No level-8 warrior named Aragorn rides past and pulls a huge purple firestorm behind him while shouting, “OMFG ROFL I’m glowing.” The chat is usually pleasantly quiet. Even the audience seems more mature and agreeable than in many other games, more like a fantasy opera audience.
Unlike most competitors, here the “RP” in “MMORPG” is capitalized, the Roleplay.
Roleplay meets MMO
Character creation
Behavior tips
Dangers and temptations in RP
Little sparkle, little magic: Much atmosphere
Already when looking at the individual classes and their abilities, the difference to other games becomes apparent. An archer in the Lord of the Rings can shoot with the bow, which he does well, but he cannot magically rain down millions of arrows or jump 42 meters backward like a ninja while pulling ice arrows from a magical quiver. An archer in the Lord of the Rings aims for the head or sets a trap.
His enemies are quite fearsome: goblins, orcs, or ogres – but he defeats them with the means of a competent warrior, like a hero, not with those of a superhero or demigod.
This also applies to the other classes. While wounds in other games usually disappear magically, that is not the case in a universe that takes Tolkien seriously: If every injury could be cured with a bit of fairy dust, there would be hardly any exciting story to tell.
Thus, the characters in the Lord of the Rings have morals instead of hit points. The healer is a bard who encourages fighters in the face of terror with cheerful tunes to keep fighting. Although this may sound a bit soft to some, it is fundamentally a consistent way to approach the game concept of “healing”.
The game characters also look different from those in contemporary fantasy games. They are dressed in earth-tone or pastel-colored clothing. The highest fashion is sometimes a fashionable feathered hat that a hobbit lady would wear. Weapons do not sparkle, but are forged or made from better wood.
[pull_quote_center]Crafting – which plays a shadowy role in many games – is fully utilized in Lord of the Rings Online.
While in other games entire trees are chopped down, the diligent hunter in HDRO bends down and hacks off a piece from a branch.
The funny thing is: This makes the storyline seem more personal and dense. The main quests lead from the civilized and orderly world to more and more corrupted zones.
At the beginning, the goal is still to solve a few everyday problems (in roleplay, this means reducing giant spiders or rampaging wolves), leading one to the story around the Fellowship in hostile territory. The player often moves parallel to the famous main storyline and almost feels reverent when he really sees Frodo or Aragorn.
The deceleration of the Lord of the Rings
Through the deceleration of the game and the fact that Lord of the Rings Online takes the source material seriously, it creates a different game feeling and a different rhythm than most competing games. This seems to be what makes the classic so appealing.
This also ensures that, while so many competitors from the last seven years are no longer around, many still enjoy checking out Lord of the Rings Online.
Today’s Lord of the Rings Online player does not have to forego familiar conveniences. Even in HDRO, there is now an instance finder, and the later expansions correspond much more closely to modern role-playing conventions. And to be honest: In the endgame, it does sparkle, gleam, and superhero more than in the original game “Shadows of Angmar”.
[pull_quote_center]The game can now be started with a partially downloaded client.
So, if after watching the movie The Desolation of Smaug you feel like controlling a hobbit yourself, you can do so within half an hour. Maybe it will indeed be a game to enslave?
