The Bottom Line
Pros
- Based on the movie Return of the King, with excellent cinematic scenes and movie clips.
- Voices include those of the original actors from the films.
- Multiple paths and multiplayer gameplay modes.
Cons
- No Save features other than at in game check points.
- Extremely hard.
- Inability to skip through cinematic scenes.
Description
- Eight playable characters with exclusive voice-over provided by the actual actors from the films.
- An all-new co-op multiplayer mode will allow players to team up with a companion.
- Third person action/adventure gameplay, multiple paths for each member of the Fellowship.
- Battle vicious boss monsters including Shelob and the Witch King.
- Immersive musical score composed by Academy Award-winner Howard Shore.
Guide Review - Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
There are three paths to follow in Return of the King. After the battle at Helm's Deep you can follow Gandolf's path, the Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimili's Path, or the Sam and Frodo path. Each character gains valuable experience from battling orcs and other evil minions of Mordor. You can use this experience to add special powers and attack moves to your character's ability.
The controls for Return of the King don't help the game's difficulty one bit. They're hard to learn and next to impossible to master. For even the most experienced gamer I would recommend starting out at the easiest gameplay level to first get feel for the game.
One excellent feature in Return of the King are the graphics and in game cinematics that blend movie and game scenes nicely. This however is even marred by the inability to skip through some of these scenes, especially the opening introduction upon starting the game.
One final annoyance I was finding was the lack of a quick save feature. The game is hard enough with out having to make it through certain parts over and over again starting at predetermined save check points.
For fans of the movie and previous games(for PC gamers that's just Fellowship) don't expect a lot of ground breaking aspects. It's a decent companion to the movie but overall very disappointing in numerous areass.
