Image Source: Daedalic Entertainment
Originally announced on 25 March 2019, Daedalic Entertainment has now revealed that their The Lord of the Rings: Gollum game is due to release in 2021 and will be coming to PC platforms, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X.
It looks set to be a promising game, given how high the licensing estate – Middle-earth Enterprises and the Tolkien Estate – sets the bar for companies to attain permission to create such a product.
You only have to look at the hoops that Amazon jumped through to commission their upcoming $1 billion series.
Based on the information provided, The Lord of the Rings: Gollum looks to be, at the very least, an incredibly interesting prospect.
A lot to draw on for The Lord of the Rings: Gollum story
Many of the games from the last couple of decades based on Middle-earth have drawn inspiration from Peter Jackson’s epic cinematic trilogy, including the likes of Shadow of Mordor, The Third Age, The Two Towers, The Return of the King, and The Battle for Middle-earth.
Daedalic’s creation, however, will be based more from the writings of the author, J.R.R Tolkien, following the journey of Smeagol and his alter-ego Gollum after he gets the One Ring by murdering Deagol.
Speaking to the Hollywood Reporter, CEO and co-founder of Daedalic Entertainment, Carsten Fichtelmann, said:
“You already have that big conflict in the character, two voices talking to you continuously, which means there is a good reason there are decisions to make in the game: the Smeagol decisions or the Gollum decision.”
The story will follow Smeagol and Gollum through their journey before they begin to appear in The Lord of the Rings books, skulking after the Fellowship of the Ring in the Mines of Moria.
In the lore, between finding “the precious” and trying to get it back, Smeagol used the ring for stealing and antagonising his relatives until his grandmother disowned him. From there, he became twisted and torn between his love of the One Ring and wanting to be rid of its influence, eventually fleeing to the Misty Mountains.
Gollum goes on to lose the ring to Bilbo Baggins, becoming a spy for and feeder of the great spider Shelob, being captured and tortured by the dark forces of Sauron, and even gets interrogated by Aragorn and Gandalf before he locks onto Frodo.
As Gollum is of unnatural long life due to the One Ring, there’s a lot that can be explored in the upcoming Daedalic Entertainment game.
A game that follows Smeagol’s devolution into the creature Gollum, with his antics getting progressively more sinister as Gollum becomes the dominant personality, could make for a fantastic story.
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum gameplay information revealed
The developers say that a big part of them landing the licence from the Tolkien Estate was that they wanted to create a story-based experience, which will apparently be in the form of a stealth-action adventure game.
As described by Games Radar, citing an interview in Edge Magazine, the game will feature gigantic levels, a dual-personality mechanic, and a “densely wrought aesthetic” inspired by the drawings of J.R.R Tolkien.
The Smeagol-Gollum character is such an intriguing one, and one of the most loved features of The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy and arguably the star of the show in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
Utilising the two sides of the character, especially in an Id and Super-Ego kind of way, is very interesting and could lead to a lot of fun gameplay.
Speaking to Edge, the German game studio also promised that each gigantic level would host a persistent environment in which there are many lines of quests.
The player will also have to navigate friendly and unfriendly NPCs during their adventures through the massive locations.
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is set to be the first of a series of games in a partnership between Daedalic Entertainment and Middle-earth Enterprises.
Hopefully, on the way to its 2021 release, the developers will reveal more information and perhaps some gameplay footage.
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