Mini review: (Recommend to read before purchase)

Just bought it, completed it very quickly (two days of casual play). Quick mini review:

Graphics: (5/10)
The first level is very deceiving as the graphics look very nice, from then on the environments are very bland and the shadow textures are awful. Framerate can get a bit choppy in some parts too.

Sound: (7/10)
The lord of the rings music from the films plays throughout the game and of course it's epic. The main drawback is the in game sounds (including in game voice acting). It sounds incredibly scratchy and not something you expect to hear on any handheld.

Gameplay: (7/10)
It's the lego formula so not much has changed there. Different characters have different abilities and collect different items along the way though it's a very basic system. The combat is pretty fluid and there is enough variety in characters to keep changing to mix things up.

What is different from the console version? EVERYTHING
Although in it's own right this is not a bad game I cannot stress the amount of content that is missing in this game that I know will be in the console version. In the console version you can collect mithril to upgrade your abilities, you can switch weapons on the fly. There are entire levels scrapped from the Vita game, there are far less story clips in the Vita version. You only have to watch a trailer and I can assure you a lot of the stuff you see doesn't happen in the vita version. There is no open World element really just expanded hubs you can walk to. In an interview the developer said they were going to 're-imagine middle earth' and you could walk from mirkwood to mordor.

Overall (6/10 or 2/10)

On its own merits its not a bad game (just incredibly simple, even for lego) but I can assure you if you want the full experience skip this and wait for the console version. It's so frustrating they have given the Vita such a dumbed down port when it could handle SO much more.

Hard to say really because in their own rights they are not bad games, it's just there is a superior console version which is leaps and bounds better. I would say if you love gaming on the go then buy it, if you love lego games and have a console by that version in stead. With regards to whether you should buy HP or LOTR is entirely down to preference over which franchise you prefer more. I would say LOTR does a better job at bringing the franchise to life but if you prefer HP to LOTR then go for that.