Must play for Tolkien fans. Gameplay breaks no new ground, but is helped by creative use of instancing to advance plot.
GAMEPLAY: 8/10
No big new ground here. The interface and action is extremely similar to WoW, mostly watching cooldown timers while autoattacking. The majority of the game world is PvE only, and players can only fight one another in a special zone where some of them choose to play monsters. This is a good thing if you like PvE, as it frees them from incessant tweaking and whining comparing one class to another that characterizes WoW. The classes are clearly defined; nobody is going to roll the tank or healer class and complain they can't do enough DPS. The trait system allows flexibility, and makes it fairly easy to shift your character's strengths as often as you like. The group conjunctions (Fellowship attacks) available in party add an interesting wrinkle to group combat. The game is extremely casual and solo friendly. Tons of solo and small group content rather than the forced grouping that is the hallmark of other MMOs like EQ, FFXI, and Vanguard.
GRAPHICS: 10/10
Perhaps the most visually stunning MMO ever. While the character models and gear are a little bland, the landscapes are absolutely gorgeous and extremely detailed. Fields gently sway in the breeze. Water captures the reflections of the night sky, nearby surrounding, and even your character if you stand over it. The overall look is extremely reminiscent of the Peter Jackson movies - which is a good thing, IMO, since those received multiple Academy Awards for their beautiful design. Character and monster animations are smooth and detailed. Overall, sometimes I play just to see the place, like the time I made the looooong run to Rivendell just to see the most beautiful valley I have ever seen in a video game.
SOUND: 8/10
Sound quality is good. Background music is appropriate to each area - the Shire is light, happy, folksy music, the dwarf halls is deeper, somber, more matrial music, Rivendell is sweeping, beautiful yet sad. Instruments sound like the ones that would be appropriate for the time - lutes, harps, horns, flutes, etc. It's background music, and sets the appropriate tone without
In fact, one of the cooler parts of this game is your player can PLAY music. You can train to play certain instruments, buy one from a bard, and play songs using a keymapping system that allows you to hit any note you like. Nobody will toss out their 88-key electronic piano-style keyboard for their QWERY any time soon, but it allows players to bring passibly decent tunes to local taverns and street corners. It also allows you to hear the less-talented (like me) massacring "Row, Row Your Boat" - but hey.
Voice acting is limited, but very good. Narration is provided by either Ian McKellan himself or somebody who sounds exactly like the Gandalf from the movies. Similarly, many of the dwarves sound very much like they were voiced by Jon Rhys-Davies (Gimli). Aside from narration, it's only little snippets from NPCs, but the tiny bit that's there is good.
The one annoying part is the battle noises of some characters, specifically the yells of Captain and Minstrel battle cries and the constant Gimli-like bellowing of dwarven fighters. Although other battle sounds are excellent, these are so obnoxious I had to dock points.
VALUE: There's a huge amount of content to explore at launch, with a free expansion already planned for June. For a $50 up front and $10-15/month you get dozens of hours of play per week - no movie or book matches that value. The experience is a blast for any Tolkien fan and the attention to detail in plotting and game design make one look forward to the next part of your central epic quest or next area to explore.
REVIEWER'S TILT: A big question is "are you a fan of Tolkien?" If not, what you have is a beautiful, casual friendly MMORPG that breaks little new ground. If yes, and obviously I am, then the value of stepping inside Tolkien's grand vision is huge. There are so many ways in which this game could have gone wrong and made the millions of Tolkien fans world-wide gnash their teeth. Instead, it followed in the steps of the Peter Jackson movies in providing a stunning vision of Middle-Earth that seemed to capture so much of the feel and look of Lord of the Rings. Even better, the game has the full license to the LotR books, rather than the movies, and has been meticulously researched to be accurate in every tiny bit of lore. The level of detail is what made the Lord of the Rings so popular in the first place - never before (and perhaps never since) has one person so fully fleshed out another entire world down to it's history, myths, sociology, and languages. With a team of Tolkien lore researchers signing off on every detail, LotR Online gets it stunningly RIGHT. That in itself is probably reason enough for a Tolkien fan to give it a try, but thankfully they made the gameplay rich, interesting, and casual friendly enough to make it fun. It doesn't seem to really cater to the power gamer or heavy PvP crowd, but that's okay. After all, WoW became the most successful MMORPG in history by tossing many of the punishing principles of older MMORPGs (heavy death penalties, endless grinds and camping) and focusing on fun first and quest based adventuring. LotRO wisely follows in those footsteps, relying on the richness of the world it presents to make the experience rewarding.
I really can't say how pleasantly surprised with how well LotRO turned out. I wasn't particularly dedicated to the development of it, as I have been busy playing WoW for over two years now and was suspicious of the many potentials for LotRO to fail. In the end - well, like many online gamers I have a guild of friends that keeps me playing WoW even when it gets to be a grind, but as a Tolkien fan for 30 years, this is a stunning achievement.