Post by Al on Nov 15, 2004 23:18:38 GMT -5
I was going to start a Halo 2 thread, but I know X-boxers are scarce around here, so I'll leave it at "it freakin' rocks" and talk about this instead.
Has anyone else checked out LOTR: The Third Age? Despite the laughable plot, it's a pretty cool foray into Middle Earth. For anyone who hasn't head of this, it's the Lord of the Rings done Final Fantasy style--the catch is that you're not playing as Frodo or Aragorn. Instead you get to be the LOTR B-team, comprised of Gondorian guard Berethor, mystical she-elf Idrial, suspciously long-haired and bearded Dunedain ranger Elegost, grumbly dwarf Hadhod, and a few others who seem to be suspicious shades of familiar faces.
It opens in the outskirts of Rivendell soon after the Fellowship has set out, and Berethor wanders the woods on a quest from Denethor to find Boromir. From there, he gathers companions and mops up the Fellowship's chitlins from the southern pass and the Mines of Moria all the way to Pellenor Fields and Minis Tirith.
It's a neat idea, if you can get past the generally dubious premise and some specifically outright apocryphal moments (fighting side-by-side with Gandalf against the Balrog comes to mind*). The game borrows liberally from Final Fantasy X, allowing you to "tag" in and out party members during battle, but that's hardly a bad thing. The graphics are very well done and the voice acting is strong, if woefully underused. It also features an Evil Mode, where you can assume the role of Sauron's minions from a lowely goblin swordsman to the aforementioned Balrog and battle the Forces of Good (tm).
I wish the plot was more character oriented instead of constantly cutting to movie clips, and the difficulty rarely gets more than "mildly frustrating," but there are some really tense fist-pumping-in-the-air, yelling-at-the-screen moments (again- the Balrog battle) that have definitely solidfied the game as wholly recommendable in my mind.
Al
*don't worry, I didn't spoil anything. It's on the cover of the box.
Has anyone else checked out LOTR: The Third Age? Despite the laughable plot, it's a pretty cool foray into Middle Earth. For anyone who hasn't head of this, it's the Lord of the Rings done Final Fantasy style--the catch is that you're not playing as Frodo or Aragorn. Instead you get to be the LOTR B-team, comprised of Gondorian guard Berethor, mystical she-elf Idrial, suspciously long-haired and bearded Dunedain ranger Elegost, grumbly dwarf Hadhod, and a few others who seem to be suspicious shades of familiar faces.
It opens in the outskirts of Rivendell soon after the Fellowship has set out, and Berethor wanders the woods on a quest from Denethor to find Boromir. From there, he gathers companions and mops up the Fellowship's chitlins from the southern pass and the Mines of Moria all the way to Pellenor Fields and Minis Tirith.
It's a neat idea, if you can get past the generally dubious premise and some specifically outright apocryphal moments (fighting side-by-side with Gandalf against the Balrog comes to mind*). The game borrows liberally from Final Fantasy X, allowing you to "tag" in and out party members during battle, but that's hardly a bad thing. The graphics are very well done and the voice acting is strong, if woefully underused. It also features an Evil Mode, where you can assume the role of Sauron's minions from a lowely goblin swordsman to the aforementioned Balrog and battle the Forces of Good (tm).
I wish the plot was more character oriented instead of constantly cutting to movie clips, and the difficulty rarely gets more than "mildly frustrating," but there are some really tense fist-pumping-in-the-air, yelling-at-the-screen moments (again- the Balrog battle) that have definitely solidfied the game as wholly recommendable in my mind.
Al
*don't worry, I didn't spoil anything. It's on the cover of the box.
