I thought I'd share my opinions on a game that I've very recently bought, that wasn't too expensive. Lord of the Rings: War in the North. I would like to say that I've played this on the XBOX 360, and it's also available on the PS3 and PC.

The thing that drew me to this game was two things. 1. Lord of the Rings (Duh). I remember playing The Two Towers and Return of the King on the PS2 when I was... I think nine? Anyway, they were my two favourite games for well over a year. Normally, movie-to-game games have a trend of, well, svcking. Not those games, though! Ah, the memories... Anyway, I'm going off-topic. The second reason was also Lord of the Rings. In case people haven't noticed, Lord of the Rings had lost a lot of popularity as the movies and games that went along with it went into memory. No big LOTR games were being made, and the movies have had a break from 2003 to 2012. Nine year gap. And then, suddenly, a brand new and exciting console game comes out of nowhere! I was excited, but I never ended up getting it until about a week ago.

I was going to get it at Christmas. Thanks to Amazon for ruining that, by the way.

There are a few things to look for in a game, and graphics, I thought I'd say, are not one of them. While a nice touch, they don't make the game for me. I'm interested in...

1. Accessibility (e.g. I won't need any brain power to understand the game, or at least the basics) Please don't mistake this for simplicity. The more the better.

2. Excitement (well, who wants to play a boring and uninteresting game?)

3. True-to-original (I didn't want to see anything that messed with LOTR lore. Innovate within boundaries, so as not to displease fans of the series.

4. Smooth (no glitches, fluid gameplay, etc)

And several smaller factors.

Now! On to the game!

The plot of the game is to halt an evil Mannish Lieutenant of Sauron called 'Argendaur' from warring in the North. (Bet you never saw that coming) You can choose any three characters, and Elf, Man or Dwarf. (where have we heard that before?) For my playthough, I choose the man, a Dunedain ranger. You meet Aragorn in Bree three days before Frodo arrives with the other Hobbitses and the Precious. This I liked, being directly tied into the story, without any collision between the movie/ book and game. You are told to look around in Fornost, somewhere North-East of Bree, which is full of Orcs, and in which Agenduar is chilling. You go there, meet Elronds sons (their names escape me, but they're cool guys) and together you duke through waves of enemy bad guys of several classes. (I'll get into that soon). After this, you go to a Ranger's camp, and then to Rivendell. What's cool is that you can talk to characters of the Fellowship like Frodo, Gimli, Aragorn and Gandalf. Also Bilbo and Arwen. This doesn't collide with the LOTR plot, either. Anyway, I'll leave the rest of the plot out, lest I spoil anything for you guys, but me personally, I found the characters bland and the plot VERY linear and somewhat uninteresting. BTW talking giant eagles. And rock giants.

Gameplay. I thought it was fun. Tedious at times (wave after wave after wave after wave of monkey-orcs irked me, but not in a wholly awful way. More just gave me motivation to kill, which I suppose helped. The combat is basic, 'X' for a light attack, 'Y' for a heavy attack, 'B' to roll, 'RT' to aim a ranged weapon and 'Y' to fire. 'LB' blocks. In some games, I don't feel blocking to be 100% necessary. But screw that, on this game IT REALLY IS. Some enemies are fun to fight, such as the monkey-orcs, Uruk-Hai and Orc Chieftens. But I will guess something now, and I'll admit I'm wrong if I am. After you've fought two trolls, you'll cry whenever you see another. Those bastards are TOUGH. And NASTY. Seriously there's one level with THREE at once, and it took me, the Elf and the Dwarf about three minutes to kill one. By then all of my healing potions were gone, and half my arrows (you do NOT want to get within melee range of those...) and then came two more... After several failed attempts (I gave up on eight) I just ran through the mission. I'm ashamed... The combat is fast enough, and I do enjoy it. There were little to no glitches, which is always nice. However, I don't think I could do an all-nighter on it like I have on other games. The combat gets pretty repetitive and I got to the point where I could just strip off my knackered gear for better stuff, and see more cutscenes. Fun, but a little tedious after a while. Some of the enemies literally won't die. A minor boss (without a health bar but tough and noticeable such as a troll takes about five minutes solo. I didn't even manage, the AI allies had to help me, ONE of them is that tough. Orc Chieftans, two of them against one... I'll just lie down and die, save them the exertion. No chance.

Overall ratings!

Gameplay: 7/10 - Fun, but repetitive. But not bad.

Graphics: 7/10 / 5/10 - 7 for consoles, a 5 by PC standards, when running average.

characters - 3/10 - If this wasn't LOTR, it's probably a 1.5 from me. Besides the introduction of actual characters, there was nothing interesting to me.

Plot: 6/10 - Interesting-ish, but very linear and predictable. Again, if a standalone game, probably scored lower.

Mechanics: 5/10 - There is potion-making, which is always nice. And the fact that items would degrade with use added a little something to the mix, so you'd have to visit one of the dead towns every now and then. Also, lots and lots of armour and weapons, so you can be unique-ish.

Depth: 4/10 I feel that they could have gone deeper with this. The safe havens, towns and such between quests, are for recuperation, repairing, healing, stuff like that. But Bree has a dozen people in it. And it's always night time. And always raining. I feel like Snowblind didn't try all too hard with these areas of the game. Also, you can find useless loot that only takes up inventory space and is purely for selling. Why not just give us more money? These items should have some other use, so it would make the player think 'To sell or not to sell?'

Atmosphere: 7.5/10 - Very Lord of the Rings. The brilliant mountains of the North, the rivers and valleys and grasslands of the Shire, the corrupted and dark Fornost, and the humongous Dwarven cities. Awesome.

Cheesiness: 9/10 - Good god, this game is CORNY. They've went all out on the cheese factor, it's ridiculous! To be honest, if I'm shot down in battle, I'd be screaming 'FFFUUUUUU************!!!! MY KNEE!!! HELP ME!!! COME ON DUDE, CHRIST!!!", not "Oh, I'm sorely hurt..." and also the very very cliché medieval language, and the overly-friendly-to-friends dialogue. Put up with it in pain, or laugh through the experience, you might do either.

OVERALL RATING:

7/10 - I'd reccomend this game, it's a lot of fun. However, I'd not get it full price. Either get it on Steam sale, from some cheap shop or perhaps second hand. But a good, fun addition to Lord of the Rings!