Lord of the Rings : Game One

Copyright : Melbourne House | Reviewed by : Patrick Furlong

This is an adventure game based on the first two books in J.R.R Tolkien?s trilogy - The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers. The three stories of The Lord of the Rings will be familar to anyone who has seen or heard of Peter Jackson?s Oscar winning film adaptation.

As Hobbit Frodo Baggins, you with fellow hobbits Sam, Pippin and Merry along with fellow members of the Fellowship - wizard Gandalf, man Aragorn, eld Legolas and dwarf Gimli, head to Mordor where you hope to drop the Ring of Power into the fires of Mount Doom where it was made, ending the revival of Sauron, the Dark Lord. But it will not be easy with the wizard Saurman the White working for him.

This was a brave attempt in 1986 and some editions of the game came with a free paperback copy of The Fellowship of the Ring.

Graphics

The graphics are rather poor although the presentation is intresting. MODE 1 is used here, but not very well. The presentation tries to make it look like a book and makes for an intresting look.

Sound

Not a beep.

Gameplay

Text adventures are one of my favourite style of game, but I couldn?t get into Lord of the Rings. The game is rather slow and it is very easy to get lost.

Overall:

A brave attempt, but Melborne House didn?t make Lord of the Rings work well as an adventure game. Maybe if they had made it more like the book, it might have worked, but despite being a huge fan of Lord of the Rings, I just didn?t like this game.