New Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle Earth 2 Screens and Gameplay Info

Tolkien’s masterpiece was said to have been immortalized by the movie some years back. With the magnitude of success it has gained, not a few doubt that the feat will never be achieved by any franchise in any field of entertainment. Well for people who learned to love fantasy via LOTR, it would have done them good to “fantasize” more. With the upcoming release of Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle Earth 2, ignore all the hype, for once, EA may have earned a ring.

Look at the screens and you’ll have a better (but not quite enough) idea of how rich the gameplay of this title will be. The ship tangled at battle suggests pirate-like confrontations (giving the game both land and air action). But wait (no, this is not home tv shopping), you might want a view from the top? Well, the image with a dragon simply describes battle including flight-gifted creatures. The best part can be noted on the third image, an army setup type perfect for gamers who love making conquests or storming seiges.

Well, enough of suppositions, here are some hardcore facts about the gameplay from the recent Pre-E3 event of EA. Staying dog-like loyal to the movie (that was also very faithful to the book), the game will revolve around the battle that’s happening outside of Mordor, while Frodo and his ‘partner’ (sorry for the term) Sam is hiking towards Mount Doom. The gamer is then tasked to hold the reigns of an army – the good side which includes the combined forces of elves and dwarves (sorry girls, no Legolas character), or the bad (bad is such an understatement) guys, which comprises of orcs, goblins, giants and trolls.

More of the screens and gameplay info after the jump.

Tolkien’s masterpiece was said to have been immortalized by the movie some years back. With the magnitude of success it has gained, not a few doubt that the feat will never be achieved by any franchise in any field of entertainment. Well for people who learned to love fantasy via LOTR, it would have done them good to “fantasize” more. With the upcoming release of Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle Earth 2, ignore all the hype, for once, EA may have earned a ring.

Look at the screens and you’ll have a better (but not quite enough) idea of how rich the gameplay of this title will be. The ship tangled at battle suggests pirate-like confrontations (giving the game both land and air action). But wait (no, this is not home tv shopping), you might want a view from the top? Well, the image with a dragon simply describes battle including flight-gifted creatures. The best part can be noted on the third image, an army setup type perfect for gamers who love making conquests or storming seiges.

Well, enough of suppositions, here are some hardcore facts about the gameplay from the recent Pre-E3 event of EA. Staying dog-like loyal to the movie (that was also very faithful to the book), the game will revolve around the battle that’s happening outside of Mordor, while Frodo and his ‘partner’ (sorry for the term) Sam is hiking towards Mount Doom. The gamer is then tasked to hold the reigns of an army – the good side which includes the combined forces of elves and dwarves (sorry girls, no Legolas character), or the bad guys, which comprises of orcs, goblins, giants and trolls.

To give you a better picture of actual commands via your Xbox360 controller, here’s a bit of info. The A button, shoulder pads and triggers give the basic commands for game actions such as going over a group of elven archers and commanding them to release arrows, or for trolls to pick up trees and use them as clubs against the cutesy, fresh-from-the-saloon, Elves. Another cool add-on is the automated batlle formation feature. Hold the A button and a series of formations will be offered to you, giving you the option to move squads or units in single commands thus saving time which is better than a coat of mithril in Middle-Earth wars. It also promotes strategy-based moves, much like disciplines in chess where each formation suits a different type of creature, army and terrain. You can create caves to attract goblins, fissures to beckon trolls, then dig tunnels to make a path for both armies. If you’re the girly type and like pretty elves, then set up woods or glamorous castles set in nature to gather their flock. I could go on and on, but I hate being a spoiler. Besides, it’s better if you find out things on your own right?

Basically, the game is testing the gamer’s ability to build, manage and lead armies. Much like other war-based games, tactics such as “Rushes” (where the player ‘rushes’ all his units to one full relentless attack), and “Entrapment” (where the gamer plays weak, leading the opponent to be careless and use up all units, then release an even bigger army), can also be utilized, only this time with detailed orcs swinging scintars, trolls wielding clubs, giants hurling boulders, elves springing arrows and slashing elven knives, dwarves making killer cuts with their axes, and high elven heroes  summoning  powerful magic. Got the picture? Yeah, all out warring chaos with a middle earth flavor!

The single- and multiplayer LOTR: Battle for Middle Earth Two RTS is set to be released on June 13 carrying the $59.99 price tag. It’ll make use of the highest PC setting to produce the highly detailed image of the game, with the gamer hearing battlecries in 5.1 Surround Sound. The online modes are as follows: Hero Vs. Hero (picture Aragorn vs Legolas, you got it), Capture and Hold (think Minas Tirith), Resource Race (basically, army buliding, you know the drill) and King of the Hill (take hold of an area, ward of interested occupants as long as you could).

If there was “one ring to rule them all” then this title is set to rule for quite a long time. So, answer me, do you want to be Sauron or an Elven high lord?