Emperor Pan I
Respected Member
Lord of the rings: The Battle for Middle Earth is an amazing rts game, which takes place in Middle earth of course. It does take a large amount of space (4 gigs) and requires a really good computer to get the best value of the game, and many will be disapointed at the high requirements (#1.3 GHz or faster, 256 MB ram, 4 GB or more free space on hard drive, and Video card with 32 MB or more memory and one of these chipsets is required: NVIDIA GeForce 2 GTS or greater ATI Radeon 7500 or greater.) all In all it is quite amazing, me speaking from a "good computer owner" standpoint. Finally, the game has been released. up until now, the only other RTS LOTR game was the War of the Ring, and other games for LOTR (EA's Two Towers, Return of the kings, and the third age) were incredibly horribly garbage, and a waste of time for me. This one however, is a really great game.
I will procede to rank certain aspects, make my view of the game into a review of the game, and make it look more professional.
Gameplay 9.5/10: Gameplay on the surface is straight foreward. Take your units, kill the enemy camps. You use resources to build units, and your objectives are to kill all enemies. Same basics as any rts, however, it becomes more complex, when u actualy start playing. There are four different Races that you can use, Rohan, Gondor, Isengard and Mordor. Each Each race has heros, like Gandalf, Farimir, Gollum, Eowyn etc. Like in Warcraft III, heros gain ranks (ie. levels), and have spells to use. Spells do not require any sort of magic, they only have a refresh time period. There is also no variety in spell combos like warcraft. At a certain rank, a hero gets a spell, no choosing, want it or not. Heros lead armies, and though u do command a large number of units, the multiple selecting could be better. forces of good, and evil have two differnet magic trees. These trees allow you to use generic spells an dabilities. Good side uses the power of the Evenstar, and allows for the summoning of Ents, or Eagles to calling for aid from the elves. Whhile the Evil side uses the power of the ring, allows for seveal bonuses to units and even the summoning of a mighty balrog. These trees are larger in the champaign, because it allows for the direct alteration of a player owned hero(ie. buying a conversion of gandalf the grey to gandalf the white).
The story of the Campaign is very much like the story of the books. Though they took a few sidesteps from actual plot lines of the movie, all in all it holds true. The game starts in Moria, controlling just the fellowship, and ends when the ring is destroyed. Several forced mission involves the fellowship heros to battle in the specific places in the movie to progress story. This however can alter the story. Gandalf did not fall in Moria? Borimir lived? Eowyn dies at helmsdeep? The game allows for many alterations, which is quite obvious when playing the evil side. The game provides an evil side, allowing for you to take middle earth by force. The champaign is large and incredibly fun.
There is an overall map, with something like 30 provincs, including famous landmarks from teh books. And while through most of the game u are free to take whatever territories you like, You are still required to defend Helmsdeep, or Minas Tirith. Each province provides a bonus, boosting command, power or resource. Every point in command is important. More command means a higher population cap. The game starts out low, and ends at a 300 unit population capacity. Power provides points towards the magic tree. More points, allows for more expenisve spells. Power is hard to gain in game, and takes 3 battles to boost it in game. Resource gathering is boosted by a certain % depending on territories u have taken. If a territory provides 20% resource increase, recources will gather 20% more(amount X 1.2).
One problem about the overall map, is there is really little strategic value in taking a specified area except for the bonuses. Unlike in Rome total war, a territory in no way affects the enemy, and the enemy makes no effort to take it back. you can't close in on him by taking certain territores. On the main map, there is really nothing the enemy does, except when the major battles from the movies takes place.
In contrast to other RTS games, the game handles differnetly much differnetly in building. Gone are the massive bases, turtling with towers, and tower rushing. A base is set with a specific amount of buildings, and are built in a circular fashion around a mandatory castle in the middle of a settlement. There is no tech tree, and each race has differnet number of buildings. Rohan for example has 6 buildable buildings, and main Rohan settlements have about 6 buildable places. Gondor has something like 12 places, and thus has more buildable places. Recources are gathered from buildings, There are no peasents. Farms or slaughter houses are built, and gather a set amount of recources. This means that those 6 places to build on, suddenly become 3 or even 2 if u want sufficient recources to supply an army. Now, here is some strategic elements come into play. Around the map there are strategic points. the value of the point determines what u may build on it. Lower value allows for a lone farm, a higher value allows for you to raise a settlement, providing 3 buildable places, or you may build a new castle providing an amount of buildable ares that equals your main settlement.
Controllable units are divided into categories. Infantry, cavalry, creatures, siege and heros. Each unit comes from a specified building in battalions. Battalions are groups of units (does not apply to creatures) and are grouped up to 5 for good, and 10 for evil. Battalions gain ranks, much like heros. The higher the rank, the stronger the units. When a building trains a unit, the building itself gains a rank, and that allows buildings to provide more upgrades for units, and become more resiliant to attacks.
Creatures are larger units, which do not come in battalions. These range from the Trolls, to the Ents or from the Eagles to the Naz'Gul. Creatures are expensive, and take longer to build, but usualy are devastating. The Troll for instance has a strong attack, that can knock several men to the floor, while the elephants can completely murder several battalions of archers in one swipe. Creatures provide the game with more of a variety, and interest factor.
Siege are basicly siege units. Orcs can use ladders to scale a wall, or a battering ram to break a gate. Gondor has trebuchet that cna hurl large rocks. Unlike Warcraft III, there is a realism factor, and the splash is damaging to all units in an area, like the siege tanks blast. Siege weaponry is great for battle, but can quickly turn on your if not careful with ur aiming, and ur unit positions.
The counter system is basic, foot soldiers beats archers, archers/pikeman beat cavalry, cavalry beats infantry. Creatures do extra to infantry and cavalry, while archers do extra to creatures.
Archers are also infantry, and do take extra from cavalry and creatures, but they can dish out extra damage (cavalry takes 50% more damage from archers, and a hero will lose 50% armor when mouting a hourse). This means archers are important, but must be kept strategicly away from major fighting, but also provide deadly volleys of arrows. However, Rohan has a mounted archer, that has the speed of cavalry, and the damage of an archer. This provides some variety, and is seen in all races unique units. It makes things more interesting in many aspects.
Battalions of units also can use a different formation. For example, the tower guard can go into a tight formation, gaining 50% armor, but losing 75% speed (much like footmen in warcraft III or like the Phalanx in Rome Total War.)
the overall AI is really easy to beat and outsmart. There is not much challenege even against a hard computer. This should encourage players who beat the champaign to venture online.
Overall, I just summed up the basics of the game, the way it is played, and what to expect. There are a few undesirable aspects, but many more enjoyable.
Graphics, 9/10: Graphics are incredibly good for a RTs game at the magnitude that BFME is at. Videos from the movies frequently play at the bottom of the screen, annoyingly covering up the minimap in the middle of a battle. They play at specific points from the film, and seem to want to remind you that your playing a LOTR game based on a movie.
Sound, 10/10: Hero voices, music, creature and unit sounds all come from the movie. Though both Aragorn and Legolas' charachters were replaced by different voice actors, most of the actors from the movies provided the voices(ie. Ian Mckellan/Gandalf). The Music is from all four music, and is very nice to listen to in the background. Unit responses are not so annoying, like in SC or WC, cause their voices are not so irritating.
Replay Value, 9/10: This is a large game. It has 2 very long campaigns, skirmish mode with up to 7 computer-controlled enemies, and an online multi-player mode. The Online tries to copy warcrafts system, but cant compare in that respect. it does provide a ranking aspect, and does provide suitable opponents.
Overall, 9/10: The game could be better in many ways, but it is a very large game. There is days of playing available, and many ways to enjoy your time on this game. I am disapointed with many features that were pulled out of the game right before release. There seems to be balance issues, and with EA, they will stay imbalanced.
closing statements
It is definately Not better than Rome Total war, and in many ways is similar if not a little better than Warhammer 40k dawn of war. If you like Lord of the rings, and RTS games, this is a game worth buying.
I will procede to rank certain aspects, make my view of the game into a review of the game, and make it look more professional.
Gameplay 9.5/10: Gameplay on the surface is straight foreward. Take your units, kill the enemy camps. You use resources to build units, and your objectives are to kill all enemies. Same basics as any rts, however, it becomes more complex, when u actualy start playing. There are four different Races that you can use, Rohan, Gondor, Isengard and Mordor. Each Each race has heros, like Gandalf, Farimir, Gollum, Eowyn etc. Like in Warcraft III, heros gain ranks (ie. levels), and have spells to use. Spells do not require any sort of magic, they only have a refresh time period. There is also no variety in spell combos like warcraft. At a certain rank, a hero gets a spell, no choosing, want it or not. Heros lead armies, and though u do command a large number of units, the multiple selecting could be better. forces of good, and evil have two differnet magic trees. These trees allow you to use generic spells an dabilities. Good side uses the power of the Evenstar, and allows for the summoning of Ents, or Eagles to calling for aid from the elves. Whhile the Evil side uses the power of the ring, allows for seveal bonuses to units and even the summoning of a mighty balrog. These trees are larger in the champaign, because it allows for the direct alteration of a player owned hero(ie. buying a conversion of gandalf the grey to gandalf the white).
The story of the Campaign is very much like the story of the books. Though they took a few sidesteps from actual plot lines of the movie, all in all it holds true. The game starts in Moria, controlling just the fellowship, and ends when the ring is destroyed. Several forced mission involves the fellowship heros to battle in the specific places in the movie to progress story. This however can alter the story. Gandalf did not fall in Moria? Borimir lived? Eowyn dies at helmsdeep? The game allows for many alterations, which is quite obvious when playing the evil side. The game provides an evil side, allowing for you to take middle earth by force. The champaign is large and incredibly fun.
There is an overall map, with something like 30 provincs, including famous landmarks from teh books. And while through most of the game u are free to take whatever territories you like, You are still required to defend Helmsdeep, or Minas Tirith. Each province provides a bonus, boosting command, power or resource. Every point in command is important. More command means a higher population cap. The game starts out low, and ends at a 300 unit population capacity. Power provides points towards the magic tree. More points, allows for more expenisve spells. Power is hard to gain in game, and takes 3 battles to boost it in game. Resource gathering is boosted by a certain % depending on territories u have taken. If a territory provides 20% resource increase, recources will gather 20% more(amount X 1.2).
One problem about the overall map, is there is really little strategic value in taking a specified area except for the bonuses. Unlike in Rome total war, a territory in no way affects the enemy, and the enemy makes no effort to take it back. you can't close in on him by taking certain territores. On the main map, there is really nothing the enemy does, except when the major battles from the movies takes place.
In contrast to other RTS games, the game handles differnetly much differnetly in building. Gone are the massive bases, turtling with towers, and tower rushing. A base is set with a specific amount of buildings, and are built in a circular fashion around a mandatory castle in the middle of a settlement. There is no tech tree, and each race has differnet number of buildings. Rohan for example has 6 buildable buildings, and main Rohan settlements have about 6 buildable places. Gondor has something like 12 places, and thus has more buildable places. Recources are gathered from buildings, There are no peasents. Farms or slaughter houses are built, and gather a set amount of recources. This means that those 6 places to build on, suddenly become 3 or even 2 if u want sufficient recources to supply an army. Now, here is some strategic elements come into play. Around the map there are strategic points. the value of the point determines what u may build on it. Lower value allows for a lone farm, a higher value allows for you to raise a settlement, providing 3 buildable places, or you may build a new castle providing an amount of buildable ares that equals your main settlement.
Controllable units are divided into categories. Infantry, cavalry, creatures, siege and heros. Each unit comes from a specified building in battalions. Battalions are groups of units (does not apply to creatures) and are grouped up to 5 for good, and 10 for evil. Battalions gain ranks, much like heros. The higher the rank, the stronger the units. When a building trains a unit, the building itself gains a rank, and that allows buildings to provide more upgrades for units, and become more resiliant to attacks.
Creatures are larger units, which do not come in battalions. These range from the Trolls, to the Ents or from the Eagles to the Naz'Gul. Creatures are expensive, and take longer to build, but usualy are devastating. The Troll for instance has a strong attack, that can knock several men to the floor, while the elephants can completely murder several battalions of archers in one swipe. Creatures provide the game with more of a variety, and interest factor.
Siege are basicly siege units. Orcs can use ladders to scale a wall, or a battering ram to break a gate. Gondor has trebuchet that cna hurl large rocks. Unlike Warcraft III, there is a realism factor, and the splash is damaging to all units in an area, like the siege tanks blast. Siege weaponry is great for battle, but can quickly turn on your if not careful with ur aiming, and ur unit positions.
The counter system is basic, foot soldiers beats archers, archers/pikeman beat cavalry, cavalry beats infantry. Creatures do extra to infantry and cavalry, while archers do extra to creatures.
Archers are also infantry, and do take extra from cavalry and creatures, but they can dish out extra damage (cavalry takes 50% more damage from archers, and a hero will lose 50% armor when mouting a hourse). This means archers are important, but must be kept strategicly away from major fighting, but also provide deadly volleys of arrows. However, Rohan has a mounted archer, that has the speed of cavalry, and the damage of an archer. This provides some variety, and is seen in all races unique units. It makes things more interesting in many aspects.
Battalions of units also can use a different formation. For example, the tower guard can go into a tight formation, gaining 50% armor, but losing 75% speed (much like footmen in warcraft III or like the Phalanx in Rome Total War.)
the overall AI is really easy to beat and outsmart. There is not much challenege even against a hard computer. This should encourage players who beat the champaign to venture online.
Overall, I just summed up the basics of the game, the way it is played, and what to expect. There are a few undesirable aspects, but many more enjoyable.
Graphics, 9/10: Graphics are incredibly good for a RTs game at the magnitude that BFME is at. Videos from the movies frequently play at the bottom of the screen, annoyingly covering up the minimap in the middle of a battle. They play at specific points from the film, and seem to want to remind you that your playing a LOTR game based on a movie.
Sound, 10/10: Hero voices, music, creature and unit sounds all come from the movie. Though both Aragorn and Legolas' charachters were replaced by different voice actors, most of the actors from the movies provided the voices(ie. Ian Mckellan/Gandalf). The Music is from all four music, and is very nice to listen to in the background. Unit responses are not so annoying, like in SC or WC, cause their voices are not so irritating.
Replay Value, 9/10: This is a large game. It has 2 very long campaigns, skirmish mode with up to 7 computer-controlled enemies, and an online multi-player mode. The Online tries to copy warcrafts system, but cant compare in that respect. it does provide a ranking aspect, and does provide suitable opponents.
Overall, 9/10: The game could be better in many ways, but it is a very large game. There is days of playing available, and many ways to enjoy your time on this game. I am disapointed with many features that were pulled out of the game right before release. There seems to be balance issues, and with EA, they will stay imbalanced.
closing statements
It is definately Not better than Rome Total war, and in many ways is similar if not a little better than Warhammer 40k dawn of war. If you like Lord of the rings, and RTS games, this is a game worth buying.
