Lord of the Rings On-Line: An MMO with an Ending?

Lord of the Rings On-Line, affectionately called LOTRO for short, is another game designed and built by Turbine (of DDO, AC1 and AC 2 fame).  What made LOTRO unique is that it’s deal was direct between Turbine and the DBA that owns the rights to works of J.R.R. Tolkien.  Thus, LOTRO is based off the books, rather than the abbreviated movie versions.

LOTRO shares is very basic code with Turbine other main MMO, Dungeons and Dragons On-Line.  Both of which have their origins in the old Asheron’s Call 2 engine.  But after that, both LOTRO and DDO have gone their separate ways and share little in common, other than they are free to play and both owned by WB Games/Turbine.

I did beta for LOTRO way back when.  I really didn’t like it.  The game play seemed simplistic, the graphics nothing exceptional and it just seemed cartoon like in general.  I had just started playing DDO at the time and found that game play, art work and setting much more to my liking.

During DDO’s dark days (2008-2009), I (and others) became increasing concerned that DDO was going to fail and we started looking for other games to play.  We ended up in LOTRO thanks to some friends we had met in DDO.  My wife and I started playing and we got into the game a bit, enough that we decided to buy lifetime subs as they were still offered then.  But just as we started to get into LOTRO, DDO came roaring back and we have pretty much dropped LOTRO, except to play very casually now and then.  We have amassed a huge fortune of Turbine Points at this point, and have’t had to pay cash for an expansion in years!

But LOTRO has always been interesting to me, mostly because I love the setting.  The game play, remains a bit too simplistic for me, although I admit, I haven’t played at higher levels to see if that changes any, whether tactics are really needed or just the mob hit points become inflated (Turbines tried and true way to add “challenge” to their games).  But LOTRO is also interesting to me, because it already has an ending.  Most MMO’s have no real ending, the beauty of them is that they can go on and on forever.  But LOTRO is different.  Frodo will destroy the Ring, the dark lord will fall and their will be much rejoicing.  Currently the game is about ready to unleash the epic battle of Helms Deep later this fall in an expansion, and since they decided to have some scaling content, even I with my army of low level characters will be able to participate.  So I’m looking forward to it.  But really, the LOTRO devs have taken their sweet time, which some players have called (And is also a title of a popular LOTRO fan podcast) “A Casual stroll to Mordor”.

Much has been made on the LOTRO forums and other gaming websites about Turbine’s contract with the DBA managing Tolkien’s books ending.  I really don’t see that happening as it would be a major blow to both companies and certainly would make other game companies think twice before investing in a game that someone might pull the rug out from under them at any point.  But I fully expect a deal to get done, quietly and quite possibly unnoticed by players.

LOTRO has always had a big player base, especially compared to DDO.  When DDO was successful in becoming a Free to play game, LOTRO also soon followed, although the total success of free to play in LOTRO is somewhat questionable.  The game isn’t as instanced as DDO and some of the gates seemed artificial at first, but they seemed to have smoothed things out and LOTRO seems to have a vibrant and steady player base, although it is certainly reduced from its peak, a trait shared by most games these days.