Back in 2011, Snowblind and Warner Bros. released a tie-in action-RPG called The Lord of the Rings: War in the North. Although it wasn’t incredibly well received, it seems to have developed a bit of a cult following, especially after being delisted in recent years. This was actually one of the earliest games I reviewed, too, back when it first came out, and I admittedly didn’t give it a great score. As much as I wanted to like it, being a fan of the books and movies, it had issues that marred my experience.
Several days ago, Aspyr surprised us all by announcing that they had updated and re-released the game for modern platforms, calling it The Lord of the Rings: War in the North – Legacy Edition. The announcement came out of nowhere, as nobody expected a game like this to receive such treatment; especially when it didn’t receive acclaim. However, as the press release teased (and IGN has reported), more remastered The Lord of the Rings games are planned. The ones most people want to see return are the EA games, but who knows if that will be possible in terms of rights.
We were offered a review code for this updated version, and I decided I’d give it another shot. My hope was that I’d enjoy it more with its promised quality of life updates and changes. I’ve also been in the mood for a hack n’ slash game. Unfortunately, despite these updates, War in the North – Legacy Edition remains a frustrating and kind of middling experience.
Set before Frodo’s journey, The Lord of the Rings: The War in the North centres upon three characters (Eradan the Ranger, Farin the Dwarf and Andriel the Elf). After meeting Aragorn in a dark, rainy and quiet village tavern, they’re tasked with going ahead and dealing with one of Sauron’s allies and his varied friends. Agandaur has amassed his own army, and must be dealt with in order to aid the Fellowship’s upcoming quest.
The result is a twelve to fifteen hour long expedition through different regions of Middle-Earth, during which the trio must do battle against various types of enemies, including orcs and the living and the dead. They get assistance from a giant bird, and can call it for help during outside missions, when a golden feather is held. Obviously, this can’t be done when you’re inside a cave or something like that.
In the original version of this game, players were forced to choose one character and stick with it throughout the campaign. That’s how I beat it on the XBOX 360, and I remember doing so by myself, with the other two characters controlled by the computer. However, what’s nice about this Legacy Edition is the fact that it lets one switch between all three playable heroes, using a combination of buttons. This allows for a lot more freedom, and is helpful to say the least. However, it still has its drawbacks. For instance, each hero’s inventory must be managed separately, along with buying and selling their weapons, armour and equipment. They must also be levelled up separately, but that’s easier done, and also isn’t uncommon in such games. You don’t need to switch characters to do this, like you do in order to shop. All it takes is opening the menu and pressing a button to cycle through them. Equipment is handled similarly, but shopping is not, and they all have different amounts of money.
There are still signs of the stilted structured of the original version, as it lets you press Y to change characters after completing a location.
Looking back, I’m not sure how I managed to beat this game solo, because it was made with co-op in mind. The Legacy Edition still suffers as a result of this, because the experience is left frustrating and overly difficult for single players. I consider myself a decent gamer, although not as good as I used to be, due to age and fatigue. Still, this was surprisingly challenging, and I played solo since I didn’t have anyone to play with. None of my friends game much, I don’t have siblings and everyone is busy.
The core gameplay loop in War in the North involves walking through different maps, set in varied parts of Middle-Earth, while hacking, slashing and shooting projectiles at enemies of varying types. The Ranger has a sword, and a bow with limited arrows; the Dwarf has a crossbow and can use a sword or an axe; and the Elf has a staff that can be used for melee and shooting magic. As you progress, you’ll unlock different skills or magic powers for each one, including damaging attacks and the ability to cast a protective barrier that keeps ranged attacks out. These abilities require cooldown periods or magic, the latter of which doesn’t regenerate much. There are potions for this, but they are very limited, much like the ranged ammo, which is annoying.
Despite the above, each character having its own skill tree full of unlocks, and being able to add three points to their strength, health, and other stats after levelling up, this is a frustrating experience. Even on the normal difficulty level, and in the first mission of the campaign, enemies hit hard and take a surprising amount of player health away. You’ll find that your health bar(s) empty quickly, leading to characters regularly being downed and crawling around hoping to be revived. If you revive them, their health goes back to full, but it’s a risky proposition because this can be interrupted by a heavy attack, and it’s possible to die while doing it.
A lot of my time with this game involved rolling away from attacks, and reviving allies. The ally AI isn’t all that good, and they ‘die’ often. They are good at reviving each other, though, and will also try to revive your assumed character quickly. However, they’re open to the same interruptions and damage while doing so. It gets old and annoying quickly, and it’s frustratingly difficult. If you’re going to offer single player, then make it so that the game scales properly for it.
I got by, but the second boss kicked my ass numerous times, leading to some anger and a lot of retries. I’m not an angry person, and have never been one to throw my controllers (they’re expensive, I think that’s dumb and I want to keep them pristine). However, I got pretty frustrated and yelled once after dying in an annoying manner.
This boss battle takes place in a small cave, and involves a heavy enemy who can do spin attacks or slam his sword down. He’s joined by more regular enemies, who seem to be buffed and also keep being replaced, meaning there’s no reason to focus on them. My allies and I kept being downed, and I’d sometimes get very close to beating him, just to be killed while trying to revive my friends. I would try to let him attack, roll away from it and then run to my allies, but it didn’t always work. I wasted almost an hour before I beat this boss, and it frustrated the hell out of me. I actually considered quitting, but eventually beat him.
I looked, but there seemingly wasn’t a way to lower the difficulty. When I exited out to the main menu, it said normal like it had before, and it wouldn’t let me change it. I also looked in the options menu more than once.
One problem is that there’s no real feedback when you get hit. There’s no rumble, either. As such, it’s possible to get hit and hurt badly without really knowing until you look at the health bars(s), or the screen darkens when near death is upon you.
There are also lots of enemies to deal with, and it’s rare that the player feels powerful. That said, if you repeatedly hit an enemy, you’ll get the chance to do a takedown by pressing Y (which is the button that handles heavy attacks). Sometimes two are required in order to kill certain enemies, meaning that you’ll have to do it a second time while they’re laying on the ground. Doing this repeatedly without getting hit will let you become more powerful until you end up being attacked, but it’s not common to get into such a streak.
Since this is a fifteen year old game (man, I feel old), and came out during the 360/PS3 era, it has one thing that has disappeared in more recent years. I’m talking about turret sections. There are occasional areas where you’ll come across big bows of a sort, and can fire explosive projectiles at the many enemies that come out of the wood work afterwards. It’s fun, and gets your pulse going.
I miss those segments.
The traditional sections also feature crawling enemies who explode when they get close to you, or when they’re hit. With so many enemies around you, it can occasionally be hard to target or hit them in time. Ranged ammo and magic are also surprisingly limited, but are very helpful when you have them. I used the crossbow to take down some giant enemies.
The Lord of the Rings: War in the North – Legacy Edition doesn’t seem like a full fledged remaster, either. Yes, it’s been altered to allow for control of all three characters, and given quality of life improvements like enemy lock on, health/mana bars for allies, and slightly better menus, but it’s still very dated. This was never a great looking game, as it’s very dark and lacks colour, has always had some dated textures and looks muddy in dark areas. The lighting is slightly better, though, as are some of the textures, and the resolution has been upped. Plus, it now features 60 frames-per-second gameplay. That said, it doesn’t feel greatly improved. Then again, it was a shadow drop and isn’t very expensive. Some people seem very happy that it’s available again, after apparently being delisted. I’d honestly forgotten about it until they announced this version.
The best thing about this game is its writing, (and story.) They did a good job bringing Middle-Earth to life, and presented a quality and interesting tale set just before the Fellowship of the Ring. That’s one good thing for fans of the subject matter.
The writing is complemented by good voice acting, and fitting sound effects. The music is also fitting, and decent, and the effects are what you’d expect from such a game, with melee, ranged and magic combat. Certain sounds can get annoying, though, such as one liners uttered by downed allies.
I also want to applaud the art direction. While this has always been a dated and drab looking game, in terms of its heavy use of brown, black and gray, and its muddied visuals in dark environments, it does have some nice locations and character designs. It feels like Middle-Earth — at least what one would imagine, and what we’ve seen on screen over the years.
I was really surprised when they announced that The Lord of the Rings: War in the North had been remastered and released for current-gen consoles and PC. I had forgotten about it, but looked it up and remembered reviewing it. Although I didn’t like it too much 15 years ago, my hope was that I could revisit it and enjoy it more with the quality of life improvements. Some of said changes they’ve made are great, but the gameplay is too basic, challenging and frustrating, especially for single players, despite the game offering that option. It’s also quite dated, still. As such, I feel that this is only recommendable to big fans of The Lord of the Rings, those who previously liked the game and those for whom it was a ‘childhood game.’ Make sure to play it with others, too.
This review is based on the XBOX Series X version of the game, which we were provided with.