Everyone loves Lord of the Rings, don’t they? Well, actually, I don’t. I quite liked the books, but I wasn’t fussed with the films at all which is a bit of a surprise considering my love for all things dwarfy and elfish. Arguably this puts me at an immediate disadvantage to enjoying Lord of the Rings: Conquest and maybe it does. However as I liked Star Wars: Battlefront (also made by Pandemic Studios), Dynasty Warriors and various other hack n slashers, I thought I’d give this game a shot. After all, surely it will be a fun hack n slasher, they can’t be that hard to make surely? Unfortunately it seems I was wrong.

The game opens up initially offering multiplayer and one single player or co-operative campaign depending on if you can find a willing friend to play along: the ‘Good’ campaign, War of the Ring. Once this campaign is completed then the ‘Evil’ side of the game opens up in the form of Rise of Sauron, essentially the same story, just from the evil perspective. The story of course being the main storyline of the books with a bit of poetic license and of course, the Evil campaign having an alternative ending. Each campaign and subsequent levels feel extremely similar in terms of gameplay. On opening, one can choose to play as one of four classes: warrior, archer, scout or mage.

All the classes are controlled in a very similar manner but are fairly well balanced. The warrior, somewhat predictably, mainly has physical up close attacks, although can throw axes a short distance at the enemy. As well as this, the warrior can use special attacks by adding special elements to his weapon such as fire. The archer can fire poison, fire or multiple arrows at its target and in some ways is the strongest of the classes, as a well aimed headshot invariably kills the enemy immediately. The scout can backstab an enemy, if it manages to sneak up behind one successfully, instantly killing them. While the mage can heal as well as fire lightening bolts and flame attacks. But don’t worry; you won’t be stuck with whatever class you choose at the start of the level as at various points in the level you can change class. As well as this, occasionally you will be given the option to play as a hero. These are where Lord of the Rings fans will be very happy as you are given the opportunity to briefly play as heroes such as Aragorn and Gandalf. Unfortunately as exciting as it sounds, it’s not very. You see Aragorn is simply a reskinned Archer class and Gandalf is a reskinned Mage. Still, if you’re a die hard Lord of the Rings fan, you will probably still be very happy nonetheless. Of course, who cares what class you are; if you don’t know what you’re doing you won’t get very far. This is where the trusty yellow arrow comes to it. In game it tends to be a bit manic with warring factions all over the place, so to help you along the way, the yellow arrow points you at every objective you need to get to. Sometimes it stops and you have to defend the area you’re in but for the most part as long as you follow the arrow around, you’ll be ok. This is fine if you don’t mind an extremely linear game. Or the fact that you can just run past everything else, Orcs and all, and head to the nearest yellow arrow to progress in the game. I know it defeats the object of the game but I have no doubt that after the first mission or two, you will be doing this too. After all, you won’t be missing out on much. Sure you will miss out on the ‘fun’ of the clunky combat that feels far too detached, or the reminder that all the classes are mostly the same when it comes down to it. But when it comes to quality gameplay, you won’t miss a thing as it’s just not really there. The objectives almost always come down to a few basic ideas: defend a location, capture a control point (a flag essentially) or meet up with your allies. When you die, you simply respawn at the nearest control point with all the enemies around you having the same health as they did before you died, meaning if you had inflicted a fair bit of damage already then you can finish them off easily. This makes things a little too easy at times considering you can simply keep respawning and chipping away a bit at your opponent. As well as this, if the enemy happens to be right next to a perilous cliff, you can push them off causing their instant death and a very easy solution for you. It’s a pity as I would have liked to have seen more intelligent enemies; it would have made things that bit more challenging. The only really irritating parts I found were when you had to defend an area for a set time. This was where the friendly AI felt a bit lacking as it just didn’t seem very good at defending, leaving everything down to you which in some places got extremely tedious when for the 100th time you were overrun simply because the friendly AI had left the area you were guarding. Perhaps the most annoying thing that then occurs is if you fail an objective, the level ends and you restart right back at the beginning of it which is a much harsher punishment than if you die, which seems a little unfair. To break up the monotony of repeating the same actions over and over again, there are some different segments in the levels such as being able to play as an Ent and using mounts. Unfortunately the controls feel a little clunky. In fact in terms of playing a tree, I found the mediocre Prince Caspian game fulfilled my tree playing urges much better than Lord of the Rings: Conquest has, which is worrying in itself considering how poor Prince Caspian was.

Aiming to be the shining light of this fairly average game is the online facilities that EA has kindly provided us with. For once, they almost work. It does have its quirks but for the most part I can see it making a nice change from the usual FPS/Sports games monopoly on Xbox Live. When I initially went to search for an online game to play by selecting quick game, I was initially rather annoyed to see that I couldn’t because I didn’t have the appropriate downloadable content. So I had to look under marketplace in the game and I couldn’t find any new map packs. Rather annoyingly, the new map pack isn’t listed in game despite all other DLC being there. You have to go back to the Xbox Dashboard and look through there. Only a minor niggle but considering there was a very recent title update, you would think it would already be there. If nothing else, surely EA are missing out on business by not including it? I digress, back to the actual multiplayer element. Offering conquest, capture the ring (flag to you and me), team deathmatch and hero deathmatch, there are plenty of options to whet your appetite. With 2 pieces of DLC available already there’s plenty to keep players busy. From what I have seen, the community is actually thriving quite nicely which makes a pleasant change as so many games lose their community very quickly. In places it reminds me of a third person Halo 3 but without the smack talk which is always good! Although not a reason to buy this game, it is a nice bonus to see a well rounded multiplayer facility despite the somewhat lacklustre offline mode.

Overall, Lord of the Rings: Conquest is the sort of game that a Lord of the Rings fan is much more likely to enjoy than a gamer. To a gamer, it is distinctly average and slow. The combat feels sluggish in places, and the graphics not quite up to scratch. On top of that it just gets too tedious too fast. However to a Lord of the Rings fan, it is a perfect companion piece to the films and books. It will evoke memories of events seen in the films (especially as many FMVs are closely linked to the film), it will excite you as you get to play your favourite character, and Howard Shore’s music score will be like, well it’ll be like music to your ears frankly. Presentation wise Conquest is top notch, it has to be said. It is just unfortunately the gameplay side of the game which has suffered, which is inexcusable considering it is a game after all! As you may be able to guess, no I can’t recommend this game. I would actually go so far as to say I enjoyed Dynasty Warriors 5 more, as although it was a somewhat tedious hack n slasher, it was at least fast paced, as any decent hack n slasher should be. Maybe if you’re bored and it’s very cheap and you enjoy achievement gaining (it is very generous at doling out achievement points), but don’t expect much at all. Unless of course you are a huge Lord of the Rings fan, in which case ignore all this and rush out to get it. But seriously, just don’t do it.

It’s been a quiet couple of weeks on this blog, for which I apologise for. I’ve been quite busy as well as lacking in motivation which isn’t a great combination for this blog, nor for a budding writer such as myself! Writing wise, I’ve just finshed up a review of Codename Panzers Cold War, the white sliced bread of the PC RTS world. It’s my first paid review and my first review to soon be featured on playboy.co.uk so I’m rather happy with that. Pity it was such a mediocre game and so terrible to review. Terrible, not because it was a bad game, but because it felt like there was so little to say. It was a real challenge as it was just so middle of the road, nothing positive or negative stood out! I’ve just finished writing up the review for Lord of the Rings:Conquest which I was rather disappointed with. I generally love a good hack n slasher. Despite their repetive nature, they are my guilty pleasure. However LoTR:Conquest just doesn’t cut it for me, it’s just too slow compared to the likes of Dynasty Warriors amongst many other things. Review will be up here in the next few days as well as a link for Codename Panzers.

Back to gaming for fun, I’ve been busy with a few games.

I finished off Prince of Persia at last. I never did figure out if I enjoyed it or not. I assume I must have as I played it to the end but it had a lot wrong with it. A lot of the time it felt like an on the rails platformer, if such a thing could exist, where I just had to press a, b or y from time to time to progress further. I didn’t particularly like the two main characters, and certainly didn’t like having to stop every few minutes to listen to a conversation that I couldn’t skip. As well as that, the combat was very tedious. Yet I still played it, and I’m still not 100% sure why. I guess it was because it was easy so it was a nice stressfree simple game. So yeah I guess I enjoyed it. Wouldn’t recommend it to anyone though.

Next up in the pile was Sega Mega Drive Collection, otherwise known as a nice walk down memory lane. I know Nintendo never will, but I would kill for a similar collection of Super Nintendo games rather than be restricted to the Wii’s Virtual Console. Anyway, back to the Mega Drive. I’ve enjoyed replaying the various Streets of Rages, especially 3 as I never played that originally. Also enjoyed playing the Sonics again. When I have some time I’m going to play through the Phantasy Stars and Shining Forces as I also missed those when they first came along. I guess that’s the problem with being a kid in those days, I couldn’t afford many games so I missed out on so many classics! I used to love playing The Story of Thor but I never actually owned it. Instead I rented it as often as I could in my local Blockbuster. Of course the problem there was it had a battery back up save system on its cartridge. There were two copies of The Story of Thor in the store so it all depended on if I got the right copy as to whether I could progress much further in my game. Plus on a few occassions some git had deleted or overwritten the save anyhow. As you can guess, I played through the opening stages of the game a lot, and never actually completed it! One day I started it the other day and was surprised how much harder it was than I remember. Maybe I’ve actually got worse at games with age?! That’d suck. It certainly reminded me of how much easier games are now, and so did a few other Mega Drive games. I don’t know what I’d do without a save function now.

I’m finally starting to get into Fallout 3 after erm about 3 months of just not getting into it. I’m about 15hrs in and I’m finally starting to enjoy it. I still don’t think it’ll be in my Top 10 games of all time or anything like that but it’s certainly gone up the list of all games I’ve ever played. I love it sometimes, then sometimes I hate it. It is immensely satisfying to headshot a raider with the very nice VATS system, and then it goes and pisses me off. Usually by my getting lost in a tunnel because it all looks too samey, or when an NPC gets stuck walking to somewhere that I have to follow them to. I have no doubt that I’m probably being excessively critical (there are more irritants, I’ve just managed to have a blank moment and forgotten them all!) and yes it is the definitive first person RPG, but you have to remember: I don’t tend to like Western RPGs, I much prefer JRPGs. I really enjoyed Knights of the Old Republic, but I found Mass Effect disappointing and lacking soul, and Oblivion was alright but not the be all and end all that others found it to be at the time. On the other hand, I loved Enchanted Arms and Eternal Sonata both of which suffered a few mixed reviews. So ultimately, I guess, like everything else, it all comes down to personal opinion! Mind you if everyone accepted that, I’d be out of an aspiring career so don’t listen to me

Finally, I picked up Tomb Raider:Underworld for £10 (after using a voucher from Christmas). Only played the prologue and the start of the first level. First impressions were not as I hoped. I found the first proper level a bit vague and open for my liking. I like being in a Tomb, I don’t want to be in the middle of an ocean. But ah well, I’ll crack on with it when I have the time.

As my final comment tonight, my iPhone is unfortunately a bit unwell and off for repair at the moment. I had no idea how useful I found it to be until now that I’m without it. When I bought it last year I was worried I’d be lured into the ‘ooh shiny gimmicky gadget’ bug, which I had been. However it’s very useful too. The mp3 facilities, the video playback facilities, being able to twitter on the move, facebook on the move, email, wi-fi, train times etc. I miss it. I hope it comes back soon It’s been about 10 days now.

On that note, feel free to add me on Twitter if you like my random musings: JenjeaHaly is the name on there

Forza 2 has certainly been my surprise hit of late. I’ve put off purchasing it for a long time. I’ve never been very good at racing games, I get by usually, but I don’t tend to have the patience to hone my skills at them so generally I just don’t bother. The last racing game I played was probably PGR3, again I kept meaning to buy PGR4 but never got round to it. So as the Forza 2:Collector’s Edition was available at the same time as I was purchasing SW2:Empires in the 2 for £20 range, I thought it was worth a go. I’m very glad I did, I’m hooked! Nokkon sent me a ridiculous number of cars to get me started and I’ve been having a great time, it’s probably not quite the correct way of doing it as I’ve got so many good cars to start with but I’m enjoying it which has to be the main thing. Looks like it’ll last me a good long while too

Both Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise and Infinite Undiscovery come out Friday and I really wish I could buy one or both. But unless money magically appears in front of me, it won’t be happening I’m going on holiday Monday-Friday to Center Parcs with friends (arranged before my Dad died and when I was still working so could afford it) and it’s going to cost me a fortune so no chance. I’d trade something in but there’s nothing I’ve completed that I can trade in, which means that really I have plenty of games to play anyhow so I should get on with that first!

Hoping to have more chance to write while I’m away so fingers crossed for some more interesting discussion soon. Oh and a Space Siege review for the PC has just been uploaded, feel free to read, just don’t buy the game! A STALKER:Clear Sky review will be up in the next week or so too as my copy’s arriving tomorrow hopefully.

Today, I’m planning an afternoon of Jericho on hard. Should be fun hopefully. If not maybe Lost Odyssey now I have the official guide to help me along the way. I was going to go through it without but I changed my mind. I’d rather do it that way now.

Also I’ve been playing the review copy of Age of Conan that arrived last week. It’s not bad at all. Technically very good for an MMORPG although I think my interest in MMOs is waning a bit now. It should get a good write up but I’ll make sure to link to the full thing when I’ve finished writing it.

Finally, in this patchy entry: Can anyone name a game where you kill innocent women just because? I don’t mean female ninjas or whatever, i.e. people that are ‘kill or be killed’ types. I mean totally innocent ones.
Just something that I was discussing the other day in a tirade about how gory slasher films can get away without criticism but not violent games despite the fact they always seem to involve some poor young, attractive woman get tortured and murdered by some random nutter. Which personally I find much more disturbing than anything I’ve seen in a game. I’m certainly not saying they should be banned (I don’t really agree with banning of anything fictional), it just seems daft that they are fine but games aren’t. I’m guessing it’s because games are a new media that the conservatives of the world (that’s conservative with a small c) just don’t understand yet.
Anyway if someone can name a game, let me know!

Not sure what my next goal is really. 60k seems pretty far off. Half trying for completionistness (inventing new words is fun), mainly with Football Manager 2008 initially and then Football Manager 2006 I think. Just because they’re not hugely common 1ks because they take a while to do. I think I’ll just keep slowly chipping away at Creature’s gamerscore and work my way up the ranks, got rentals on the way which is always useful.

Rest of life is messy so least said the better!

Been quite hectic here. I had some health problems through December that kept my mind very occupied with various worries. All fine now though. Also in that time, I managed to get a new job! So I’ll be starting that February 11th, it’s full time so I may have less time to update but I am still 100% determined to continue with my writing for other sites as I love doing it.
Leading onto that, I haven’t written a huge deal for play.tm since the last update. But there is a review and an article.

The review is for Bladestorm, a fantastic little game courtesy of Koei. If you like Dynasty Warriors, you should definitely enjoy this. Yeah it’s a bit samey but I’ve really enjoyed it. Enough so that I haven’t yet ebayed it as I’m still playing it through, and believe me, it’ll take a long while to complete! Really glad I got the opportunity to review this as I’d never have picked it up otherwise as it’s not usually my type of game.

The article was entitled Gaming and the so-called ‘mainstream’, basically a bit of a ramble on how the face of gaming is somewhat changing now. Made a change writing an article instead of a review although it was harder to write.

Also I now have a high definition TV so I can finally enjoy my 360 in the way it is intended. I’ve been surviving with a 19″ TFT for the 360 and a 20″ CRT TV for far too long. Thanks to the future new job, I could afford a new TV.
So I plumped for a Samsung 32″ R88, and I’m very happy with it!
Here’s a crap camera phone photo or two:

The cables need sorting out but I’m waiting for an HDMI cable to hook up my 360 to it instead of through VGA, so I’ll tidy up the cables then.

Oh yeah my 360 RRODed just after Christmas, luckily I had some money for once so I went out the same day and bought a X-Box 360 Arcade for £150. My old 360 is on the way to Microsoft as we speak. It’ll be sold off once it comes back. At least the new one has the newer chipset, an HDMI port and does sound quieter. I don’t like the faceplate though, I’m sure it’s flimsier than my old Premium.

I’ve hit 40k in gamerscore too, although my interest has now waned slightly thanks to CoD4 multiplayer!

Anyways, sweet and sour chicken with egg fried rice awaits me.