The Lord of the Rings: Gollum never looked particularly promising, but after a string of delays, some were hopeful that the end product might be half decent. Well, it would appear that hope was misplaced as Daedalic Entertainment’s ambitious release has been near-universally panned by critics.
According to several outlets, LOTR: Gollum is a bug-ridden unparalleled slogfest. Rachel Watts ofRPSpulled no punches, saying “playing it for more than 30-minutes at a time would make me feel unsettled, prompting some kind of feral need to scoop my brain out of my skull.”
The reviews describe an unfinished game, prone to crashing near-constantly if the player gets ambitious with the graphical settings. Sam Pape ofGameSpotrevealed that during his 11 hours of playing Gollum, it crashed a staggering 120 times. Other noted bugs include clipping into terrain, spawning in the wrong location, music disappearing and cutscenes ending prematurely.
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Unplayability aside, critics aren’t finding the game fun or engaging. LOTR: Gollum is a stealth game as the wretched creature lacks the strength to engage in combat. However, from the sounds of it, the stealth mechanics are the absolute bare minimum. It’s essentially just skulking around in shadows and destroying light sources, much like A Plague Tale.
Well, surely Tolkiens’ world redeemed Gollum? It would appear not. The game runs more-or-less parallel to the events of the Fellowship of the Ring but of course, Gollum was not dining on small cakes in Rivendell, he was languishing in the dungeons of Barad-dûr. While Daedalic is worthy of respect for highlighting one of the least-explored locations of Middle-Earth, Barad-dûr with its dingy dungeons and Orcs isn’t conducive to either picturesque views or engaging conversation.
It’s very rare to find a game that’s universally panned, and it’s hard to imagine that the opinions of players will be any more positive when the game releases today. That isn’t the extent of IP holder Embracer Group’s woes, though. The behemoth gaming company has seen its stock price drop over 40% (perReuters) as a result of a $2 Billion deal suddenly falling through. On top of this, several Embracer-owned upcoming releases have been delayed out of 2023, prompting the company to lower its financial forecasts for the year.
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