When it takes you two or three minutes to take down a single orc, and you see a group of six of them running toward you, it's hard to see this as anything but an inconvenience. And this means combat gets extremely tedious. You won't get very deep into the game before you're facing absurd amounts of enemies with ludicrous amounts of health. However, as you progress through the game, you'll encounter enemies with more and more health, requiring longer and longer battles. It seems almost like each sub-section of the menu was designed by a separate person who had no communication with the other members of the design team.īut War in the North is all about the combat, and at least the in-game controls are button-mashingly smooth. Why there's not one single button that you can consistently use to confirm your menu selections is completely beyond me.
You're asked to "confirm" any of your menu choices before they are applied in some cases, you need to hit the X button (PS3) to confirm your choice, in others you'll need to use the Start button, and in one specific case you'll need to use the square button. It does what it needs to, for the most part, but unlike pretty much every other RPG ever made, the menu has no consistent button layout. This feels completely counterintuitive, and I see absolutely no reason this option isn't available the second you pick a character from the start menu.Īnd this isn't the only thing that feels counterintuitive. That means you'll spend a bit of time playing as the stock character models before you're ever given the option to customize your look. Instead, you'll have to seek out a mirror in the game, which will allow you to change your character's appearance. Now, players are allowed a fair amount of customization with whichever character they choose-hair color and style, eye color, etc.-but this customization isn't available from the get-go. You will choose one to play as, and the other two will be your companions, either controlled by A.I. There are three characters to select from here: Eraden, a Dúnedain Ranger Farin, a Dwarven champion and Andriel, an Elvin loremaster. In my opinion, War of the North's fascination with violence is something of a disservice to the works it draws inspiration from.Įither way, you will spend your time in War in the North chopping orcs into several pieces and watching their black blood stain the landscape. Tolkien was a veteran himself, seeing combat in World War I, and his stories specifically and intentionally focus on the glimmers of hope rather than the overwhelming darkness that surrounds them.
#THE LORD OF THE RINGS WAR IN THE NORTH CO OP SPLITSCREEN PC LICENSE#
The thinking behind this was that war is dark and vile, and the M rating finally gives Snowblind the license to actually show that side of the War of the Ring. It allows players to kill orcs with more gratuitous violence than they've ever been allowed before.
You see, War in the North takes pride in the fact that it's the first ever M-rated Lord of the Rings game. Instead, it seems that Snowblind has a different audience in mind: those who have seen Peter Jackson's films and said, "Remember that part where Aragron cuts the head off that scary dude with the bow and arrows? There should have been more stuff like that in the movies."
( Mae Govannen to my fellow Tolkien geeks.) I thought it was pretty safe to assume that I was the target demographic for The Lord of the Rings: War in the North. In fact, I'm a little embarrassed to admit it, but I can speak a few choice phrases in both Elvish and Dwarvish. The books are among my favorite works of literature, and the Peter Jackson films have become a once-a-year ritual for me.
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