The Lord of the Rings: War in the North Previews
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AtomicGamer:
My time spent with War in the North was as the mage character; you won't be controlling any Frodos or Gandalfs here, as these are pretty much new characters in a different conflict than what the movies depicted. There's also an elven archer and a dwarven warrior, and all of them have unique sets of loot to collect, separate talent trees, and can do lots of damage on the battlefield. (This is not a game with any kind of MMO-style tank/healer/dps setup.) Combat is generally linear and story-oriented, and while it plays a bit more from the third-person perspective using dual sticks rather than the top-down style of Dark Alliance, the RPG loot and talent systems will still get their hooks into you.
Jumping in with two other gamers, we immediately got to work. The game has a three-player cooperative system - yes, three, not four - and while there was a story and a goal, what I remember most was killing a whole butt-ton of orcs in the process. For some reason, this demo was decidedly low key in scale and ambition compared to the one shown at PAX East earlier this year, as it had little in the way of the large boss characters or ranged/melee enemy combinations that we saw in the previous demo. Instead, this demo seemed to focus on monsters swarming us and getting cut down by our arrow shots, magic bolts, and a very angry axe getting swung around. It's important to point out that this game is much bloodier than previous LOTR games, presumably because even the movie-watching crowd has to have grown up now that it's been a full decade - so Snowblind expects to get an M rating for this one.
FutureGamez:
Impressively while you can play this game by youself the computer will control the two other characters. Alternatively you can play with a split-screen mode, or online. The developers are promising a game at least 10 hours in length, and much more if you explore all the side areas while multiple playthroughs will open up new options and difficulty levels.
Graphically this game is looking pretty slick and certainly captures the look and feel of the LOTR universe. Creatures - from human to orc - look faithful to what was described in the books, and what has been seen in the feature films (although this game isn't linked to the films artistically).
And GameSwot:
Theoretically, all the potential ability options at your disposal and the dynamic nature of having a well-balanced group should provide a broad range of tactics to wield. But once we were hurled into the fray against groups of meaty orcs and hulking troll brutes, the intense action devolved into chaos almost immediately. At first, battle proved to be far from smooth encounters against larger foes had us getting frequently wet-ragged to the ground, taking a long time to recover and sometimes even glitching our dwarf into the environment itself. Eventually we got a feel for the combos and dodge maneuvers, and being able to stay upright for more than a few seconds at a time gave us a chance to cleave some skulls. Chaining successful attacks in rapid succession lets you enter into a temporary (heroic) mode where you'll dish out serious damage on foes, making it possible to take down larger adversaries quickly.
The emphasis on brutal combat yields intense encounters that are bloody and satisfying, even if battle is still buggy in the game's current state. There were moments where combat turned into a total frenzied mess, but the action really came together when each team member was on-point and working together. The game's cooperative element extends well beyond carving the limbs off of smelly orcs, too. Each character has other special race abilities that prove useful outside of the fray. Our dwarf, for example, was able to detect a secret tunnel entrance inside a cave that other players weren't able to see. You can also trade and gift items to other players, which is helpful considering the large amount of loot you'll find.
