The Lord of the Rings Online Previews
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Once you've arrived in the world proper, the Shadows of Angmar is quite quest-oriented, although if you're inclined just to wander and explore, you can definitely do so. Should you opt to undertake the tasks available from NPCs that are easily recognized via the golden rings floating over their heads, advancement is a fair bit faster since the experience point bonuses for completing them are reasonably substantial. Actually, while the progression curve is undoubtedly still not final, it was reasonably rapid through to level 10. That's how high I got in approximately five and a half hours of playing time without joining any groups (which are called fellowships) or attempting to power-level.
And a snip from MMORPG.com's article:
Harbor no illusions. Lord of the Rings Online is not an exercise in innovation. It's a game designed to be immediately familiar to those who play MMORPGs like World of Warcraft and honestly, the experience at low levels did not seem immediately dissimilar to that game. The user interface, for example, is definitely a cousin of what Blizzard did. The upside is that in Lord of the Rings Online, MMOG fans should instantly know what to do, while fans of the films or books should not have much trouble picking it up. Turbine hopes that the differentiation comes from their setting and a few choice features along the way.
