The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria, the action-adventure and survival game from developer Free Range Games, will officially release on October 24th, 2023, for PC via the Epic Games Store, and the PlayStation 5. The announcement came via a new tweet, and the devs followed up in the thread by revealing the Xbox Series X|S version will release in “early 2024”.
There is currently no word on support for Steam. Pre-orders are available now for the Epic Games Store. An in-depth developer video was released on IGN today, delving into the various biomes, characters, and more:
It’s undoubtedly clear that Return to Moria is trying to earn goodwill with the Middle-earth fanbase by welcoming John Rhys-Davies to perform Gimli again. It’s an undeniable win, as the original film trilogy remains beloved, and perhaps the most mainstream and recognizable adaptation.
However, fans can’t help but feel burned by The Lord of the Rings: Gollum, which ultimately faltered in many respects. Even after teasing RTX gameplay, fueled by NVIDIA DLSS 3, the visuals turned out to be unsatisfying both in terms of graphics and style. The game also didn’t explore the boundless lore very much.
Now, The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria is concerning players as it experiments with such a concentrated path into Middle-earth again. And it doesn’t have the AAA visuals fans have hoped for, despite some fun attention to detail.
More importantly, there seems to be a steep conceptual divide between developers and fans. Many players are looking for a vast RPG with a budget to match one of the greatest literary triumphs in history.
Hopefully, Return to Moria can deliver on its many promises. Dwarves are ripe for original material, as well as Moria. And some of the survival elements could be neat, particularly with co-op that supports several players.
You can read more about The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria, Free Range Games, and other Middle-earth titles by following our news section.
Comments