The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is an epic adventure through the dangerous realms of Middle-earth. There, an inner conflict rages in the mind of a halfling. Of course, we are referring to both Smeagol and Gollum’s split personality, an integral character that straddles both. Hobbit and Lord of the Ring story. Bridging the void between these two narratives, Daedalic’s third-person stealth platformer puts you in control of a titular threat on an endless quest for a precious ring. Sadly, the only precious thing about my time with Gollum was the hope that one day I could finish the game, uninstall it from my PS5, and never have to think about it again.
As you can imagine, we’re not big fans of The Lord of the Rings: Gollum. Throughout the roughly 10-hour campaign, we were exposed to some of the oldest and woefully dull stealth and platforming segments in a game to date. In fact, I couldn’t even finish reading all the chapters of the story. (of chapter 10) In chapter 9, I encountered a game-breaking bug that stopped me from progressing and prevented me from completing the game before the embargo. We have reached out to Daedalic Entertainment for assistance with this matter, but have yet to hear back at the time of writing.
But we were little surprised when this game-wrecking bug emerged from the shadows. That’s because, from start to finish, we ran into a series of bugs that not only hampered the experience, but also led to game crashes and app restarts. I’m stuck in a death loop. Characters disappear from game cutscenes. And you won’t be able to interact with important mission objects. Frankly, it was a mess and felt like a glimpse of what should have been in the early days, quick Building games that need more time in the oven.
This made it even more difficult to navigate through the game’s (nearly) ten story chapters, which lacked a noticeable sense of diversity. Each chapter, which lasts about an hour, consists of a rotation of stealth, platforming, and fetch quest levels, and while the only thing that really confuses you is the location, don’t be afraid to revisit old disciplines. Whether we went to the Fiery Pit of Mount Doom or to Milkwood, the Elven Kingdom, it was hard not to run into some trouble. Sometimes it’s the dangerous controls on long climbing sections that have killed us over and over again, and other times it’s brutal yet mind-boggling at near-instantaneous fail-stealth levels. It’s a far more stupid AI that sometimes made me want to throw my DualSense at it. TV, like a stone pointed at Samwise Gamgee’s head. Ultimately, it all becomes a recurring feverish dream, not helped by the fact that almost half of the campaign is set in the same linear location.
Despite the repetition, there were times when I was scratching my head as to where to go. The level design feels so messy and doesn’t really lead you down the set path. This meant that we frequently jumped on ledges, causing us to back off or return to our starting point. On some more open levels, it felt like you stumbled upon your destination by chance. Some levels include a bird’s eye view of the layout, with the camera moving across the intended route. There is a veiled suspicion that this is an afterthought feature to combat confusing level design. Don’t get me wrong, it was never like a maze and we always knew where to go. However, while most linear games make discovery feel almost natural, Gollum never feels right.
But let’s talk about the IP that the game is based on. The world of JRR Tolkien is filled with a fantastical setting and a small amount of lore that could break even the most boring gameplay he loops. It’s a pity that Gollum has absolutely no interest in using it, not really even thinking about it. felt like Lord of the Ring. The bizarre appearances of figures like Gandalf and the mere mention of Aragorn make the references within it feel so hollow and tailored to the person they once were. kind of We watched a movie while it was playing in the background.
Narratively, there’s nothing here that feels like it has little impact on the wider world. Instead, we were offered an affirmation about the events we had suspected, and everything seemed as if Daedalic wasn’t really allowed to touch anything too essential in the world. It feels pretty pointless. Lord of the Ring universe. Naturally, this is more likely a legal/normative restriction than something Daedalic is to blame, but it’s a shame because this character and setting had such potential. is. We’d love to hear the Orcs discuss world events, refer to parts of the book to spy on intricate details, or visit locations ripped straight from the film. But it’s all so bland that it almost feels like it’s set in the same place where Sam and Frodo destroyed the One Ring or a band of dwarves made a daring barrel-based escape. not available.
The game attempts to take advantage of mechanics unique to Gollum’s character, such as intermittent choices that allow you to take either side of Gollum’s personality. There’s something interesting there, especially when you argue your case to persuade either Smeagol or Gollum. That’s helped by a performance that, despite the absence of Andy Serkis, doesn’t feel too derivative, especially once you get used to the game. However, like almost everything else, it feels underdeveloped. After a few tries, you will steadily find that your choices mechanically lead to the same results. Also, we had never lost an argument with the other side, so we didn’t feel that the answer we chose was all that important. Maybe we are good at taking our side.
A graphical presentation rounds it all out. It’s not too bad in motion, and maintains a steady 60 frames per second in performance mode for games. However, it can actually come as a shock at how unpolished and downright bad it all looks. There are options for quality mode and quality mode with raytracing, but the game crashed so many times in those modes that I didn’t experience much. I understand Daedalic may not have the biggest budget for this game, but everything is muddy and decidedly he looks like he was in the PS3 era. This is especially disappointing considering how fragmented the level is with numerous loading screens. Despite the proper use of DualSense haptics, it certainly doesn’t feel like a PS5-powered game.
Conclusion
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is a broken game. In a situation where it can only be said that a big opportunity was missed, there are few characteristics that can be recovered.Single-player linear has serious potential Lord of the Ring Experiences like this, but ridiculously outdated level design, clumsy controls, a severe lack of polish, mushy and unimpressive graphics, and a boring story make Gollum completely off the mark. As a big fan of books, movies and games, it saddens me that this experience has nothing precious to offer.
