As an avid video game player and massive Lord of the Rings fan I have definitely had my share of ups and downs when it comes to games from Tolkien’s beloved fiction. There certainly hasn’t been a shortage of titles and I’ve played almost all of them. From the great (Battle for Middle Earth on PC) to the not so great (Fellowship of the Ring on Xbox) I’m usually down to give a LOTR game a go. When an earlier Humble Bundle included War in the North along with Guardians of Middle Earth I was obliged to pick it up based on the inclusion of those games alone.

There are definitely times when I think being a Lord of the Rings fan can potentially hurt my enjoyment of one of their games more than it helps. Knowing the story too well makes it difficult to overlook errors and inconsistencies, and there are always plenty to be found. It’s not particularly the fault of any single game, because the LOTR fiction is actually pretty slow paced and not nearly as magical as would be best for movies and games, so they tend to jazz things up a bit. I don’t blame them in certain cases. For instance, the original three movies did a pretty decent job walking that tight-rope. The first Hobbit movie, however, made me so mad that I refuse to watch the next two.

I was curious to see where War in the North would find its balance. First of all it seems unique because instead of being fully movie licenced or not at all, it seems to occupy some area in the middle where it definitely was granted some access to likenesses and design, but none of the voice acting. Elrond looks like Hugo Weaving, Gandalf looks and sounds a LOT like Ian MacKellan, but at the same time the fiction seems to follow the novels more than the movie. That suits me just fine, as long as they do a good job of it. It turns out they did en excellent job in some parts and an absolutely terrible job in others.

Before I launch into a full rant that I can’t escape I should make some notes on the gameplay. War in the North is a Beat-em-up with RPG elements. The combat is all real-time and mostly relies on you hammering the “X” button until a little prompt pops up over the enemy’s head, then you press “Y” to decapitate. Repeat 12,000 times and you’re all set. There are skill trees and you can equip different armor and weapons, and these elements were important and rewarding enough to keep me pretty invested in them. Weapons and armor broke down and needed repairing WAY too quickly, but overall I was enjoying speccing out my character.

The combat can definitely get pretty bland and repetitive, and if fact can at times be pretty frustrating. Once you get the hang of the combat you can manage in most encounters, but they are pretty challenging. You are accompanied by two party members of which you can play any one. I played the elf the whole game, but you were allowed to swap. Your companions will go down and need to be revived, luckily they are very diligent about reviving each other and will revive you if necessary. The problem comes when they both go down and all the enemies in the area immediately flock to you. You’re never going to be able to survive like this, and reviving a friend requires you to channel without being hit for 3 seconds. It’s pretty much impossible with all the enemies after you. On top of that, your fallen friends constantly crawl towards you, which seems helpful unless you’re trying to lure enemies away from them only to have them limp right back into danger.

The combat definitely wears on you at times. I constantly found myself not really wanting to play this game on a given night, only to push ahead and play it anyway. Once I started playing I actually ended up having a good time, but the idea of playing more was always a bit of a stumbling block. When you turn off War in the North for the night, you don’t exactly go to bed giddy with the thought of picking it back up the next day. Only once you fire it up do you remember that it’s actually pretty alright. I quite often found that I enjoyed the downtime in towns better than the actual combat though, and that’s because I’m a fan of the fiction and the world.

Fans of the novels will have a bit of a treat, because there are some locations explored here that are only covered in the books and not in any of the movies. I enjoyed seeing The Barrow Downs and Mirkwood explored as well as some other great areas. The only areas shared with the movies are Rivendell and Bree, which are both places I’d gladly see as many times as people will show me. All these nice touches made it all the more vexing when I encountered that part that infuriated me the most.

The Eagles, man, the freaking Eagles! Before I go too crazy I’m going to say that all my opinions about the Eagles don’t make this game any better or worse technically, and it will only bother Tolkien fans. If you’re not a Tolkien fan, proceed un-ranted at. EVERY Tolkien fan has had to endure the same question from all their friends every time the story is brought up. “Why didn’t they just get the Eagles to fly over Mount Doom and drop the ring in?”. It’s a legitimate question I’ll admit, and the answer I’ll also admit is a tad suspect. Basically, the Eagles have been alive for so long that any events happening in the short term don’t even register as a blip on their radar, sort of like Dr. Manhattan. They are quite literally above it all. Furthermore, they see themselves as observers and rarely take action. It was unbelievably rare that Gwaihir the eagle saved Gandalf from Orthanc (Saruman’s tower) and in the book Gwaihir proceeded to bitch the whole ride back how much of an inconvenience it was for him to save Gandalf’s life.

Only at the very end of the LOTR story did the Eagles even begin to become concerned about the whole war, and even then they barely helped. It is really tough to convince confused friends of this argument, especially when games like War in the North come around and blow that argument right out of the water. Early on you meet an eagle named Belaram. He has been imprisoned by orcs (unlikely) and when you save him he pledges basically a life-debt to you (extremely unlikely). He comes to your aid countless times throughout the story and even at one point requests that Gwaihir, head of the eagles, grant him permission to take off and help you full time. Gwaihir lets him go and lets him bring TWO other eagles to just hang around and chauffeur you and your gang around Middle Earth.

Those complaints are just me being a nerd, I understand, but if a guy who writes video game reviews based on fantasy novels can’t complain about the inaccuracies within, then I have no idea what the internet is even for anymore. At the end of the day Lord of the Rings: War in the North is an alright game that was made simultaneously better and worse by being placed in Middle Earth. So let’s call it a wash, shall we?