The Lord Of The Rings Zelda-Style RPG Nobody Remembers

Lord of the Rings games are surprisingly uncommon, even though the franchise and its engrossing world feel ripe for a video game adaptation. We’ve had direct adaptations of the movies, a smattering of spin-off games, and the better-known Shadow of games, but beyond those, there’s little in the way of LOTR video game media. It is a shame, but something that is being somewhat rectified in the near future.

The upcoming open-world Lord of the Rings RPG is set to take the world by storm, much like its Harry Potter counterpart, and potentially even encourage a new wave of LOTR games. However, it is a little while away, and fans may be desperate to get their hands on any Lord of the Rings content as soon as possible. Fortunately, there is a little-known LOTR game from 2003 that perfectly replicates the Zelda RPG experience that is sure to help pass the time before Warhorse Studios’ epic title finally drops.

The Hobbit On Xbox Is A Really Unique RPG

2003’s The Hobbit is an oddity that has been lost to time. While EA held the rights to make video games based directly on the movie adaptations of The Lord of the Rings, Vivendi Games (the parent company of The Hobbit’s publisher, Sierra Entertainment) was able to make games based on the books. It tried its hand at The Fellowship of the Ring and found success, but ultimately opted to scrap plans to make a Two Towers game after EA got to it first. Instead, it chose to make The Hobbit, and the world is all the better for it.

Sure, 2003’s The Hobbit isn’t the best game based on LOTR media, but it also isn’t the worst Lord of the Rings game. It sits somewhere in the middle, its numerous features coalescing to create a surprisingly faithful yet ultimately weird adaptation of the novel that closely resembles its obvious The Legend of Zelda influences. This is a 3D platformer with plenty of loot and colorful gems to collect, a hack-and-slash combat system with a lock-on system, and a colorful art style reminiscent of games like Majora’s Mask or Wind Waker.

Bilbo can use the Ring to sneak around, fight deadly spiders, encounter the three trolls, pole-vault while platforming, whack orcs with Sting, and loot so many chests. The Hobbit is very much the adaptation one would expect from a 2000s collect-a-thon platformer, but there’s plenty of fun detail that will resonate with dedicated LOTR fans like myself. It’s amazing to see iconic locations from Middle-earth brought to life with such color and vibrancy, something that’s sorely missing from later games in the series. Unfortunately, The Hobbit is bizarrely difficult, something that certainly put me off completing it as a child.

The Hobbit Is A Surprisingly Tough Game

My core memory of playing The Hobbit as a child was dying while opening chests. Sure, combat was tricky, more akin to Dark Souls than The Legend of Zelda, thanks to its reliance on timing attacks and waiting for the right opening. However, the lockpicking minigames, of which there are four variants, were extremely difficult, and failure to unlock a chest in the very short allotted time almost always meant instant death.

The platforming, while fun, was also inconsistent, with Bilbo plummeting to his death on numerous occasions. It isn’t as if the game was simply too hard as a child, as even revisiting it in 2026 proved to be a challenging experience. That being said, there’s enough whimsy here, enough novel mechanics, and Lord of the Rings’ flair to make playing The Hobbit more than worthwhile, especially as there really isn’t anything else like it.

It comes from an era of video games that simply doesn’t and can’t exist anymore. Sure, it isn’t the best Lord of the Rings game, but it offers something that none of the others ever could. It’s fun, and funny, and frequently silly, in the way that Tolkien had always intended The Hobbit book to be. I’ll always have a soft spot for the Zelda-inspired The Hobbit and will likely find myself returning to it time and time again in the years to come, if only to see if I can finally beat those dastardly lockpicking minigames.

Created by

J.R.R. Tolkien

First Film

The Lord of the Rings (1978)

Cast

Norman Bird, Anthony Daniels, Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Liv Tyler, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, Cate Blanchett, John Rhys-Davies, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Christopher Lee, Hugo Weaving, Sean Bean, Ian Holm, Andy Serkis, Brad Dourif, Karl Urban, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, James Nesbitt, Ken Stott, Benedict Cumberbatch, Evangeline Lilly, Lee Pace, Luke Evans, Morfydd Clark, Mike Wood, Ismael Cruz Cordova, Charlie Vickers, Markella Kavenagh, Megan Richards, Sara Zwangobani, Daniel Weyman, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Lenny Henry, Brian Cox, Shaun Dooley, Miranda Otto, Bilal Hasna, Benjamin Wainwright, Luke Pasqualino, Christopher Guard, William Squire, Michael Scholes, John Hurt