The Lord of The Rings: Return to Moria

• DEVELOPER: Free Range Games
• PUBLISHER: North Beach Games
• PLATFORMS: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S
• GENRE: Survival/Crafting
• RELEASE DATE: 24 October 2023
• STARTING PRICE: 39.99€
• REVIEWED VERSION: PC

The Lord of The Rings: Return to Moria is your typical survival, crafting and adventure title where you'll build bases, mine, fight various enemies and progress further from time to time. However, I believe that this game has received somewhat harsher criticism and comments from players than it deserves. Yes, the game is full of bugs, has performance issues, some elements such as combat are not well designed, but it can really surprise you with its rich Middle-earth lore and multiplayer gameplay.

The concept itself is unique, it contains a combination of our favorite Lord of the Rings trilogy, in this case it is about the Fourth Age of Middle-earth, after the fall of Sauron and the end of the war for the ring, and survival crafting elements that have their advantages, but also disadvantages. In the game we will also find the well-known character Gimli, whose voice is lent by the actor John Rhys-Davies. Namely, the story revolves around Gimli calling all the dwarven factions back to Moria to reclaim it from the goblins and orcs still in those areas. When we have in mind where the action is exactly located, then we can additionally enjoy the fact that the game mentions the events of the Fellowship of the Ring, for example, the places where Legolas, Frodo, Sam, Aragorn and the others passed. While you'll spend most of your time exploring the various rooms, and there's too little emphasis on the story, certain elements such as the singing of the dwarves, ancient architecture, Durin's tomb, the elven forest, and more will somewhat alleviate that sense of lack of a story.

The big disadvantage this game has is that you don't have much freedom. The construction of different buildings, walls and objects are limited in terms of placement, that is, not everything is well thought out, especially since everything can pass through each other and you have to work hard just to place something in the place you want, and there is also the possibility that everything falls apart because the game does not register the space where some platforms are placed. The most important ore in the game is the black diamond, which is extremely difficult to get, almost impossible in some situations, which spoiled the entire gaming experience, and you need black diamonds for fast travel. You can find them very quickly in the very depths of Moria, however, there is currently no possibility of opposing the deepest darkness from which you can die very quickly. It should also be noted that Moria is surrounded by unbreakable walls, or structural walls of caves, so you are also limited in what you can destroy and where you can move.

There are a lot of bugs, from constant repeating of strange sounds, items dropping through the world, quest markers lingering after the objective is completed, bugs that cause all enemies to disappear, no crafting ability after returning to base and the list goes on. This game needs a lot of tweaking, not only to remove bugs, but also to improve the quality of existing features.

As I mentioned, you will spend most of your time traveling and exploring different locations, hidden rooms, collecting resources and upgrading your equipment and weapons to successfully defeat all the threats in this game. This is even a fun aspect, you never know what can jump out in front of you as you move deeper into the mines, and the darkness brings even more mysterious events and enemies. Also, don't panic if you get overwhelmed with the massive content and resources in the game, it doesn't force you to move on and progress right away, but you have enough time to explore and get through everything. In addition, fun can be found in drinking beer that increases your morale, stamina, but also gives different effects and benefits. Furthermore, you can brew potions, analyze recipes in detail and always plan your future endeavors. The game is surprisingly well-paced and progress is rewarded quite generously, however, each new zone again does not offer as much variety and detail. You will always get five to six new things that you need to upgrade, after that, what next?

Unfortunately, it can be concluded that the construction, the combat, which we will talk about soon, and exploration missed their goal, that is, they are not well connected to each other. Building bases should be fun, but it's very difficult to even think about the possibility because you are truly limited in that regard. Furthermore, the combat was too repetitive for me, you have a normal attack, a boosted attack, the ability to block and roll, or rather dodge. All of this would be fine if the AI wasn't so boring and limited. You practically don't even need to think about how to fight: attack the goblin twice, block and start again, but it gets tedious when there is a lot of them in one place. However, there are a large number of enemies, from spiders that throw poison at you, trolls, orcs, bats, bosses in camps and others that have enriched the space of Moria. The weapons are practically the same, you use the axe and swords in the same way, and a few arrows and bows are a poor addition to an already poor combat system.

Perhaps the most annoying feature of this game is the onslaught of hordes of goblins and enemies. This happens most often during mining and exploration while making too much noise or they may attack your base with the intention of destroying it. There's nothing worse when enemies keep popping up, when it takes you half an hour just to move that horde away from your base. Also, all enemies have large health bars, and a large group of them in one place can drive you crazy because you won't know what to do first; attack or defend. Additionally, enemies could get stuck and stop moving. Some invisible force in the area prevented them from doing anything, which then made them immobile and an easy target.

However, excluding all the bad things and bugs found in the game, the most fun part of this game was the multiplayer gameplay. I managed to gather six different dwarves with whom I embarked on a unique journey together. Multiplayer simply writes its own stories, and it's truly more fun when you don't have to think about everything and have someone to laugh with at every flaw of this game with. I am not a person who will turn all the shortcomings into something that is not fun, on the contrary, I find it fascinating that we finally got a game that has survival elements and that combines the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Despite a large number of irritating features, it was the concept of this game that completely captivated me and the unique experience of traveling as a dwarf through the world of Moria.

Developer Free Range Games hit the nail on the head with the concept of Moria, which is unfortunately not well executed. Dwarves are known for their mining and metalworking skills, which makes them excellent protagonists in a survival game, and if you combine all of that with Lord of the Rings, you've got one absolutely damn good game. Also, this is one of the few Lord of the Rings games that stayed true to the entire story, however, if you're more of a survival game fan than a Lord of the Rings fan, then Return to Moria is definitely a title to avoid, at least until they improve and correct certain difficulties. There are simply better options when it comes to survival games, but if you have some company to play this game with, then this title is definitely worth a try.

Review copy provided by the publisher