Gollums Existence is Miserable so when you play the game you feel miserable too. You also feel like you were robbed of your “precious” 70 dollars and feel betrayed. All the choices are made deliberately from a Role playing perspective to make the player be able to identify and relate to gollum. They archived their Goal!
just play Styx if you want your fix. that's a damn good game in comparison, and you will find yourself thinking why this gollum game couldn't meet anything nearly as good as Styx when it came down to the story and gameplay.
Playing as Gollum is a weird idea but one that could've been incredibly fucking good with a really tight, well written experience. The inverse is true as well, because it makes it that much worse when everything sucks lmao
I’m so glad they gave us the opportunity to buy a Lore Compendium too. Other games foolishly give that kind of stuff to you for free, but the Gollum devs know that people don’t want their money.
It could have been something great. Imagine Smeagol's very slow descent into madness presented into a 10hour long game which basically is a case study of a key character to the Lotr trilogy. If it was that it could have been a perfect game, but it fails at even that premise.
@@jogonyachickennugget4911 Just read a summary of Smeagol's history and use your imagination. I bet you could come up with a decent 8 hour game based on that, or filling blanks with details on how he manged to survive this long (he's a small creature in a big world after all). You could tell his story from being exiled, to traveling to Mordor the first time. This way you don't need to turn his disorder into gameplay, because his descent into madness naturally happens throughout the story. Just some ideas.
The next game is going to be "Balrog." You wander around in a pitch-black cavern for about 2 hours, at which point you have to track down the muffled sound of pickaxes and Scottish accents, and as the first dwarf breaks through and a shaft of light engulfs the camera, the end credits play.
Yea this would've been perfect. You start out all happy as Smeagul in green pastures, etc etc and as events occur as we know from the movies, now queue the unique game story were Gollum is being tortured by the ring and have him go through crazy scenarios, each scarier than the next to do what the ring wants, but in the end you become "Gollum" as we know. Like the game literally transforming from happy green green into fucked up dark spooky shit. And with each level/ chapter that you survive you see the changes from Smeagul slowly turning into Gollum.
@@psy-bun Or you could make choices which change the story, and end up with a happy gollum. There were plenty of ways to make this terrible idea...less terrible.
This is the future publishers want. My only solace is that they can't actually do away with indie devs, who'll always be free to just go off and make some weird little experience that will stick with me years after I've forgotten even the names of the AAA companies.
@Matt The Latios (BoredGar) yeah, as usual, there's more nuance to the situation than can be fit in a youtube comment. I'll add this: procedural generation works fine for anything that doesn't need to convey meaning. Surface textures, natural structures like rocks and trees, and level layouts that are thematically chaotic like cave systems, these are all things that have long benefitted from procedural generation. But proc-gen levels can't convey specific ideas; it's all environment, no story-telling. Imagine Outer Wilds if the ruins and writings were just sort slapped down wherever, with no eye toward making a good set-piece.
@@Ottonymos i am genuinely expecting that over the next decade, we're going to see more and more AI entertainment flood from big corporations- movies, tv shows, video games, books, all of it, while at the same time a big spike in indie entertainment. AI media costs virtually nothing for corporations to create, so even when their profits start to sink, they won't roll it back. they will happily insist on an inferior product that draws in less profit rather than a superior project that they had to invest money into, and human creators that they had to respect. meanwhile, indie entertainment will get bigger and bigger, because AI will never be able to beat a human creative project, but indie development doesn't provide healthcare, job security, steady salary, etc to the people involved- so as usual, literally everything gets worse, but CEOs will continue to get pay raises.
This is like playing as Dudley in a Harry Potter game and you have to hide from Death Eaters. Such a bizarre choice of playable character for this universe
The most bewildering thing about this game is the fact the studio sent out reviews copies of it. They must've known the feedback would be devastating, so why do it?
The developer, Daedalic, once was a pretty big name when it came to indie-ish point and click games here in germany. Very funny humor, not too big on animations, but kinda cute cartoon style of graphics. However, lately alot of people who worked there claimed that all the important people have left, only students are hired, people are overworked and nobody in the upper management knows what they are doing. The only positive thing former workers pointed out is that co-workers are friendly towards each other because they're all stuck in the same boat. So seeing how Gollum ended up, I'm sure it is how you said: Nobody in leading positions knew what they were doing. Hell, I almost wanna bet that a level designer actively put the rock there to hide the volcano out of spite, if the stories are true of how bad the dev has gotten. It is sad because they used to make really good games. Harvey's New Eyes is one of the best point and click games ever. But that game is over 10 years old now, and clearly nobody working on that is still with the developer.
I had an internship at Daedalic in the art department a long time ago... Daedalic managed to attract some of the most promising and skilled young artists from germany as their interns. If you wanted to work in animation in germany you just wanted to join daedalic. But how it really worked was: We were thrice as many (unpaid) interns as employed professionals. Everyone full of dreams and hopes, but with no actual experience. And we did just work as normal employes not as interns. If they did not change anything since back then - this game was probably made mostly by interns too. Would not surprise me a tiny bit. Shame on daedalic. Shame on the management. I hope for all these artists/programmers/designers that they can move on to better projects under a better lead, and maybe can learn and grow.
@@blodeuwedd18 In 2020 Studios did get closed in München and Düsseldorf. 2021 they liquidatet Daedalic Entertainment Studio West GmbH and Daedalic Entertainment Bavaria GmbH. 2022 Nacon bought Daedalic. And Nacon is at least questionable. Keywords Frogware and Sinking City.
@@blodeuwedd18 Really interesting to here. I remember at the German Dev Days around 2 or maybe 3 years ago, Deadalic was getting a fee prices (More than other German dev studios) and it felt like they are currently the best German studio around. They really made me feel like they are the company I want to join.
The concept of being in a cursed/damned part of a wonderful world, playing as a character who's furtive, has dubious morals, strong self interests, a audible immersive representation of his two distinct personalities, is a concept with SO MUCH potential, being able to sneak around, trick people, chose between plans that fit each personality more, having such choices make real difference in gameplay and/or story, all while showing the beautiful creations of Tolkien... Yet they managed to get the worse of every step 🤡
"it looks like it was designed by highschoolers or college students as a summer project" that probably is partially true. i worked as an intern for daedalic a long time ago and... if they do things the same way as back then it means the game was probably done by interns almost exclusively. Back then there was at least thrice the amount of (unpaid) interns in comparison to employers. And if there are no experienced professionel employes the interns don't have anyone to learn from. So they just do it the best they can. And don't get me wrong: Daedalic did manage to attract some really talented and skilled artists as interns. But that talent does not matter in the lack of everything else. I'm sad for these people. They probably poured their hearts into this project and tried their very best.
@@isidro_ Yeah i don't know what sources you want me to share and what difference it will make so let's go for believe me :) I gain nothing from lying and I gain nothing from telling the truth so i leave it up to you
Maybe it was developed by interns, pour unexperienced and underpaid guys. That would make this topic even worse. Of course it is 100% unprofessionell for the studio to release a game like that as a full title for 50-60 dollars with additional minor dlc things to even gain extra money. It's incredible cheeky and 100% disrespectful towards the players.
@@Flowery1991So long as you're not being outright hostile or cruel towards the devs, I think it's 100% fair and reasonable to criticize them for their incompetence. I'm sure they all tried really hard, and wanted this game to be good, I don't doubt that in the slightest. But good intentions don't make a good game. And while the level of bugs on display would be one thing, because those can at least be patched, between the awful visuals, amateur and shallow gameplay, shoddy level design, poorly constructed story, and just overall questionable design decisions, there are deep-rooted, fundamental issues with this game that can't be fixed with even a massive patch, they'd require a full redo of the entire game. If this were on Gamejolt for free, or a game on Steam for like 10 bucks, yes, I'd feel bad criticizing the devs for something they clearly tried very hard to make good, but lacked the skill to pull off. But this is an official Lord of the Rings game, charging $60 USD at base. At that point, effort and passion don't matter. You're asking to be held to a greater standard, and your lack of ability as a dev *has* to be emphasized. Because this isn't a good game with a bad launch. This is a bad game across the board.
This really looks like one of those games your mother would get for you for cheap together with the console back in the ps2 era and that would then sit in your collection forever after you played it only once.
Playing as Gollum sounds like something that'd be a good side mission in a LoTR game. You get to play as Gollum for a level or two and then go back to the main game. Why would you take that and make it the whole game?
I don't think the concept was the problem. I've worked on video games, play them all the time, and I'm a huge lotr nerd - and honestly, I was really excited for this game. I don't think there's anything wrong with a game based around Gollum, inherently. I think they f--ked up the execution.
Playing as gollum sounds fun af. Creeping around, crushing orcs with rocks, manual (non tool, gollum style) hunting and fishing mechanics to restore life, it has so much potential. Had. Had potential
That's what I think too but apparently people actually wanted to play as him. I can't play a game where I can't empathise with or care about the playable character in some way.
Tbh it's hard to relate to totally uncharismatic villain with no life goals. Of course there are people capable even of that, but I doubt the majority of players can do it.
@@oldcat1790 his goal is to survive and seek his addiction. It's actually super relatable. All some people can do it survive. Not everyone's got big broad plans. Sometimes it's just "make sure I survive another day and seek out what makes the days go by easier"
It's gonna be interesting to learn how much of a hell this must've been to work on, especially for people on the dev team who are actual Lotr fans. That has gotta sting knowing you made your own fav franchise's worst video game in existence lol
@@ivoryvignettes I do feel bad also, it was their first fully 3D game project it looks so I know they tried their best. The publishers are the ones most likely to blame for a tight deadline.
Gollum as the main character had the potential to make a great stealth survival game, starting from the moment he sets foot into the caves under the Misty Mountains. Rangers and wizards have been done to death. However, this isn't that game. Why do devs/publishers almost always manage to screw up such a great license?
i wasn't seeing the potential in this sort of storyline when i first saw the sneak previews, but i'd still agree. As terrible an idea as this concept IS...there were plenty of game-play ideas that could have made this entertaining. instead, They went with a generic, formulaic game loop.
Fuck Rangers and Wizards, I wanna play a goblin with split personality that scavenges for food while evading anything that's even remotely a threat Then again I love survival games and stealth games
Way not make a game about Sauron on his state of mind and his will to conquer middle earth we can play since the beginning of the second age and manage your empire, make the one ring, asigne rings to the people you want to enslave , build your armies fell beasts necromancy build orc armies and breeds corrupt numenor make it a blend between managing and empire and explore what a corrupted Ainur like Sauron does with his free time.
Well they should have started the game after he left in search of the ring. You know, when it is implied that he would enter houses and eat babies. Would make for some interesting stealth sections.
The original Lord of the Rings games on ps2 and Xbox, I thought were badass and they still are to this day. The Return of the King was awesome because of the cooperative play. What was really cool was they would show cut scenes from the movies and then you would go straight into the game. The combat was fluid and solid for its time
Later they realize their studio got sacked due to how awful the game was and they try to go meet Elrond to make up for their mistakes but on the way they get pummeled to death by angry Tolkien fans. The game then drifts into oblivion and it won't be seen for a long time...
The first time I ever saw Gollum's character model and heard his voice...I audibly said "Oof..." I knew it would be trash. The fact that it's *even worse* than I thought it would be is a cryin' shame.
It’s such a shame to see what happened to Daedalic Entertainment. Their point & click adventures are some of the greatest games I’ve ever played. So much love for detail, creative, funny and at times heart breaking.
This game is the equivalent of making an A Song of Ice and Fire video game and the main character they choose for you to play as is Reek and the whole game you’re stuck in Winterfell cleaning Ramsay’s horse, doing his bidding and trying to remember your name by choosing three options and finding the one that rhymes with Reek.
They should have made it like 5 hours, really worked on removing all the useless crap and actually put full effort into it. Then release it for like 20 bucks. No one wants to pay 60 dollars to play Gollum. A short experience might have been interesting if they understood what they were making.
There are so many games being released for the price of a full AAA game that really should be 20 bucks. There’s a market for mid titles they just refuse to price them as what they are…
Which is funny considering one AAA game I particular has worser graphical ingenuity horrible dialogue and technical difficulties that are so lacking polish that the new game they just made looks like it was made for a GameCube title. Though at least to their merit they can make good themes.. every sound from this game feels like a Xbox one game
The New Jedi Knight game is really really good imo All the things i wanted the first to be while playing it they seemed to make happen in this game...Story is great and platforming is on point , feel like Indiana Jones but going through Jedi Temples from long ago..
I'd be interested in listening to a postmortem on this game to learn how it was bungled so badly. I can't help but feel bad for the hard working developers who poured years of their lives into a project that was this badly mismanaged. And it's a shame, I thought the concept itself was really intriguing and unique.
At what point do we stop giving the developers a pass every time the game they directly had a hand in utterly fails? For a game to release in this state is a failure within the entire company and team top to bottom, has to be, looking at the graphics alone. This is made by people who clearly have no business touching a beloved, well known IP like Lord of the Rings and should be relegated to making expansion content at best, if not burger king. 😂
@@jibronigibironi8959 This project screams to me that it's a victim of mismanagement, and the team not having a clear vision of what the game is supposed to be. To be clear no one should buy this game, but we can still have empathy for the folks who were probably really excited to work on Lord of the Rings game only to end up pushing out a turd. Believe me, no one wants to spend years of their life polishing a turd. 😭
@@bwatson77 I don't know, this is coming from a studio that is basically a nobody. I don't see any games on their resume that is noteworthy that justifies them getting their hands on a beloved, established IP to start with. I can't give this kind of studio a pass. There is nothing there that allows me to.
the studio's previously known for making Deponia and some other point & click adventure games, it seems like this was an over-ambitious attempt to pivot from there into the AA or AAA space that the studio couldn't sustain with the resources it had
I appreciate the lengths you went to to say: "People legitimately tried". As someone who has been in game dev for 20 years, I can tell everyone: Literally zero games out there are made 100% by people who don't care. Sure, some of the people on the team might not care, but there is always some who do, and they fight like hell against all odds to try recuing it, but most times- as in here, it's not possible. At the end of the day, it's a failed effort. But at least the acknowledgement of effort is refreshing when most people are like "WTF devs?!" This game will one of of those "what happened?" stories that will come out someday, and odds are high it was as you said: extreme mismanagement. It usually is.
What really got me was the price tag. From the trailers it looked like a really good LOTR next gen tech demo walking lore simulator I’d easily pay $20 to $30 for. Hearing it doesn’t even achieve that and is going for $60+ is wild.
I think what could have made this game work is having him go through cool environments and just watching things unfold, Gollum is always there watching a greater story in middle earth happen before his eyes. A 5 hour quick story but entertaining and for $40
If anyone has seen that one prank from Impractical Jokers where Joey and Q show off fake game concepts like “Superman: The Clark Kent Stuff” or “Murder Your Family” to the focus group, this game fits in perfectly.
@@SolidTV1 Daedalic has been bought as a publisher by Nacon for 60 million $. I can't find detailed information about the studio itself and how many people worked on this, but I'm fairly sure it's not the usual indie '3 dudes working in a flooded basement' kind of deal.
@@SolidTV1 So in this specific case it seems that a publisher with 195 Steam titles, some of which are pretty well renowned, has decided to create their own studio and failed miserably.
You could’ve had the start of the game when you are a hobbit, and consequently have you to accidentally find the ring then kill your friend. And then it’s like his spiraling into madness and you go through all the key moments In the series
I have no doubt a good studio could have made an incredible Gollum game. I think the premise is ripe with opportunities. They could have went completely offbeat, and did some sort of survival action/horror game. Something more base camp focused where you are in the mountain. They could have executed well on stealth too if they leaned more into it. Done passive stealth or active stealth. Something akin to Alien Isolation or Styx. It was very possible to do something cool.
I think the idea of playing as Gollum could be interesting, to play as someone passive to the whole war of good and evil and just being a spectator. The problem with that is that Gollum literally has nothing to do, he's in his cave with his ring until Bilbo shows up and then idk he does nothing until Froddo shows up. His whole point of being is the ring, he wouldn't even go anywhere if he already has it
Unfortunately I have this feeling for most new releases these days, I'd rather support Indie developers or passion side projects rather than "AAA" games.
man, it hurts seeing this being made by daedelic. they are the guys who made the deponia point and click adventures. they are a beloved game dev studio in germany.
@@oneinathousand2156 Regardless of how talented the team may be, you can't shine shit, and i think it would be unfair to place the blame for the games concept on them.
I always finding it amazing that the gaming industry allows products like this or the first cyberpunk release etc to see the light of day! If this were any other industry, the product would never leave the shop floor, and if it did, there would be absolute carnage in within the consumer base.
Well, there is indeed carnage among consumer base, which manifests in massive refunds and barely triple-digit active player base. As for Cyberpunk, it was among the first wave of "undercooked" AAA releases, and from a reputable studio, so the preorder hype got real. As we progress further into optimization purgatory, less and less gamers tend to trust pre-release marketing and form pre-orders, unless it comes from those devs who had not dropped their reputation below the poop threshold.
Gollum’s not a weird character to pick at all, he’s a very interesting character. Exploring his mental state and the beginnings of the personality split would be fascinating! And people love playing as little gremlins! …and then they made this, so.
From the very beginning, when I heard that Gollum would get a new game, I had my doubts. Either the developers got a really good idea, or they didn't...and it was the latter. It takes skills to make a game out of a character that is quite strange to begin with, at least t o fill the gaming experience for dozens of hours. But the studio doesn't even know the visual side, how they would build the attractive world of Lord of the Rings.
I absolutely love how literally nobody was excited for this game (well I saw exactly 2 people on Reddit that were but that's about it) and we all knew well in advance that it would be terrible and yet it STILL managed to be worse than we all expected. Now that takes some talent.
That would be such a great game! And a great opportunity for game developers to delve into all sorts of lore, world building, while also creating their own storyline.
I don't know, it doesn't feel like a weird concept to me. The execution can fail at what it wants to achieve, sure, but Gollum's psyche is this weird, intentionally unrealistic ode to addiction, general monomania and the basest expression of greed imaginable. And, well - we've seen Elves. We know they represent the best parts of us. We've seen Dwarves. We know they're something of a fleshed-out commentary on our own stubbornness. We've seen the Men of Middle-Earth act like, well, normal humans who you'd expect to be conflicted and emotionally tortured in times of war, and we've seen them take charge like we know the best of can when the chips fall in the right places. We've certainly seen the Orcs get the same treatment, too - and not just across Tolkien's legendarium. All of that, and we somehow can't explore what happens when you abandon your dreams, your hopes, all sense of nobility or basic self-reespect for the sake of some irrational need? I mean, I get it, we're all gamers and we're all here for your average power fantasy, but you'd figure that after games like Outlast or even asymmetrical multiplayer games like Dead By Daylight, we'd have some patience for the concept of exploring a fantasy of weakness, of outright madness. Honestly, if Daedalic had polished this up a bit more, I'd have been interested. There's a baker's dozen other titles that could give me my "Boilerplate Fantasy Medieval Good Guy with a Sword" Fix, anyway.
I still can't fathom the decision they made to design Gollum to be "likeable" while at the same time making it look like an Oblivion non descript goblin.
What is with games’ obsession with putting LOTR games in Mordor? It’s literally, *by design*, the ugliest and dullest location in Middle Earth. Why not Rivendell, Lorien, Moria, Minas Tirith or hell even the Shire? Put some damn color in these games.
I really like the concept of this game! (Surprising even myself...). It all makes perfect sense to me, each part - as long as I only hear about it. Then I take a look at the screen, catch a glance of Gollum's facial animation and in that instant I am sure: we live in a cold, dead, uncaring universe, and our existence is a morbid, purposeless thrashing of flesh, fearing and longing for a release.
They should have made this a game of engaging puzzles, robust combat, exploration and traversal (which it does to an extent), with great dungeons, imposing castles, lush forests and snow capped mountains, with impressive NPCs, and some back story showing us how Gollum came to be where and who he was (for those new to the lore). A kind of Hogwarts Legacy meets WoW. Instead, we got Gollum in a toupee collecting underpants with skid marks in them.
I remember seeing a mini showcase of this on UE and thinking “Oh ok I guess this could be cool after a year or so of work” but then it came out like two weeks later.
Holy hell. I thought this was going to be a nostalgic episode and I was surprised I never heard of this game back in my early 2000s gaming days .... To learn it came out THIS YEAR bowled me
You know, I really appreciate that you don't bury the lede or post in a way that feels like clickbait. Your titles basically include your conclusion, and your intro explains how you feel. I'm not sitting here going, "Ok but how is it?" for half the video. Thank you for your integrity and quality.
Game Gollum: having a full on moral dilemma war in the soul wrestle with conscience over eating a beetle. Meanwhile canon Gollum watching, casually chowing down on some tasty infants he picked up from the local nursery
This game should've been a Survival game where you only are required to kill in a VERY stealthy way. Orcs can see better than humans in the dark, so getting discovered should trigger a sequence to escape and hide. For that you need an expansive level design, with caves, crooks and nooks to slip into. Gollum was supposed to be a rumor to orcs. Not a common occurrence or someone they had chats with.
Luke you do realise the publishers of this game will use your dialogue @18:58 to 19:01 and 19:04 to 19:07 and splice it together for there positive review "its amazing its amazing, i have no words this game has taken my breath away".....thanks for vid
I will never blame the devs Its the people at the top. The devs are doing what they are being told to do in the time they are given no one wants a game to bomb but this sucks and you gotta call em as they are.
@@XxgoodbudsxX It's an easy catch phrase which encompasses a large number of issues which would otherwise take far too long to explain each time. A shortcut. It's not seen as an excuse...it's a direct point of failure.
If you look at the publisher and some of the games the developers have made in the past, you will see they have put out mostly no-name indie titles in years past; so this project seems particulary ambitious and high-profile for them based on their previous works. The problem is that they don't seem particularly talented - which might explain why the premise and execution seems so incredibly off as well as why this thing was even green-lit to begin with...
This studio was very beloved in Germany and some of their games were very well received in their genre. However, those were 2D point&click games, and all of the very talented people who made these games left the studio in 2020.
God could you imagine the devs anxiety prior to launch day, how this could get put out just goes to show the publisher doesn't take it's consumers seriously
I think we all knew that a game about Gollum wouldnt be that entertaining. But I did hold out hope that they might have been able to create something at least somewhat charming.
I don't think Gollum/Smeagol as main character is a bad idea. he is actually a really interesting twisted mind character it doesn't need all the time to be beautiful elf or warriors. The only bad thing is how much potential there wasted with this character, there could play more with the downfall of Smeagol slowly turning into gollum losing humanity but gaining new ability's.
@@dominicmarazita8103 yeah tbh i don't think the game is "lore" acurrate xD we all know Gollum isn't a really interesting character still saying the "Game" would be better with a higher focus on the character development xD. But you definitely need something to make Gollum to work as a "Character" xD otherwise he is basically boring in a game xD
Seeing this review pains me. Because it is true. I'm from Germany and Deadelic has designed some of the most beautiful, funny and touching point and click adventures, like edna bricht aus, harveys neue Augen and Deponia, which shaped my youth. And it hurts to see how badly they miscalculated with this game. Especially because it was supposed to be their leap into the big games.
I watched somebody play a game and like EVERY CHOICE was mapped to the same button when you had to choose different choices to make “Do I want to press A? Or A? Or perhaps A?….I think I’ll go with A”
Literally, all this game needed to be was Styx: Shards of Darkness with a Lord of the Rings coat of paint. It wouldn't have been anything that set the world on fire, but it would've been solid and underrated.
Nah there's been some really good stuff this year and more coming.. RE4 Remake. Tears of the Kingdom, ff16 coming very soon, as well as SF6. It's just that the bad stuff has been REALLY bad.
I really have to disagree with the idea that Gollum would be a bad protagonist in a video game. However, it would indeed require some really, really good and talented writers in order to make the story interesting (especially if it's a full-fledged full-priced triple-A title). But I really believe that in the hands of good writers and good developers, Gollum would make a really good game protagonist. It would potentially make for a relatively different game (perhaps one of those more "artsy" games maybe.)
I'm so upset. I was legit really looking forward to the idea behind this game. Gollum vs Smeagol ideas and split personalities and multiple endings seemed amazing. Gollum was always my favorite character and I was excited he was going to be the star... then this happened.... smh
Did you even watch the video? It’s not the fact that you play as Gollum that you’re not having a good time playing the game, it’s the fact that everything about the game is complete horse shit.
When we got the first trailer I said "imagine going from dominating armies of orcs and Uruk, Caragors and Gruags and the next LoTR game you play as Gollum. Seems very underwhelming" I got dogpiled and now the final release was exactly that. Underwhelming. The devs even had an apology up and ready like it's been collecting dust on their desktop ready for the inevitable.
!['Suicide Squad' is vapid, repetitive, and gross... [Review]](/img/n.gif)
Gollums Existence is Miserable so when you play the game you feel miserable too. You also feel like you were robbed of your “precious” 70 dollars and feel betrayed. All the choices are made deliberately from a Role playing perspective to make the player be able to identify and relate to gollum. They archived their Goal!
10/10
LOL yes
Hahahahahahahaha you sir deserve to review games. Pure gold of a comment 🤣
This made me lol
anyone dumb enough to buy this will feel like Gollum finding the precous replaced with taters
This feels like one of those games that was in development hell for 10+ years and was rebooted every other week
Got I can't wait when we find out wtf was going on behind the scenes of this
Anthem
Maybe this is the remastered edition of a game that never released 20 years ago.
just play Styx if you want your fix. that's a damn good game in comparison, and you will find yourself thinking why this gollum game couldn't meet anything nearly as good as Styx when it came down to the story and gameplay.
It's actually good. From your own opinion sheep.
10/10 immersive experience. Made me want to throw myself into the fires of Mount Doom.
I can't unsee this abomination. 😢
Use deadly traps to defeat the orgs
Make goggum climb up the mountains!
It makes you FEEL like gollum
@@untitled458 you have to be very smart to keep golem out of danger
this is literally the morbius of video games
It's Sméagoling time! And then he Gollum'd all over them. Truly the game of all time.
That would be redfall , get it? Cause vampires
Definitely one of the games of all time
It's Gollumin time!
@@Omelletr hahaha good one. I gotcha.
Playing as Gollum is a weird idea but one that could've been incredibly fucking good with a really tight, well written experience. The inverse is true as well, because it makes it that much worse when everything sucks lmao
fr
It feels like a movie tie-in PS2 game that my mom randomly bought for me because she recognized the title.
Relatable💀
You guys reminded me of Mind Pulp channel 😄 they play all those ps2 movie stinkers
If my grandpa bought me this game, I'll be like "Grandpa, NEVER BUY ME GAMES."
Gollum looks like a PS2 game, but runs poorly on even top-end PC hardware. What optimisation!
But the LOTR PS2 games were actually pretty good !
Can we all at least offer our thanks to all the orcs who worked tirelessly to paint all of the handholds yellow for Gollum.
The real MVPs 👏
Orcs never get any respect.
Non-employees getting injured on-premises in a nightmare from a legal standpoint. No one wants to deal with that.
Dumb complaint. Just standard game design that most games have.
@@Brahaja Fair complaint. Dumb standard bad game design that most handholding games for babies have.
If you bought the game, here's some cash so you can get the DLC too. You're welcome.
Of course, how could someone miss out on the Elvish VA DLC?
I’m so glad they gave us the opportunity to buy a Lore Compendium too. Other games foolishly give that kind of stuff to you for free, but the Gollum devs know that people don’t want their money.
You’re evil
@@DutyStalker357 Saw that on Skill Up's, it's so fucked up. I was gonna get this on PC for a laugh but.
@@drawfull pirate it
It could have been something great. Imagine Smeagol's very slow descent into madness presented into a 10hour long game which basically is a case study of a key character to the Lotr trilogy. If it was that it could have been a perfect game, but it fails at even that premise.
Yeah exactly that, and with the groundbreaking visuals that upholds the Lord of the Rings standard
How would you have done it tho? Like what is there to do?
@@jogonyachickennugget4911 Just read a summary of Smeagol's history and use your imagination. I bet you could come up with a decent 8 hour game based on that, or filling blanks with details on how he manged to survive this long (he's a small creature in a big world after all). You could tell his story from being exiled, to traveling to Mordor the first time. This way you don't need to turn his disorder into gameplay, because his descent into madness naturally happens throughout the story. Just some ideas.
well its MY very slow descent into madness so it accomplished that in a way
no the premise is bad, there's no way to make this a good game. might make a good movie, but not a game
The next game is going to be "Balrog." You wander around in a pitch-black cavern for about 2 hours, at which point you have to track down the muffled sound of pickaxes and Scottish accents, and as the first dwarf breaks through and a shaft of light engulfs the camera, the end credits play.
I am laughing so hard 😂 Gandalf as a secret unbeatable boss
Truly one of the best games of 2008
😂😂
Nah 2008 more like, I mean did you see the facial animations? Truly ground breaking!
2007 great crossgen game
Bro not even 2012. This some 2007 shit.
Yeah, 2007. It reminds me of the era of licensed games of movies that sucked and that were everywhere
I picture a Gollum game being some kind of survival horror considering who he is and what’s he’s been through.
Right..? Running from orcs and protecting precious could have been lots of fun
Yea this would've been perfect. You start out all happy as Smeagul in green pastures, etc etc and as events occur as we know from the movies, now queue the unique game story were Gollum is being tortured by the ring and have him go through crazy scenarios, each scarier than the next to do what the ring wants, but in the end you become "Gollum" as we know. Like the game literally transforming from happy green green into fucked up dark spooky shit. And with each level/ chapter that you survive you see the changes from Smeagul slowly turning into Gollum.
@@psy-bun Or you could make choices which change the story, and end up with a happy gollum.
There were plenty of ways to make this terrible idea...less terrible.
RE + MGS woulda perfect
just play Styx, you will get the good vibes going once again when you play that title.
"Imagine having an AI in your game that can create levels for you as you play"
This, this is what that would look like
This is the future publishers want. My only solace is that they can't actually do away with indie devs, who'll always be free to just go off and make some weird little experience that will stick with me years after I've forgotten even the names of the AAA companies.
@Ottonymous People will always want to own things, no matter how many bugs you feed them.
Roguelikes exist and do the "AI-generated levels" job much better anyways lul
(It's not an AI, just some algorithms, but I'd argue it's close enough)
@Matt The Latios (BoredGar) yeah, as usual, there's more nuance to the situation than can be fit in a youtube comment. I'll add this: procedural generation works fine for anything that doesn't need to convey meaning. Surface textures, natural structures like rocks and trees, and level layouts that are thematically chaotic like cave systems, these are all things that have long benefitted from procedural generation. But proc-gen levels can't convey specific ideas; it's all environment, no story-telling. Imagine Outer Wilds if the ruins and writings were just sort slapped down wherever, with no eye toward making a good set-piece.
@@Ottonymos i am genuinely expecting that over the next decade, we're going to see more and more AI entertainment flood from big corporations- movies, tv shows, video games, books, all of it, while at the same time a big spike in indie entertainment. AI media costs virtually nothing for corporations to create, so even when their profits start to sink, they won't roll it back. they will happily insist on an inferior product that draws in less profit rather than a superior project that they had to invest money into, and human creators that they had to respect. meanwhile, indie entertainment will get bigger and bigger, because AI will never be able to beat a human creative project, but indie development doesn't provide healthcare, job security, steady salary, etc to the people involved- so as usual, literally everything gets worse, but CEOs will continue to get pay raises.
This is like playing as Dudley in a Harry Potter game and you have to hide from Death Eaters. Such a bizarre choice of playable character for this universe
Lmao fr
It could have worked as a well made stealth game.
The most bewildering thing about this game is the fact the studio sent out reviews copies of it. They must've known the feedback would be devastating, so why do it?
Sunken cost fallacy
@@kirabad-artist6532Yep, studio wanted their money.
Sometimes marketing has no idea of what the programmers / game designers conjured up.
The developer, Daedalic, once was a pretty big name when it came to indie-ish point and click games here in germany. Very funny humor, not too big on animations, but kinda cute cartoon style of graphics.
However, lately alot of people who worked there claimed that all the important people have left, only students are hired, people are overworked and nobody in the upper management knows what they are doing. The only positive thing former workers pointed out is that co-workers are friendly towards each other because they're all stuck in the same boat.
So seeing how Gollum ended up, I'm sure it is how you said: Nobody in leading positions knew what they were doing. Hell, I almost wanna bet that a level designer actively put the rock there to hide the volcano out of spite, if the stories are true of how bad the dev has gotten.
It is sad because they used to make really good games. Harvey's New Eyes is one of the best point and click games ever. But that game is over 10 years old now, and clearly nobody working on that is still with the developer.
the origin crew with their founder (Poki) left the studio 2020. he still makes art (music).
So i think everything went downhill at this point
I had an internship at Daedalic in the art department a long time ago... Daedalic managed to attract some of the most promising and skilled young artists from germany as their interns. If you wanted to work in animation in germany you just wanted to join daedalic.
But how it really worked was: We were thrice as many (unpaid) interns as employed professionals. Everyone full of dreams and hopes, but with no actual experience. And we did just work as normal employes not as interns.
If they did not change anything since back then - this game was probably made mostly by interns too. Would not surprise me a tiny bit. Shame on daedalic. Shame on the management.
I hope for all these artists/programmers/designers that they can move on to better projects under a better lead, and maybe can learn and grow.
@@blodeuwedd18 thanks for the insight! Very sad to hear what the studio turned into.
@@blodeuwedd18 In 2020 Studios did get closed in München and Düsseldorf.
2021 they liquidatet Daedalic Entertainment Studio West GmbH and Daedalic Entertainment Bavaria GmbH.
2022 Nacon bought Daedalic. And Nacon is at least questionable. Keywords Frogware and Sinking City.
@@blodeuwedd18 Really interesting to here. I remember at the German Dev Days around 2 or maybe 3 years ago, Deadalic was getting a fee prices (More than other German dev studios) and it felt like they are currently the best German studio around.
They really made me feel like they are the company I want to join.
It really makes you *feel* like Gollum from The Lord of the Rings.
this
😂😂😂
The best online comment today 😂
Yeah it's just not that great of a feeling 🤣
I understood that reference.gif
The concept of being in a cursed/damned part of a wonderful world, playing as a character who's furtive, has dubious morals, strong self interests, a audible immersive representation of his two distinct personalities, is a concept with SO MUCH potential, being able to sneak around, trick people, chose between plans that fit each personality more, having such choices make real difference in gameplay and/or story, all while showing the beautiful creations of Tolkien...
Yet they managed to get the worse of every step 🤡
"it looks like it was designed by highschoolers or college students as a summer project"
that probably is partially true.
i worked as an intern for daedalic a long time ago and... if they do things the same way as back then it means the game was probably done by interns almost exclusively.
Back then there was at least thrice the amount of (unpaid) interns in comparison to employers.
And if there are no experienced professionel employes the interns don't have anyone to learn from. So they just do it the best they can.
And don't get me wrong: Daedalic did manage to attract some really talented and skilled artists as interns. But that talent does not matter in the lack of everything else.
I'm sad for these people. They probably poured their hearts into this project and tried their very best.
Sources: believe me
@@isidro_ Yeah i don't know what sources you want me to share and what difference it will make so let's go for believe me :) I gain nothing from lying and I gain nothing from telling the truth so i leave it up to you
Maybe it was developed by interns, pour unexperienced and underpaid guys. That would make this topic even worse. Of course it is 100% unprofessionell for the studio to release a game like that as a full title for 50-60 dollars with additional minor dlc things to even gain extra money. It's incredible cheeky and 100% disrespectful towards the players.
@@Flowery1991So long as you're not being outright hostile or cruel towards the devs, I think it's 100% fair and reasonable to criticize them for their incompetence. I'm sure they all tried really hard, and wanted this game to be good, I don't doubt that in the slightest. But good intentions don't make a good game.
And while the level of bugs on display would be one thing, because those can at least be patched, between the awful visuals, amateur and shallow gameplay, shoddy level design, poorly constructed story, and just overall questionable design decisions, there are deep-rooted, fundamental issues with this game that can't be fixed with even a massive patch, they'd require a full redo of the entire game. If this were on Gamejolt for free, or a game on Steam for like 10 bucks, yes, I'd feel bad criticizing the devs for something they clearly tried very hard to make good, but lacked the skill to pull off. But this is an official Lord of the Rings game, charging $60 USD at base. At that point, effort and passion don't matter. You're asking to be held to a greater standard, and your lack of ability as a dev *has* to be emphasized.
Because this isn't a good game with a bad launch. This is a bad game across the board.
This really looks like one of those games your mother would get for you for cheap together with the console back in the ps2 era and that would then sit in your collection forever after you played it only once.
Sound like the chronicles of narnia
Maybe even one of those games that came free with cereal boxes
Playing as Gollum sounds like something that'd be a good side mission in a LoTR game. You get to play as Gollum for a level or two and then go back to the main game. Why would you take that and make it the whole game?
I don't think the concept was the problem. I've worked on video games, play them all the time, and I'm a huge lotr nerd - and honestly, I was really excited for this game. I don't think there's anything wrong with a game based around Gollum, inherently. I think they f--ked up the execution.
Playing as gollum sounds fun af. Creeping around, crushing orcs with rocks, manual (non tool, gollum style) hunting and fishing mechanics to restore life, it has so much potential.
Had. Had potential
That's what I think too but apparently people actually wanted to play as him. I can't play a game where I can't empathise with or care about the playable character in some way.
Tbh it's hard to relate to totally uncharismatic villain with no life goals. Of course there are people capable even of that, but I doubt the majority of players can do it.
@@oldcat1790 his goal is to survive and seek his addiction. It's actually super relatable. All some people can do it survive. Not everyone's got big broad plans. Sometimes it's just "make sure I survive another day and seek out what makes the days go by easier"
It's gonna be interesting to learn how much of a hell this must've been to work on, especially for people on the dev team who are actual Lotr fans. That has gotta sting knowing you made your own fav franchise's worst video game in existence lol
Oh wow what a devilish hell. Being paid to make a fucking video game. Oh the humanity.
Yeah I can imagine. I think the game has potential
I kinda feel bad for them
@@ivoryvignettes I do feel bad also, it was their first fully 3D game project it looks so I know they tried their best. The publishers are the ones most likely to blame for a tight deadline.
@@kalvin187douglas potential this game is ass
Gollum as the main character had the potential to make a great stealth survival game, starting from the moment he sets foot into the caves under the Misty Mountains. Rangers and wizards have been done to death.
However, this isn't that game. Why do devs/publishers almost always manage to screw up such a great license?
i wasn't seeing the potential in this sort of storyline when i first saw the sneak previews, but i'd still agree.
As terrible an idea as this concept IS...there were plenty of game-play ideas that could have made this entertaining. instead, They went with a generic, formulaic game loop.
Fuck Rangers and Wizards, I wanna play a goblin with split personality that scavenges for food while evading anything that's even remotely a threat
Then again I love survival games and stealth games
Way not make a game about Sauron on his state of mind and his will to conquer middle earth we can play since the beginning of the second age and manage your empire, make the one ring, asigne rings to the people you want to enslave , build your armies fell beasts necromancy build orc armies and breeds corrupt numenor make it a blend between managing and empire and explore what a corrupted Ainur like Sauron does with his free time.
easy money, that's why
@@HSG4meR Except that only works if the game is successful, ideally good too, and this isn't likely to be the first and definitely isn't the second.
Pretty daring to make a game centred around the life of a character who sat in a cave for 5 centuries.
Well they should have started the game after he left in search of the ring. You know, when it is implied that he would enter houses and eat babies. Would make for some interesting stealth sections.
@@badman5852 That already sounds far more interesting.
The bit where he says "its Golluming time!" is a pretty badass gaming moment though.
Nah
Dear god stop
@@pnut3844ablebetter ask the devil if you want to plead to the one responsible
The original Lord of the Rings games on ps2 and Xbox, I thought were badass and they still are to this day. The Return of the King was awesome because of the cooperative play. What was really cool was they would show cut scenes from the movies and then you would go straight into the game. The combat was fluid and solid for its time
They deserve remakes, super fun even without anyone to play with
That is true! They do deserve it
I also enjoyed The Third Age.
Oh man that’s a good one!
Return of the kind was great for the fluid cutscenes.
Elrond: cast it into the fire, destroy it!
Gollum game publisher: NO
Elrond: evil was allow to endure.
Later they realize their studio got sacked due to how awful the game was and they try to go meet Elrond to make up for their mistakes but on the way they get pummeled to death by angry Tolkien fans. The game then drifts into oblivion and it won't be seen for a long time...
And now we can all collectively shake our heads in shame as everyone saw this coming.
The first time I ever saw Gollum's character model and heard his voice...I audibly said "Oof..."
I knew it would be trash. The fact that it's *even worse* than I thought it would be is a cryin' shame.
It’s such a shame to see what happened to Daedalic Entertainment. Their point & click adventures are some of the greatest games I’ve ever played. So much love for detail, creative, funny and at times heart breaking.
This game is the equivalent of making an A Song of Ice and Fire video game and the main character they choose for you to play as is Reek and the whole game you’re stuck in Winterfell cleaning Ramsay’s horse, doing his bidding and trying to remember your name by choosing three options and finding the one that rhymes with Reek.
Or making Hodor the main character
The worst trolls in this game are the devs for thinking people will pay money for this
I feel bad for the devs tbh. But some things just don't work out.
I bought it from the store today for £50
They should have made it like 5 hours, really worked on removing all the useless crap and actually put full effort into it. Then release it for like 20 bucks. No one wants to pay 60 dollars to play Gollum. A short experience might have been interesting if they understood what they were making.
@@morganator4874 -50 😁
@@snickle1980 I like it
There are so many games being released for the price of a full AAA game that really should be 20 bucks. There’s a market for mid titles they just refuse to price them as what they are…
Which is funny considering one AAA game I particular has worser graphical ingenuity horrible dialogue and technical difficulties that are so lacking polish that the new game they just made looks like it was made for a GameCube title. Though at least to their merit they can make good themes.. every sound from this game feels like a Xbox one game
The New Jedi Knight game is really really good imo All the things i wanted the first to be while playing it they seemed to make happen in this game...Story is great and platforming is on point , feel like Indiana Jones but going through Jedi Temples from long ago..
I'd be interested in listening to a postmortem on this game to learn how it was bungled so badly. I can't help but feel bad for the hard working developers who poured years of their lives into a project that was this badly mismanaged. And it's a shame, I thought the concept itself was really intriguing and unique.
At what point do we stop giving the developers a pass every time the game they directly had a hand in utterly fails? For a game to release in this state is a failure within the entire company and team top to bottom, has to be, looking at the graphics alone. This is made by people who clearly have no business touching a beloved, well known IP like Lord of the Rings and should be relegated to making expansion content at best, if not burger king. 😂
@@jibronigibironi8959 This project screams to me that it's a victim of mismanagement, and the team not having a clear vision of what the game is supposed to be. To be clear no one should buy this game, but we can still have empathy for the folks who were probably really excited to work on Lord of the Rings game only to end up pushing out a turd. Believe me, no one wants to spend years of their life polishing a turd. 😭
@@bwatson77 I don't know, this is coming from a studio that is basically a nobody. I don't see any games on their resume that is noteworthy that justifies them getting their hands on a beloved, established IP to start with. I can't give this kind of studio a pass. There is nothing there that allows me to.
Sounds perfect for a Matt McMuscles 'What Happened? ' video on the future.
the studio's previously known for making Deponia and some other point & click adventure games, it seems like this was an over-ambitious attempt to pivot from there into the AA or AAA space that the studio couldn't sustain with the resources it had
I appreciate the lengths you went to to say: "People legitimately tried". As someone who has been in game dev for 20 years, I can tell everyone: Literally zero games out there are made 100% by people who don't care. Sure, some of the people on the team might not care, but there is always some who do, and they fight like hell against all odds to try recuing it, but most times- as in here, it's not possible.
At the end of the day, it's a failed effort. But at least the acknowledgement of effort is refreshing when most people are like "WTF devs?!"
This game will one of of those "what happened?" stories that will come out someday, and odds are high it was as you said: extreme mismanagement. It usually is.
It's so dark... Like I get he's a miserable character so the environment's gotta be more dreary but damn it's like traveling in gollum's ass
Gollum 70$
Elden ring 60$
Welcome to this industry everyone
What really got me was the price tag. From the trailers it looked like a really good LOTR next gen tech demo walking lore simulator I’d easily pay $20 to $30 for. Hearing it doesn’t even achieve that and is going for $60+ is wild.
This really looks like one of those weird movie tie in games from the mid 2000’s
I think what could have made this game work is having him go through cool environments and just watching things unfold, Gollum is always there watching a greater story in middle earth happen before his eyes. A 5 hour quick story but entertaining and for $40
🔘
🐴
that's called a movie
@@jamesbyrd3740 and it would cost under $20 to watch it
If anyone has seen that one prank from Impractical Jokers where Joey and Q show off fake game concepts like “Superman: The Clark Kent Stuff” or “Murder Your Family” to the focus group, this game fits in perfectly.
this game feels like if they let Gollum direct a videogame
I am so mad that untalented people get budgets to make such awful games while some brilliant indie devs have to work with scrap...
This was made by on of those brilliant indie devs...
This was made by an indie studio.
@@SolidTV1 Daedalic has been bought as a publisher by Nacon for 60 million $. I can't find detailed information about the studio itself and how many people worked on this, but I'm fairly sure it's not the usual indie '3 dudes working in a flooded basement' kind of deal.
@@SolidTV1 So in this specific case it seems that a publisher with 195 Steam titles, some of which are pretty well renowned, has decided to create their own studio and failed miserably.
@@SolidTV1 If you have more information on the developer and the game budget, let me know,
This feels like the sort of weirdly specific licensed game that they stopped making in 2011.
You could’ve had the start of the game when you are a hobbit, and consequently have you to accidentally find the ring then kill your friend.
And then it’s like his spiraling into madness and you go through all the key moments In the series
I have no doubt a good studio could have made an incredible Gollum game. I think the premise is ripe with opportunities. They could have went completely offbeat, and did some sort of survival action/horror game. Something more base camp focused where you are in the mountain. They could have executed well on stealth too if they leaned more into it. Done passive stealth or active stealth. Something akin to Alien Isolation or Styx. It was very possible to do something cool.
I think the idea of playing as Gollum could be interesting, to play as someone passive to the whole war of good and evil and just being a spectator. The problem with that is that Gollum literally has nothing to do, he's in his cave with his ring until Bilbo shows up and then idk he does nothing until Froddo shows up. His whole point of being is the ring, he wouldn't even go anywhere if he already has it
I had a sneaky feeling that this would be a bad game
Ha pun
@@the_seer_0421 heh i didn't intend that
@@James-gj8rn even better
Unfortunately I have this feeling for most new releases these days, I'd rather support Indie developers or passion side projects rather than "AAA" games.
man, it hurts seeing this being made by daedelic. they are the guys who made the deponia point and click adventures. they are a beloved game dev studio in germany.
Is this maybe a case of a development team being given a project that’s way beyond their capabilities?
Man I loved Deponia, quite surprising they made this
@@oneinathousand2156 Regardless of how talented the team may be, you can't shine shit, and i think it would be unfair to place the blame for the games concept on them.
You can place the blame on them for the tons of glitches, bugs and soft locks though.
Analritter💀
I always finding it amazing that the gaming industry allows products like this or the first cyberpunk release etc to see the light of day! If this were any other industry, the product would never leave the shop floor, and if it did, there would be absolute carnage in within the consumer base.
Well, there is indeed carnage among consumer base, which manifests in massive refunds and barely triple-digit active player base.
As for Cyberpunk, it was among the first wave of "undercooked" AAA releases, and from a reputable studio, so the preorder hype got real.
As we progress further into optimization purgatory, less and less gamers tend to trust pre-release marketing and form pre-orders, unless it comes from those devs who had not dropped their reputation below the poop threshold.
Gollum’s not a weird character to pick at all, he’s a very interesting character. Exploring his mental state and the beginnings of the personality split would be fascinating! And people love playing as little gremlins!
…and then they made this, so.
That's like making a Simpsons game where you play as Hans Moleman
Hey Hans is the goat , more like milhouse,
@@morbidangel2424 you're gay for mole man
More like Graggle Simpson lol
Id play that
Honestly, I couldn't think of a character I'd want to play as less than Gollum
Maybe the fish he caught that one time? That might be worse. 🤔
@@DubberRucks It was at least juicy sweet
Maybe Rings of Power Galadriel
@@Ale-dd3ek does she qualify as a a "character"?
Man I would never wanna play as gollum 😂😂😂😂😂
From the very beginning, when I heard that Gollum would get a new game, I had my doubts. Either the developers got a really good idea, or they didn't...and it was the latter. It takes skills to make a game out of a character that is quite strange to begin with, at least t o fill the gaming experience for dozens of hours. But the studio doesn't even know the visual side, how they would build the attractive world of Lord of the Rings.
this game feels like an out of season april fools joke
I absolutely love how literally nobody was excited for this game (well I saw exactly 2 people on Reddit that were but that's about it) and we all knew well in advance that it would be terrible and yet it STILL managed to be worse than we all expected. Now that takes some talent.
I, uh, didn't know this game existed and I wish I never found out
Yeah. It's a game. That exists. Today. For money.
I'm still holding out hope for a game based around the Dúnedain rangers
that would be awesome! fighting mechanics of shadow of war, open world, customize you ranger, AWESOME
one day, you'll get your wish.
If these guys made it, you'd be a trader that wandered into their camp every couple weeks.
That would be such a great game! And a great opportunity for game developers to delve into all sorts of lore, world building, while also creating their own storyline.
LOTR War in the North - one of the main characters was a Dunedain.
I don't know, it doesn't feel like a weird concept to me. The execution can fail at what it wants to achieve, sure, but Gollum's psyche is this weird, intentionally unrealistic ode to addiction, general monomania and the basest expression of greed imaginable.
And, well - we've seen Elves. We know they represent the best parts of us. We've seen Dwarves. We know they're something of a fleshed-out commentary on our own stubbornness. We've seen the Men of Middle-Earth act like, well, normal humans who you'd expect to be conflicted and emotionally tortured in times of war, and we've seen them take charge like we know the best of can when the chips fall in the right places. We've certainly seen the Orcs get the same treatment, too - and not just across Tolkien's legendarium.
All of that, and we somehow can't explore what happens when you abandon your dreams, your hopes, all sense of nobility or basic self-reespect for the sake of some irrational need?
I mean, I get it, we're all gamers and we're all here for your average power fantasy, but you'd figure that after games like Outlast or even asymmetrical multiplayer games like Dead By Daylight, we'd have some patience for the concept of exploring a fantasy of weakness, of outright madness.
Honestly, if Daedalic had polished this up a bit more, I'd have been interested. There's a baker's dozen other titles that could give me my "Boilerplate Fantasy Medieval Good Guy with a Sword" Fix, anyway.
I still can't fathom the decision they made to design Gollum to be "likeable" while at the same time making it look like an Oblivion non descript goblin.
What is with games’ obsession with putting LOTR games in Mordor? It’s literally, *by design*, the ugliest and dullest location in Middle Earth. Why not Rivendell, Lorien, Moria, Minas Tirith or hell even the Shire? Put some damn color in these games.
I really like the concept of this game! (Surprising even myself...). It all makes perfect sense to me, each part - as long as I only hear about it. Then I take a look at the screen, catch a glance of Gollum's facial animation and in that instant I am sure: we live in a cold, dead, uncaring universe, and our existence is a morbid, purposeless thrashing of flesh, fearing and longing for a release.
seeing screenshots of this game makes me feel like the flesh beast from the end of "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream"
Looks like a game you get for free in a corn flakes box 😂
They should have made this a game of engaging puzzles, robust combat, exploration and traversal (which it does to an extent), with great dungeons, imposing castles, lush forests and snow capped mountains, with impressive NPCs, and some back story showing us how Gollum came to be where and who he was (for those new to the lore).
A kind of Hogwarts Legacy meets WoW.
Instead, we got Gollum in a toupee collecting underpants with skid marks in them.
Still a better love story than Rings of Power.
I remember seeing a mini showcase of this on UE and thinking “Oh ok I guess this could be cool after a year or so of work” but then it came out like two weeks later.
Holy hell. I thought this was going to be a nostalgic episode and I was surprised I never heard of this game back in my early 2000s gaming days .... To learn it came out THIS YEAR bowled me
Bowelled
Bowelled
You know, I really appreciate that you don't bury the lede or post in a way that feels like clickbait. Your titles basically include your conclusion, and your intro explains how you feel. I'm not sitting here going, "Ok but how is it?" for half the video. Thank you for your integrity and quality.
From the trailers I saw, this has to be the most predictable end result I’ve ever seen😭 who thought this was a good idea?!
Game Gollum: having a full on moral dilemma war in the soul wrestle with conscience over eating a beetle.
Meanwhile canon Gollum watching, casually chowing down on some tasty infants he picked up from the local nursery
This game should've been a Survival game where you only are required to kill in a VERY stealthy way.
Orcs can see better than humans in the dark, so getting discovered should trigger a sequence to escape and hide. For that you need an expansive level design, with caves, crooks and nooks to slip into. Gollum was supposed to be a rumor to orcs. Not a common occurrence or someone they had chats with.
Luke you do realise the publishers of this game will use your dialogue @18:58 to 19:01 and 19:04 to 19:07 and splice it together for there positive review "its amazing its amazing, i have no words this game has taken my breath away".....thanks for vid
I will never blame the devs Its the people at the top. The devs are doing what they are being told to do in the time they are given no one wants a game to bomb but this sucks and you gotta call em as they are.
10:52 delayed for two years and still panned out this way. If it’s been in a development hell that would explain a lot.
Do you think development hell Is some sort of place or something? like why do people always use that as some sort of excuse.
@@XxgoodbudsxX It's an easy catch phrase which encompasses a large number of issues which would otherwise take far too long to explain each time. A shortcut. It's not seen as an excuse...it's a direct point of failure.
@@XxgoodbudsxX every game has been in development hell at some point. Read stories about black ops 3 destiny and gta5, you will pull your hair out.
@@XxgoodbudsxX I am sorry your school failed you. Nobody except you suggested that development hell is a real location.
They also locked two key features of the game behind pay walls: Elves that Speak Sindarin and a FUCKING LORE/DATABASE.
@@dominicmarazita8103 Auto correct
Honestly, a documentary or an Internet Historian video about what happened behind the scenes would be so interesting.
If you look at the publisher and some of the games the developers have made in the past, you will see they have put out mostly no-name indie titles in years past; so this project seems particulary ambitious and high-profile for them based on their previous works.
The problem is that they don't seem particularly talented - which might explain why the premise and execution seems so incredibly off as well as why this thing was even green-lit to begin with...
This studio was very beloved in Germany and some of their games were very well received in their genre. However, those were 2D point&click games, and all of the very talented people who made these games left the studio in 2020.
Never assumed a studio team will consist of the same people
I would have preferred a game playing as the Witch-King or Khamul the Easterling. Not sure what possessed the devs to choose Gollum of all characters.
I mean why not? Lol
I love those type of broken games, because you KNOW there're some juicy behind the scene stories to explain this mess.
God could you imagine the devs anxiety prior to launch day, how this could get put out just goes to show the publisher doesn't take it's consumers seriously
This feels like one of those mini games you sometimes get to play whilst the real game is still downloading e.g. the hoth level in battlefront
Truly a AAA game worth it's 50-60 bucks
60-70
🤣😂😂😂😂😂it's the worst game ever made a piece of 💩a walking simulator with no action
*pesos
Came from a multibillion dollar company btw
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I remember people hating war in the north but compare to this that game is next level quality
agreed!
I enjoyed war in the north.
@@Rearnold1987 imo it's the best lotr game after the shadow of war games
I think we all knew that a game about Gollum wouldnt be that entertaining. But I did hold out hope that they might have been able to create something at least somewhat charming.
They did not choose the main character to be Gollum. They just googled an image of an average gamer and made the character based on that 😆
it’s actually pretty impressive that they found the one guy who apparently can’t do a decent gollum impression
The Wheel of Sauron was know throughout the Lands of Mordor to be a formidable foe.
I'm surprised they haven't turned it into a limited run series to stream yet. 😂
I don't think Gollum/Smeagol as main character is a bad idea. he is actually a really interesting twisted mind character it doesn't need all the time to be beautiful elf or warriors. The only bad thing is how much potential there wasted with this character, there could play more with the downfall of Smeagol slowly turning into gollum losing humanity but gaining new ability's.
@@dominicmarazita8103 yeah tbh i don't think the game is "lore" acurrate xD we all know Gollum isn't a really interesting character still saying the "Game" would be better with a higher focus on the character development xD. But you definitely need something to make Gollum to work as a "Character" xD otherwise he is basically boring in a game xD
@@dominicmarazita8103 uff just uff
A metacritic score of 40. That in itself is refreshing to see.
Seeing this review pains me. Because it is true.
I'm from Germany and Deadelic has designed some of the most beautiful, funny and touching point and click adventures, like edna bricht aus, harveys neue Augen and Deponia, which shaped my youth. And it hurts to see how badly they miscalculated with this game. Especially because it was supposed to be their leap into the big games.
I watched somebody play a game and like EVERY CHOICE was mapped to the same button when you had to choose different choices to make
“Do I want to press A? Or A? Or perhaps A?….I think I’ll go with A”
Literally, all this game needed to be was Styx: Shards of Darkness with a Lord of the Rings coat of paint.
It wouldn't have been anything that set the world on fire, but it would've been solid and underrated.
Pretty much everything about gaming so far this year is telling me to go outside and get some exercise.
Nah there's been some really good stuff this year and more coming.. RE4 Remake. Tears of the Kingdom, ff16 coming very soon, as well as SF6. It's just that the bad stuff has been REALLY bad.
I really have to disagree with the idea that Gollum would be a bad protagonist in a video game. However, it would indeed require some really, really good and talented writers in order to make the story interesting (especially if it's a full-fledged full-priced triple-A title). But I really believe that in the hands of good writers and good developers, Gollum would make a really good game protagonist. It would potentially make for a relatively different game (perhaps one of those more "artsy" games maybe.)
6:30 ... They literally forgot that Gollum was let loose from Barad Dur and not escaped... They didn't do their homework.
I'm so upset. I was legit really looking forward to the idea behind this game. Gollum vs Smeagol ideas and split personalities and multiple endings seemed amazing. Gollum was always my favorite character and I was excited he was going to be the star... then this happened.... smh
Qt
Golem is one of the most depressing characters in the LOTR territory. I’m not shocked people don’t enjoy the concept of stepping in his shoes
Well it doesn’t help that the game itself just sucks ass
It could have been a decent survival stealth game.
Did you even watch the video? It’s not the fact that you play as Gollum that you’re not having a good time playing the game, it’s the fact that everything about the game is complete horse shit.
@@unoriginalname771 lol so true
@@kaitykimball1461 It was just destined to fail
How can a game like it even start above 10+ dollar
players shouldnt pay to play this game, instead they need to get paid by the devs to even look at this garbage
When we got the first trailer I said "imagine going from dominating armies of orcs and Uruk, Caragors and Gruags and the next LoTR game you play as Gollum. Seems very underwhelming" I got dogpiled and now the final release was exactly that. Underwhelming. The devs even had an apology up and ready like it's been collecting dust on their desktop ready for the inevitable.
7:30
You CANNOT convince me this is not a PS2 game running on low graphics.
it truly makes me sad how people worked on it hoping for it to be something good but it had to end up being like this.