The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is still without a release date since its last delay, which hopefully means that Daedalic is taking the time it needs to hone-in on anything that needs to be rectified or changed. The game still has a release window of 2023 and that would certainly be possible to hit if The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is pushing ahead on polish, but it will be interesting to see if that window is met or if a 2024 release becomes more likely.
In the meantime, The Lord of the Rings: Gollum recently aired a new story trailer during Nacon Connect 2023. This trailer shared more from its popular NPC characters Thranduil and Gandalf, as well as showed who may be the game’s chief antagonist, plus a potential run-in with Shelob or other massive spider creatures. While this trailer is another exciting look at a game that has passed from a lot of fans’ memories as of late, it has yet to emphasize gameplay above all else.
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum Doesn’t Have to Sell Fans on Its Characters
Gameplay is what Gollum fans are concerned about, not its narrative. The longer that The Lord of the Rings: Gollum hides its gameplay, the sooner fans will lose patience and excitement for it. The Lord of the Rings: Gollum could be focusing its marketing on narrative because it knows it can win over longtime fans of the IP.
Indeed, this game has some of The Lord of the Rings’ most prolific iconography with the Eye of Sauron atop Barad-dur, Gollum, and Gandalf already present, along with locations such as Mordor and Mirkwood. However, the oversaturation of the same IP iconography could be used as a way to distract fans from what the actual game entails gameplay-wise, even though that might be enough to sell them wholesale on the game.
Gollum could potentially have a fresh narrative and lore for its IP like in Hogwarts Legacy or Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, but that can only be a satisfying journey to unfold if its gameplay is also worthwhile. Gollum has never been in consideration for who The Lord of the Rings fans would like to play as most in a game, making the need for exciting gameplay even more apparent.
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum Needs to Highlight Gameplay
The Resident Evil 3 remake had the same problem in its marketing, where most of its trailers and promotional material went toward cutscenes taking place in the early game. If these trailers had been more representative of the experience players would have, perhaps fans would have been more prepared for how unfaithful the remake was to the original.
To be fair, gameplay has been shown and actually does seem to be engaging in The Lord of the Rings: Gollum, with an emphasis on stealth and the duality of Smeagol and Gollum. That said, Gollum’s delays could be used to fine-tune or change different mechanics that the game is meant to have, and therefore fans no longer know what to expect from it. There will seemingly be a lot of climbing along walls and shimmying across narrow ledges, but the inner conflict mini-game of player choice looked engaging if not elementary.
This mini-game proposed that players would attempt to select a Smeagol or Gollum choice from animated dialogue options as they move around and become increasingly difficult to select accurately. If there is more to The Lord of the Rings: Gollum’s gameplay than this, or if an even greater loop to hook players is being hidden, it needs to be shown soon in order to excite fans again.
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is in development for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
