There are few works that lend themselves as well to adaptation as J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings series. Its game adaptations began with The Hobbit back in 1982, a simple yet successful text-based adventure on the ZX Spectrum. Since then, fans have experienced the stories of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit in a myriad of different forms.
While many adaptations of The Lord of the Rings have relied on the series' most familiar characters like Gandalf, Frodo, or Aragorn, others have distanced themselves from the source material and gone on to explore original stories within the realm of Middle-earth. Unfortunately, as much as The Lord of the Rings video games adaptations have varied in terms of genre and storytelling, they've equally varied in terms of quality. Some being viewed as timeless classics, and others failing to do the series justice.
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King: As a hack-and-slash, it's nothing particularly flashy or innovative, but it's undeniably fun. It sticks faithfully to the films and allows players to experience events by mashing through the most memorable battles. If fans can look past its dated graphics, The Return of the King is a game set in Middle-earth actually worth playing again.
- Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor: If Return of the King is an ideal example of sticking to the material, then Shadow of Mordor is the perfect example of how to deviate from the books but still capture Middle-earth. Every fight feels rewarding, plus Shadow of Mordor's innovative nemesis system keeps players engaged when they might otherwise lose interest.
- The Lord of the Rings Online: Since its release, The Lord of the Rings Online has had to deal with comparisons to World of Warcraft, but it is a completely different beast. By keeping its storytelling firmly grounded in J. R. R. Tolkien's works, it remains one of the most immersive MMORPGs to date.
- The Lord of the Rings: The Battle For Middle-earth 2: Another win for EA, this title managed to take a great game and improve on it. Battle for Middle-earth 2 has received praise for its epic real-time strategy experience, but its engaging campaign deserves equal credit.
- LEGO Lord of the Rings: The blend of LEGO silliness with the seriousness of The Lord of the Rings makes for a winning combination. It takes fans through the entire trilogy, and LEGO Lord of the Rings is on Steam so it's easy for fans to get their hands on.
- The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers: While not as well-known as its sequel, Return of the King, The Two Towers is similarly successful. It's nothing too innovative, but there are few fights as memorable as Helm's Deep.
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- The Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle-earth: If there was no sequel, Battle for Middle-earth would likely be one of the best titles in the franchise, but the sequel's improvements highlight a few shortcomings in the original. Still, when it was first released, the scale of combat was unlike any other RTS at the time.
- LEGO The Hobbit: LEGO The Hobbit isn't much different from LEGO The Lord of the Rings and others, but it's paired with the lesser of the two Tolkien film trilogies and seems to fall flat. It also struggled with the fact that fans were already inundated with LEGO games by its release. Still, it is arguably one of the best games based on The Hobbit.
- Middle-earth: Shadow of War: At launch, Shadow of War included microtransactions that upset fans and were inevitably patched out, and while it improved on Shadow of Mordor in many ways, it didn't change enough to truly impress.
- The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age: Due to licensing issues, The Third Age is only loosely based on the film trilogy and the events of the Third Age. While that could have been a death knell for any project, The Third Age works better because of it. It takes a step away from the films while remaining just close enough to let players feel like they're the heroes of its story.
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- The Hobbit (2003): A solid enough platformer with hack-and-slash combat, The Hobbit is an odd duck since it was a game made with the rights to The Hobbit before the film trilogy came out.
- The Hobbit (1982): The game that started it all was an enjoyable text-based adventure. Since text-based games often left players in an entirely open world, The Hobbit was welcomed as a more structured, railroaded experience.
- The Lord of the Rings: Conquest: A Lord of the Rings game with the mechanics of Star Wars: Battlefront sounds like a recipe for success, but the results were mediocre. A select group of loyal fans has managed to keep the game alive long after the casual crowd left it behind.
- The Lord of the Rings: War of the Ring: Another RTS, but one that is ultimately overshadowed by the popularity of the Battle for Middle-earth series. It had a stingy population cap which meant battles lacked the epic scale fans desired.
- The Lord of the Rings: Adventure Card Game: Although the experience has significantly improved since it was released, there are many strong alternatives in the genre to entice fans. Yet for diehard fans of The Lord of the Rings, the Adventure Card Game may be a perfect option.
- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring: The first of The Lord of the Rings movie games was not made by EA, but by Black Label Games. Unfortunately, it feels stiff and slow-paced compared to EA's offerings, but fans who have played through both of the EA games might as well take a look.
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- The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn's Quest: While an interesting concept, the result was a gimmicky game that failed to find an audience. Some versions had a fun co-op mode, but the mechanics were too awkward thanks to using the Wii remote.
- The Lord of the Rings: War in the North: War in the North was ultimately wasted potential. It was the first game to have the rights of both the book and film trilogies, but failed to capitalize. The game is a mindless hack-and-slash with shallow skill trees and manages to skip huge portions of The Lord of the Rings' story.
- Guardians of Middle-earth: A generic MOBA clone that played in a clunky manner. While it was exciting for fans to be able to take control of characters like Radagast, Galadriel, Haldir, and more, Guardians of Middle-earth could only ride the charm of The Lord of the Rings so far.
- The Lord of the Rings: Tactics: There's not much to Tactics beyond a typical turn-based tactics game experience. It was overlooked since it came out on the PSP, but it has an interesting separation movement and combat phase that save its reputation.
- J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings Volume 1 and 2: When not colored by nostalgia, the SNES Lord of the Rings games are objectively pretty bad, but they might be worth revisiting more than other titles because of their place in Lord of the Rings history.
- War in Middle-earth: A truly ambitious game that tried to blend large-scale combat simulation with neat cutaways that displayed important events in the books, War in Middle-earth was limited by the technology of its time, but became a valuable blueprint for future titles.
- The Fellowship of the Ring: A Software Adventure and The Shadows of Mordor: The two Lord of the Rings-related text games that followed the release of The Hobbit in 1982 offered players more freedom, but ended up being more convoluted in the process.
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- J. R. R. Tolkien's Riders of Rohan: The successor to War in Middle-earth takes a step back and narrows the scope from all of Middle-earth down to focus solely on the Rohirrim and their lands. While War in Middle-earth gets points for being ambitious and original, Riders of Rohan reiterates the first experience and loses all charm in the process.
- Shadowfax: Shadowfax is both one of the earliest games based on The Lord of the Rings and one of the worst. The player takes control of Gandalf and battles off the Nazgul while on horseback. It deserves respect for being one of the first, but its gameplay is shallow even by Commodore 64-era standards.