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The latest Middle Earth Shadow of War trailer captures the true spirit of Tolkien

I liked it. It is so stupid, It's kind of hard not to appreciate. It's disassociated from the books so as to almost have nothing to do with them.

I don't know why everyone is getting so protective, Tolkien's son has already denounced the films and most people are pretty reverent of them.

http://birthmoviesdeath.com/2013/01/09/why-jrr-tolkiens-son-hates-what-peter-jackson-has-done

He would doubtless have hated any modern interpretations of his work. It is a massive tome against industrialization.
 

Maledict

Member
Why is the games tag line 'nothing will be forgotten' when literally *everything* in this game is forgotten and not mentioned in the original books at all? You'd think the ghost of the elf that forged the rings of power possessing an undying ranger who slaughtered a million orvs and saurons henchmen who then tried to forge his own ring of power might be something you wouldn't forget?
 
https://youtu.be/Eghi80ls2FM

Bless this game.

(I think it looks great but I'm sorry this video was hilariously offensive)

I would very much like to see an explanation as to why the video was offensive, exactly. It just seemed they wanted to show this tribe's personality. Or are we to believe that all things pertaining to the LOTR franchise need to be accompanied with "epic" music and never have some personality or tongue-in-cheekness?
 

Boke1879

Member
Ya know. THe game might end up being and good and it's most likely going to sell a lot. But HELL TO THE NAW at that trailer.
 
I really feel bad for the devs about this game. It looks great from a gameplay perspective and you can really tell that if only the devs were free from publisher interference they could have something special. Instead, the game looks utterly unplayable due to lootbox and greedy publisher BS. I just hope that if the game fails that WB realizes that is is entirely their fault and not the developers fault.
 

Maledict

Member
I would very much like to see an explanation as to why the video was offensive, exactly. It just seemed they wanted to show this tribe's personality. Or are we to believe that all things pertaining to the LOTR franchise need to be accompanied with "epic" music and never have some personality or tongue-in-cheekness?

Um, I'm going to say yes?

Tolkien work is the master stone of modern fantasy. It's a totally cohesive piece of work that establishes a clear world and mythos. The least you can do if you're allowed to play in that world is stick the tone even if you are making up your own stories. Tolkien has plenty of personality and doesn't need dumb meme shit saints row orcs to suddenly be interesting.
 

Marcel

Member
I really feel bad for the devs about this game. It looks great from a gameplay perspective and you can really tell that if only the devs were free from publisher interference they could have something special. Instead, the game looks utterly unplayable due to lootbox and greedy publisher BS. I just hope that if the game fails that WB realizes that is is entirely their fault and not the developers fault.

A publisher taking full responsibility for failure at the management level and not spinning it somehow? Good one.
 
Okay, so why make it based on Tolkiens material? This is why people find it "despicable". They are taking something that is beloved by millions of people and turning it into something that it wasn't meant to be, and should never be.

At this point, I hope the game does just poor enough to not warrant a sequel, but good enough to keep the IP viable. I want a deep LOTR rpg with a huge over world to explore.
But who actually gives a shit?

I'm sorry, that just seems crazy to me. The books are 50+ years old at this point. Who exactly are still fans out there of Tolkien that really want them to respect the material?

Which is fair enough. But then I wonder, why use the LoTR setting at all if that's the case?

If they're not trying to pull in Tolkien fans, if they're not even the least bit interested in doing that, then why set the game in Tolkien's world at all?

Seems like a complete waste of the setting to me.

Because Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit were very popular movie series?

They stuck Smeagol in the first game for no good reason. There is still easy marketing to be done with Tolkien's material.
 
Or: How To Alienate Your Core Fanbase In A Desperate Attempt To Court Mainstream Audiences

It's so hilariously out of touch. It's 2017, GoT is the biggest show going. Fantasy is cool. You don't need to be embarrassed about making fantasy games.
 

Wamb0wneD

Member
Riiiiight.

Or: How To Alienate Your Core Fanbase In A Desperate Attempt To Court Mainstream Audiences

It's so hilariously out of touch. It's 2017, GoT is the biggest show going. Fantasy is cool. You don't need to be embarrassed about making fantasy games.

Seriously. If these guys were in charge of GoT the season 8 trailer would have Migos for music.
 

Marcel

Member
AAA game trailers are just like this sometimes and it's just bad. EA and Ubisoft sometimes get like this as well.

EA fetishizing militarized police with Battlefield Hardline was particularly gross considering everything that happened that year with police in the United States.
 

Bulbasaur

Banned
I'm sure Tolkien started rolling in his grave years ago.

That was horrendous, combining hip hop and Tolkien shows that these guys have no fucking idea.
 
At this point I think they should just go full parody. Saints Row LOTR is actually a pretty good pitch for a fantasy world people usually think of as sacred text or some bullshit.

This sounds like a great idea if it weren't for the fact that LOTR is already under a buttload of scrutiny due to perceived racism. I don't see treating orcs like "gangstas" going over well.

EDIT: Frankly I'm kinda surprised there isn't already a giant amount of scrutiny over this.

DOUBLE EDIT: See below:

Wonder if there's bad blood between the East and West Farthings.
 

Toni

Member
Or: How To Alienate Your Core Fanbase In A Desperate Attempt To Court Mainstream Audiences

It's so hilariously out of touch. It's 2017, GoT is the biggest show going. Fantasy is cool. You don't need to be embarrassed about making fantasy games.

Bit off-topic here; but is it really?

In terms of how much money each episode takes to make or in terms of views/ratings?

I thought Walking Dead was #1.
 

Orpheum

Member
wtf LOL...the BLING tribe!!!! gosh i can't take this, i'm dying here, what on earth are they doing with this game.
 
Um, I'm going to say yes?

Tolkien work is the master stone of modern fantasy. It's a totally cohesive piece of work that establishes a clear world and mythos. The least you can do if you're allowed to play in that world is stick the tone even if you are making up your own stories. Tolkien has plenty of personality and doesn't need dumb meme shit saints row orcs to suddenly be interesting.

There's still no reason to be up in arms about this. It is a work derived from LOTR, which in no way "sullies" what came before. If you need pure Tolkien, the books are still there. Now, I don't see how catch-all terms like "dumb meme shit saints row orcs" qualify as actual criticism, but I might be in the minority seeing as most posts ITT are a circle jerk of "too much unlike classic epic" instead of, y'know, actual discussion on why the trailer is bad. It's important to remember this: just because you don't like a thing, it doesn't mean said thing is bad.
 

Fisty

Member
I think I figured it out... since there's no more LOTR movies, WB has to make up the difference with other LOTR products. Poor Monolith, this is embarassing
 
Between this trailer and the Rick Astley/Foo Fighters crossover I kind of feel like I've seen all I need to see in this life. The rest will be icing on the cake.
 
This game doesn't stand a chance on sites and forums like this one.

Who will win out though, the core gamer crew or the massive marketing budget?

I still think im picking it up at release, lol
 

MCD250

Member
Edit: Also, Rap for the exclusively orc focused trailer is
thinking-face_1f914.png
Honestly, that was probably the thing that jumped out at me most. The relationship between Tolkien's works and issues of race can be pretty dicey. Using hip hop on a trailer about orcs strikes me as, at best, rather tone-deaf.
 
This sounds like a great idea if it weren't for the fact that LOTR is already under a buttload of scrutiny due to perceived racism. I don't see treating orcs like "gangstas" going over well.

EDIT: Frankly I'm kinda surprised there isn't already a giant amount of scrutiny over this.

DOUBLE EDIT: See below:

What? Would you prefer if they made actual tonally on point videos and trailers that show passion for LOTR and its racist world?

Or would it be better if they just didn't give a shit and tried to distance themselves as much as possible from the source material they have to work with?

The latter is much more preferred honestly.
 

adj_noun

Member
Christopher Tolkien needs to see this, if only to prove once and for all whether or not steam can truly escape from a man's ears, Loony Tunes style.
 

Raven77

Member
But who actually gives a shit?

I'm sorry, that just seems crazy to me. The books are 50+ years old at this point. Who exactly are still fans out there of Tolkien that really want them to respect the material?

Batman is 15 years OLDER than Lord of the Rings. I guess if the next Arkham game or Batman game has him using a ninja sword in a brightly colored city while killing all of his enemies with fancy new super powers that wouldn't be a problem? At least not based on your logic. Batman is more in the public eye than LOTR but it has had consistent video games, movies based on Tolkiens works, board games, toys, etc.

So I would wager there are thousands of people who "give a shit". And would also wager many of them are gamers.
 

oti

Banned
i'm still day-one on this game, but all the pre-release shenanigans are seriously souring me on that. I hate to know my purchase will feel like validation to this marketing atrocity.

They gotta get all dem young teenz, Fliesen. They don't know who #datTolkien is at. Is he on Instagram? No? Gimme dat #blingbling. #dubstep #yolo #gohld
 
Wow, ok

I'm just going to go ahead and assume it was meant as a joke, seeing how the "Grog, Glory..." stuff was in awful Bling-bling gold lettering
 

rgoulart

Member
Indeed. In fact I read every Middle Earth book imagining the Orcs as pimps singing hip hop music. I love that Tolkien's vision is finally being adapted as it should.
 
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