The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is officially coming to the Nintendo Switch when the game releases next year. The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is an upcoming action-adventure game that takes players to Middle-Earth and puts them in the shoes of The Lord of the Rings' arguably slimiest character for a strange and sneaky romp through the beloved fantasy franchise.
The Lord of the Rings is an iconic franchise, and the fantasy genre would not be the same without it. The series' epic quests, massive battles, and memorable characters all combine to give it a legacy that persists in force to this day. The series has had numerous video game adaptations in the past, most prominently the recent Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor and its sequel Middle-Earth: Shadow of War. These games, like the movies they're based on, are associated with epic heroics and grand sword fights. With this in mind, the diminutive Gollum may seem like a very strange choice for a video game all his own. But that's just what Daedalic Entertainment is giving him with The Lord of the Rings: Gollum.
As reported by Go Nintendo, the upcoming adventure will be featured on Nintendo Switch, in addition to current and next-gen PlayStation and Xbox consoles and PCs. This news comes from a brief developer presentation at the Future Games Show, later uploaded to YouTube by GamesRadar. Project Manager Saide Haberstroh spilled the beans at the end of a two-minute video discussing some of the features fans can expect when they inhabit the grimy little creature himself. Haberstroh emphasized the game's focus on storytelling in the developer's quest to, in her words, "create the ultimate Gollum game." Check it out below:
Haberstroh outlined the main gameplay conceits fans can expect from the title, which is good, because "Gollum" and "action" don't exactly go hand in hand. Haberstroh admitted that Gollum isn't a traditional fantasy warrior who's likely to go charging into the fray with a broadsword, and stressed that most encounters with enemies would be largely stealth-focused. Platforming and parkour challenges will also be a significant feature of gameplay. To illustrate some of the stranger aspects of Gollum's character, Daedalic Entertainment is also including a dialogue minigame, which tasks players with selecting a voice line associated with either Gollum or his alter-ego Smeagol and clicking on it repeatedly to force that aspect of his character into a dominant position. It looks like a very unique take on a very unique character.
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum has been in development for a long time, and has been baffling journalists for almost as long. There are certainly more conventional and likable characters in The Lord of the Rings who'd make a better option for a video game protagonist, but Gollum certainly has some kind of undeniable charisma to him. He's a memorable character, if nothing else, and Andy Serkis's portrayal of him in the films was strong enough to earn the character a permanent position in pop culture. If Daedalic Entertainment can pull it together, The Lord of the Rings: Gollum might just be a winner, and now that it's coming to Switch, even more people will have a golden opportunity to live the life of everyone's favorite slimy fish-eater.
Source: Go Nintendo, GamesRadar
