Lord of the Rings DOTA Clone Coming to XBLA and PSN

[John Funk]

Lord of the Rings DOTA Clone Coming to XBLA and PSN

Gandalf, stop feeding the Balrog.

The MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) genre, which was first popularized with Warcraft III mod DOTA, has been seeing a golden age lately with hugely popular titles like League of Legends or Valve's DOTA 2. Now, one of the most beloved universes in all of geekdom is getting in on the action with Guardians of Middle-Earth.

According to the official site [http://www.guardiansofmiddleearth.com/lang_select], Guardians of Middle-Earth will feature the 5v5 battles typical of the genre, presumably with the standard three-lane-and-jungle setup as well. There will be over 20 "iconic" guardians playable in the game, like Sauron, Gandalf, and Gollum - Legolas is on the front page of the site, so presumably he's in there, too. I'm stumped on who exactly that's supposed to be in the logo with Gandalf, though.

More characters will be added in after release, with some coinciding with the release of Peter Jackson's The Hobbit film this winter - I can only imagine we'll see Bard the Bowman, Bilbo Baggins, and some of the Dwarves, but I don't think they'll be letting anyone play as Smaug the dragon. Just a hunch.

I'm a big fan of MOBA-style games, and I do like Lord of the Rings, so I'll be interested to see how this plays out, even if it is a console-only release. It just won't be the same without the frantic right-clicking back to your tower when you're about to be ganked.

Source: Guardians of Middle-Earth Facebook [http://www.facebook.com/Guardiansofmiddleearth]

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[Fappy]

This honestly has me scratching me head. This will probably be torn apart by MOBA purists (lord knows their bloodlust is unquenchable) but I may actually keep an eye on this. Who knows, it may be the genre's first successful entry into the console-space.

 

[Severin90]

Hmm interesting... Im curious to see how a moba game will do on a console..
The Lord of the Rings franchise sure is milked to the core but dont know if it would be cool or a not to see Samwise getting fed by Sauron and Saruman..
"Screw the lore we need money!"

 

[Korten12]

Hmm interesting... Im curious to see how a moba game will do on a console..
The Lord of the Rings franchise sure is milked to the core but dont know if it would be cool or a not to see Samwise getting fed by Sauron and Saruman..
"Screw the lore we need money!"

Awesomenauts is a side-scroller MOBA on consoles and works good.

Also is it just me... or instead of FPS's, MOBA's are starting to become a new fad? I swear a new one gets announced each week.

 

[endtherapture]

I don't see how it could work on consoles...the clicking precision could be highly problematic.

Anyway...I'd like to see it on PC, would be awesome.

 

[Qitz]

OH DEAR FUCKING GOD!

The XBLA community AND the MOBA one? Holy shit, the world is going to explode from the amount of asshole.

It'll be pretty boring considering you're using a controller so I'll doubt you'd have Skill Shots and the like.

 

[blackdwarf]

the only other console moba game i know is awesomnauts and that was a 2D game. i don't know i a 3d game would even work with a controller, but we will see.

 

[Therumancer]

What's the betting Sauron will be so OP most servers will ban him like a bad hobbit?

Maybe, my immediate guess would be that he's going to be underpowered just because of the idea.

That said having Sauron himself get curb stomped by a hobbit 1 on 1 is going to be hilarious, and we know it's going to happen at some point.

I can't say I'm really excited about this though, sounds like a quick cash on the LOTR name and movie images. I prefer games (of all generes) based on original creations intended for games, rather than tie in properties.

I'm not much of a MOBA gamer, but to be honest despite it's popularity it seems like a bad fit conceptually with the LOTR property due to the huge mismatch in power level of the iconinic characters, to the point where it borders on the absurd. I imagine it was intentionally conceived as matching a popular movie property that is flagging a bit, right before the release of a new movie (The Hobbit) with a popular game genere that is getting a lot of attention due to the upcoming planned release of things like DOTA2.

 

[Triforceformer]

No PC version?

What the in the everliving fuck are they doing? A MOBA game? On consoles?

HA! This is gonna be terrible.

Monday Night Combat and Awesomenauts did relatively fine despite being console exclusive Dota-inspired games. Though a pure Dota close? That's gonna be trouble I presume.

 

[Tanakh]

If they understand their audience and do a kind of hybrind of MOBA with Smash Brothers, ie. faster, more forgiving, colorful, it might be the next big thing.

 

[Jandau]

I already see it - people insta-locking Legolas and saying "MID OR FEED!!!"

Seriously, imagine the crossbreed of XBLA and DOTA trolls...

 

[Triforceformer]

No PC version?

What the in the everliving fuck are they doing? A MOBA game? On consoles?

HA! This is gonna be terrible.

Monday Night Combat and Awesomenauts did relatively fine despite being console exclusive Dota-inspired games. Though a pure Dota close? That's gonna be trouble I presume.

Yeah, I actually don't know if MNC is on consoles but I can see it working.

Anything resembling DOTA, LoL or HoN? Just can't see it working. Theres a lot of problems there.

MNC was XBLA exclusive before the PC port.

 

[ThePenguinKnight]

Hmm interesting... Im curious to see how a moba game will do on a console..
The Lord of the Rings franchise sure is milked to the core but dont know if it would be cool or a not to see Samwise getting fed by Sauron and Saruman..
"Screw the lore we need money!"

Awesomenauts is a side-scroller MOBA on consoles and works good.

Also is it just me... or instead of FPS's, MOBA's are starting to become a new fad? I swear a new one gets announced each week.

At least it'd be something somewhat new shoved in our faces. I think we should start exploring the prospect of Starwars Battlefront's formula for a Moba face-lift.

 

[antipunt]

OH DEAR FUCKING GOD!

The XBLA community AND the MOBA one? Holy shit, the world is going to explode from the amount of asshole.

Oh GOD D:

Although in all seriousness, yes that does sound quite awful, especially if it has -integrated- voice options (LoL, for example, doesn't, so it spares you the high pitch squealing)

 

[JaceArveduin]

Wait, console only? Well fuck >.<" I'd have had to come up with a way to scrounge cash up for it, but enough cash to buy a console with it?

I want to kill everyone as Faramir :'(

 

[josemlopes]

No PC version?

What the in the everliving fuck are they doing? A MOBA game? On consoles?

HA! This is gonna be terrible.

Monday Night Combat and Awesomenauts did relatively fine despite being console exclusive Dota-inspired games. Though a pure Dota close? That's gonna be trouble I presume.

Yeah, I actually don't know if MNC is on consoles but I can see it working.

Anything resembling DOTA, LoL or HoN? Just can't see it working. Theres a lot of problems there.

MNC was XBLA exclusive before the PC port.

Huh. The more you know I guess.

The new MNC (called Super MNC) is exclusive to PC though, as a free to play game.