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New Lord of the Rings: Conquest coming to DS

Play as both good and evil...

New Lord of the Rings: Conquest coming to DS

You can't accuse The Lord of the Rings series of lacking detail. Tolkien didn't spend those 12 years doing what we'd do - thinking up displacement activities and making cups of tea. Which is just as well for EA which seems keen to keep releasing games well beyond those based on the film trilogy.

Already there have been a number of spin-offs, including Lord of the Rings: Tactics for PSP, and now developer Pandemic has been tasked with whipping up yet another new instalment for the fantasy series - Lord of the Rings: Conquest.

As an action-based game, Conquest's premise of conquering all of the epic battles in the fictional series sounds pretty straightforward. What does mix matters up a bit though is that you will be able to play as both the heroic forces of good (also known as the boring ones) and - for the first time - as the various legions of Sauron's army, including cave-trolls, the Balrog and Sauron himself.

All this means the outcome of battles is left completely open. With no story to follow, anything could happen.

"We'll freely admit that we're rabid fans of The Lord of the Rings fantasy," says Josh Resnick, Pandemic's co-founder and general manager, hopefully not foaming at the mouth. "Our experience creating massive, rich, action-packed games means that The Lord of the Rings: Conquest will give fans exactly what they want: full control of the blade, bow and magic to fight its epic battles any way they want – even if they choose to play from the evil side."
In the hands of Pandemic - which has a number of action titles already under its belt, including Mercanaries, Star Wars Battlefield 2 and Full Spectrum Warrior, this could be good orc/elf-battling stuff for DS.

Lord of the Rings: Conquest will be released on DS (as well as PS3, Xbox 360 and PC), during the autumn this year.

Kath Brice
Kath Brice
Kath gave up a job working with animals five years ago to join the world of video game journalism, which now sees her running our DS section. With so many male work colleagues, many have asked if she notices any difference.