Something I found refreshing about the fighting is that it is turn-based. We've seen lots of action based RPG's lately and I thought it was nice to see classic turn-based battles back for a game that at least I expected to have open battles. This also helps encourage more strategy rather then mindless hack n' slash, which adds more depth to the gameplay.

     Something that will be noticed pretty quickly by regular RPG players to veterans is the low difficulty level of the game. EA has stated that they wanted The Third Age to be accesible to all players familiar with the hack n' slash nature of their first two LOTR games, which is understandable yet to me dissapointing. I was hoping for a decent challenge but I found myself breezing through the game without much difficulty. The battles, even on medium difficulty seem to pass by pretty fast, the toughest battles rarely even last a few minutes. Although The Third Age is MORE of an RPG then that of the previous two LOTR games, comparatively it's still rather light on RPG elements. For example, you level up extremely fast when comparing to other Role Playing Games, and character development is almost non-existent. Still, the game is packed with some ultra-cool extras, like the ability to play on the evil side of Middle Earth.

     The graphics of this game are great, with only a couple noticeable problems. Some of the best graphical aspects of the game are the spell effects, which in most cases look stunning. You can do all sorts of spells from attack spells to summoning spells, and I've yet to find one that didn't look good. The enemies also look fantastic, they're so detailed and well designed that it looks like they were pulled straight out of the movies. The only complaints I have about the graphics, is for one the movement of the characters. The movement isn't fluid and they just look stiff and hard to believe when moving around the environments. My other graphical gripe is the framerate of which isn't always consistent, this can cause slow-down in certain areas and sometimes become frustrating. But despite these two issues overall the games graphics are excellent.

     When it comes to sound this game does not dissapoint. The musical scores help further immerse you into the gameplay, while the authentic voice overs contribute as well. This time around we even get a narration by the almighty Gandalf(Ian McKellen).

     Although I wish it'd be a little heavier on the RPG elements, I understand the intent of making it more accesible to the hack n' slash fans. Overall, this is easily my favorite LOTR game and if you're looking to become part of Middle Earth, for now this is about as close as you're gonna get.

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