The Lord of the Rings: Gollum™ Reviews

peak

This is the worst game ever made. There is not a single good thing about it

This game deserves no hate, period! If you are a true fan to Lords of the rings you owe it to yourself to buy Gollum, otherwise you would miss out on something very good that does not match the reviews on steam. I recommend to play it when it´s dark because it will set the mod for the game even better. + Very wellwritten story unfolds + intuitive controls + no bugs Story It´s a very good wellcrafted sad gloomy tale being told through the eyes of Gollum with Gandalf as a listener and participant. I very much enjoy it and for me it is very hard to understand all the hate and negative review. It must be based solely on the release when it came and that it doesnt look like in the Peter Jackson movies. You care for the characters Gollum meets on his journey. I played 2hours nonstop and time just flew by because of the good written story. This game is more about good storytelling than gameplay even though it´s a game. 2 hours in it I haven´t had any problems with it being to hard. It´s just good flow. This game has been equally much hated as Gollum himself. I understand that the release must have been very bad but it´s hard to understand now when I play it. The model of Gollum is not so alike, but it is because we all compare it to the movies we all love by Peter Jackson. But if youré only reference would be the books or the animated movies from the 1970s it would´nt be judged so harsh. I will go through the positive reviews and actually add people that wrote the best of them because these are players that are openminded enough to see something nice. Gameplay I think the closest I played to Gollum I can think of directly even if its not is Telltales “The walking dead” even though that one has much less gameplay actually. The thing these two games has in common is that they both have a good story to tell. Some people wrongly calls it a platformer which is not really more true than to call Assassins creed a platformer. You control Gollum and speak with different characters, run & jump, climb and sneak around and from time to time can choose to answer or act either as Gollum or Smeagol. Everything fits in with being Gollum. The animations of Gollums very wellmade and especially when he is crawling, Quite often when I can walk in Gollums classic hunched style I prefer to crawl because it looks so spidery and scary and it is just enjoyable to the eye 😊 Moordor pweetyy! The graphics are SUPERCRISP if you just go for epic and turn on Upscaler type:Nvidia DLSS and turn on DLAA,Also use Nvidia Reflex Low Latency,also skip Raytracing mode because that has a horrible impact on all games and will turn down your framate rate massive if you dont own supergraphics card. Some of the orcs gives me the vibes of the goblsin in the legendary movie Labyrinth with David Bowie made by George Lucas and puppets by Jim Henson who made the Muppet show. The depths of the mines are very atmospheric and it feels like you really are in the world Hidden tribute to the original film There are tributes to the animated movie from the 1970s in the game which I was happily surprised to see. Checkpoint system and no savefiles. I haven´t had any problem with the checkpoint system so far but it´s just sometimes you want to go back a bit more perhaps on a save to check if there are more items that you missed or you just want to redo it because of the atmosphere. Music & Sound Music compliments the story very well and the sound effects does it job well with Gollums feet fluttering around. The voice of Gollums really wellmade, A friend of mine pointed out that some of the hate for the game is based on that it´s not the voiceactor from Peter Jacksons movie but I couldn’t care less personally, It´s not that hard to imitate Gollums voice. I also very much enjoyed the orcs conversations. Bad - The negative reviews on steam that that is either based on that it was a buggy release or players that are fanboys/girls of Gollum in the Peter Jackson had feel it´s bad because it doesn’t not have the same look from the movies. Because the game is has good story and there are no bugs so far 2hour + into the game. - The font when you see the map does not really fit in but it´s a very minor thing but it looks odd. To the devs: I just wish you the developers all the best for making such a great game with very nice story all the best and I hope you are not burdened down of all negatives. When I played your game now it is for me not understandable how people don’t like it.

I wasn't expecting much after reading all the negative reviews so yeah, it's a bad game, but it's not THAT bad. It's like the janky version of Styx: master of shadows or Styx: shards of darkness. Actually no, those games are fun to play and I'm a big fan of those games, and I don't want to ruin their reputations by comparing them to this. I'll give this game a thumb's up anyway, just to say that it's playable and worth it at a steep discount if you like stealth games. The amount of jank in this game makes me wonder: Who makes games these games these days? This could have been ok if it was made by real game developers.

back to back to back cutscenes with slight walking sequence before another cutscene before slight walking sequence before another cutscene and maybe you get some mediocre platforming before the next cutscene. surprisingly unpolished platformer despite that being the closest thing to fun this game gave me. play something like pseudoregalia instead

I have a 3080 10 and i have spent an hour trying to get this game not to stutter so badly. I've tried almost every mixture of settings from epic to low from 1440 to the lowest resolution available. I can get up to about 100 fps standing still but when playing you get about ten seconds before a massive frame drop. It comes back up but you get a few seconds or a sharp turn and bam a massive stutter. I know my hardware isn't premium but god dam this thing is a stuttery mess. I got it for like $5 and I think I'd pay $10 to light an actual hard copy of this game on fire.

[h2]tl;dr[/h2] hidden masterpiece … just kidding. But after playing Metacritic’s ‘Best Games of All Time’ entry ranked #13,658 - the insane hate for this game feels somewhat overblown [h2]Overview:[/h2] Lord of the Rings: Gollum is an action-adventure stealth game where you control Gollum on his everlasting quest after the preciiooousss. The gameplay mainly revolves around climbing, sneaking past enemies, and solving light environmental puzzles. The game features internal dialogues between Gollum and Smeagol, adding a narrative layer. You explore a series of linear levels and chapters, each presenting a mix of stealth sections and platforming challenges. There is no combat system, just some stealth executions. [h2]The Good Stuff:[/h2] Stealth and climbing mechanics are genuinely enjoyable and offer some variety. The internal debates between Gollum and Smeagol add a weird but compelling narrative layer. Occasionally, the game introduces moments that feel fresh, though overall content variety is limited. Still, it’s more engaging than expected. Especially in the beginning, the artsy-fartsy visual style is quite enjoyable and kinda reminded me of the 1978 Lord of the Rings movie. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3507430192 [h2]The Sorta-Kinda-Grinds-My-Gears-Stuff:[/h2] Controls are pretty clunky, leading to frustration. I would strongly recommend playing with a controller, as keyboard and mouse controls are by far the bigger of the two evils. Puzzles can be downright weird - some are bafflingly illogical and, honestly, an insult to the player’s intelligence. Visual consistency unfortunately fades after the promising start, but after getting used to it, there is at least some atmospheric beauty to be found. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3530112115 [h2]The Atrociously-Bad Stuff:[/h2] Firstly all characters look simply cursed. Like, really very cursed. Furthermore, the story is exclusively terrible. It makes absolutely no sense and doesn't really fit the setting. The characters introduced should not have been invented at all. The clunky controls can be painful, as certain parts require precision. [h2]Achievement-Hunter-Things:[/h2] You’ll need at least two playthroughs to get all achievements. Which, imho, is optimistic, as you need a no-death run, which is simply amazing with clunky and error-prone controls. Take your time, refer to a walkthrough, and ignore all collectibles. It's doable but unnerving. Most other achievements aren’t too complicated. The game lets you select chapters freely, which helps a lot for collectibles or chapter-specific interactions. [h2]Conclusion:[/h2] Gollum isn’t the catastrophic failure many claim, but it is also certainly not good, just better than expected. There are games that are streets ahead in their design, gameplay, and general innovation. Gollum seems streets behind. While some moments hint at potential, the game often reminds you of its flaws. It rather resembles a PS2-era title, and if you play it with that in mind, you could actually find some joy in it. The positive review is certainly influenced by the incredible hate and negative press the game received. When your baseline is below zero, you can only be positively surprised. If you are a seasoned gamer that dipped in obscure and lesser-known titles in the past, you will most certainly have played games that are way worse. I genuinely believe that the Lord of the Rings franchise mobilizes a different audience with different expectations and experiences, which ultimately influences the reception. At the end of the day, Gollum is actually way better than Shadow of War.