Two New LotR: Conquest Videos

Wait... what?? 0.o

To be honest, I'm at a bit of a loss for words here. When this game first got announced, I had some pretty high hopes for it. I really enjoyed Star Wars: Battlefront II, for all its flaws, and was very much looking forward to Pandemic's rendition of the LotR universe. Unfortunately, what I'm seeing here does not inspire confidence... check out the trailers and some of my thoughts below.

SP Trailer:

Lol, at the narrator guy; missed epic voice by a longshot. But seriously, even if it is just SP mode, this looks pretty awful. It manages to feel cluttered, yet, not epic in any way. The massive button-mashey looking gameplay reminds me a lot of Dynasty Warriors and not like what I'd imagine a LotR battle should look like. Plus, a weird amount of crazy magic going on. Fire sword wut? Plus, Sauron wasn't menacing in the least bit and got killed by an arrow. EPIC. Wait no, what's the opposite of epic?

MP Trailer:

Better, but still very blehh. What's with all the mages man? And what I can only assume are rangers of some sort? Apparently they're trying to replicate TF2's spy class, but seriously, going invisible randomly in a LotR's game seems kinda off-putting. Plus, lot's more button-mashing going on so I really don't know how skill is going to play a major factor in online matches.

But hey, maybe I'm being to negative. These are two early gameplay teasers and I'm sure they are still tweaking the crap out of that game. Here's to hoping for some freakin' awesome (and epic) battles to come.