Fall From Grace

When it comes to lore, I am by no means a stickler for strict adherance. Let’s face it, if it wasn’t for a little rule bending and more than a dash of conjecture, we wouldn’t have LOTRO at all. Therefore I’m willing to go along with a little artistic licence for the sake of gaming enjoyment. In actual fact, I’d even go so far as to outrightly praise Turbine for their highly successful efforts in developing a wealth of content from what may have originally been a paragraph or sentance’s worth of source material.

So, in all that I’ve experienced of LOTRO so far, I don’t think I’ve once been disappointed with its realisation as an MMO – until now. There is actually a part of the recent Mines of Moria expansion that I’m not sure I’ll ever come to terms with – the Fall of Moria session play instance. In short, it has to be the most poorly interpreted and visually inaccurate player experience presented in the whole game. Why so?

The waking of Durin’s Bane by the deep delving of the Dwarves is one of the pivotal events of the Third Age. This ancient servant of Morgoth is perhaps only second to Sauron in infamy and its release from almost eternal slumbering leads to one of fantasy literature’s most epic confrontations. However, Turbine’s depiction of this cataclysmic event is downright farcical.

Where was the vast subterranean chamber, filled with hundreds of dwarven miners, towering smelting furnaces and precarious walkways (think: Sorrow’s Furnace)? Where was the dark abyss or sepulchre-like cavern from which the Balrog was so rudely awakened? And most importantly, where were its immense sword and whip of consuming flame? Ok, these might be some of my personal imaginings, but you get the point… there was no scale and cinematic drama whatsoever. What we actually got was a three-dwarf, three-elf tea party, a pathetic pile of rubble and a handful of moderately aggressive anteaters.

Really Turbine, we’ve come to expect better. Go back to animated cut-scenes and leave the session play instances for the usual mat collection/grind quests.

//HoC