The biggest game from Germany appears after 4 years – flops so badly that the studio has to apologize

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The Hamburg studio Daedalic has been working on “The Lord of the Rings: Gollum” (PS5, Xbox, PC, Windows, PS4) since March 2019. Gollum was certainly the biggest game made in Germany in the last 4 years. The hype was huge, and international gaming sites have been reporting on the project for years. But the release is now a big disappointment. The studio indicates that they have probably taken on too much here.

What was special about the game?

  • The Lord of the Rings: Gollum was a game that is not actually made in Germany. If you look at the German gaming awards, mostly “indie titles” come from Germany, games that tend to be top-heavy. Daedalic itself made a name for itself with point-and-click adventures.
  • But Gollum was supposed to be a big blockbuster that was intended for a wide audience. We were talking about a big action-adventure with a lot of “stealth gameplay”. They wanted to appear on all platforms at the time of release – the expectations were high. After all, “Lord of the Rings” is something like the ultimate in licenses that you can get hold of.
  • In the years before its launch, the game was considered a AAA game from Europe like “The Witcher” and received a 12-page report in the international gaming magazine Edge in February 2022. GameStar presented the game in May 2020 in a 4-page preview as a “world exclusive premiere”.

    • The Lord of the Ring: Gollum – Sneak Peek Trailer

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    Gollum gets terrible reviews on Metacritic and Steam – bad player numbers

    How did the start go? Gollum was released on May 25th and it was really terrible:

  • On Metacritic, the game has only 36% in the PS5 version – the user score is 1.3 out of 10.
  • On Steam, Gollum has “largely negative reviews” – only 35% of player reviews are positive.
  • Gollum’s player numbers on Steam are also catastrophic. The maximum number of players was 502 and halved after just a few days.

    • Steam Reviews Call Gollum a ‘Lord of the Rings Disgrace’

    What is criticized on Steam? The reviews are harsh:

  • The game has bad graphics and even worse performance
  • The gameplay is uninteresting, it starts out boring and then stays that way for a long time
  • It was a “shame” for Lord of the Rings.

    • Even positive tests advise to wait for a sale – the game is not worth the full price of 50 €

    Developers ‘profoundly’ apologize

    How are the developers reacting? Daedalic “sincerely apologized” in a statement to fans on May 26. They acknowledge and deeply regret that the game has not lived up to expectations – neither their own nor those of a dedicated community.

    It is said that telling a story in Middle-earth has been the greatest honor and challenge ever faced.

    It sounds like admitting that “Lord of the Rings” ended up being a size too big for the studio.

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    Daedalic announces that they are working hard on bugs and patches to improve the game so players can enjoy it.

    Gollum is compared to weak hyped games like Forspoken or Redfall

    Responding to the tweet, some have expressed their disappointment at the “AAA blockbuster releases.” Gollum is put in a row with games like Forspoken, Halo Infinite, Redfall or Cyberpunk.

    That’s actually about the league in which you wanted to play with Gollum – but you certainly had imagined it differently in Hamburg.

    German developers find only right name for Collector’s Edition of their new Lord of the Rings game

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