Amazon Games Is Developing A Lord Of The Rings MMO After All...Again, CEO Wants It To Be The "Biggest MMO Out There"

Well, well, well… It seems we might be getting a new Lord of the Rings MMO after all – and it will be coming from Amazon. While the fact that it’s happening is a bit surprising, the fact that Amazon is involved isn’t – as much. After all, the company had worked with Middle-earth Enterprises on the Rings of Power show for Amazon Prime, so a partnership doesn’t seem out of place.

Interestingly, however, TenCent isn’t back for this. (Some of you may remember the prior Amazon Lord of the Rings MMO project was canceled after TenCent bought Leyou.) Instead, the company will be working with the Embracer Group – that other company that likes to buy up a lot of media companies. That's good news, though, as it seems unlikely anyone will buy up Embracer and shut their projects down.

For those wondering, this isn’t the same collaboration as before. Amazon and Middle-earth Enterprises agreed upon a new collaboration following the success of New World. A new contract was signed at that time.

Amazon also notes that this is a first for them. They’ll be leading development on the game, and it’s the first time they’ve done that for an external IP. If you’re thinking about New World and Lost Ark, New World is all Amazon, and Lost Ark’s development is led by Smilegate.

Speaking of New World, that’s the team that will be handling the development of the new Lord of the Rings game (while continuing to support New World). Amazon’s announcement notes that they won’t be making another New World, but will be using their experience in the development of this project. It seems players can expect some of the features found in New World, however – such as the massive, multiplayer battles. They feel something like this is ideal and relevant to Tolkien’s Third Age.

According to the announcement on Amazon’s site, the team is “determined to deliver an experience that is incredibly faithful to the rich fantasy lore established by Tolkien’s landmark novels.” In fact, the director of Amazon Games Orange County studio notes that the most important thing about dealing with an IP like Lord of the Rings is that they “have to be respectful and authentic”. They want fans to feel like they’re playing a game developed by other people who feel the same about the game as they do.

In an interview with IGN, CEO Christoph Hartmann said he wants it to be "the biggest MMO out there" to draw new players to the genre while satisfying fans of existing MMORPGs. Hartmann also spoke at length about the lessons learned developing New World and how those lessons will be applied to the LOTR MMO saying, "you cannot just prepare for launch, you need to literally prepare for the two years after.”

“For me, getting a license should be the icing on the cake,” Harmann says. “The game by itself needs to be so good that everyone wants to play it… My target is not just to make a certain group of MMO players happy with the game, I want people who normally would not play an MMO saying, ‘Hey, maybe give it a try because I understand the content, it's Lord of the Rings, I've never played an MMO.’... I definitely think we got to approach this from a much wider perspective than just being another MMO title. I want to make it very mass market competitive.”