Development
Following the success of the video game tie-in of The Two Towers, a video game adaptation of The Return of the King was announced on April 25, 2003. While The Two Towers was released on the three major consoles (the PS2, GameCube and Xbox) but not the PC, The Return of the King was released on the PC in addition to the three major consoles. EA announced that the game would offer three separate story branches rather than one and that eight playable characters would be on offer rather than the three of The Two Towers. Parts of Howard Shore's score and footage from the films were set to feature, and members of the cast from the films would lend their voices to the game.
Developers working on The Return of the King described the game as "bigger and better" than The Two Towers. "In The Two Towers the player would occasionally run into 10 or 15 enemies," said lead game designer Chris Tremmel, "In The Return of the King there are areas where the player faces up to 40 orcs... Fans familiar with The Two Towers will find that the combat experience in The Return of the King feels familiar but much deeper." Before creating levels, the developers would initially write in-depth level designs out on paper, going into details such as combat setup, special props and enemy types. The levels would then be created in the game environment. The game is visually an improvement over The Two Towers. "We are pushing 2x the number of polys & 2x the texture density this year," said executive producer Neil Young. Enemy AI was also improved.
Executive producer Glen Schofield stated that the biggest challenge the developers were facing was "just trying to match the breathtaking look and feel of the movies". EA Redwood Shores worked closely with New Line Cinema to make the games as authentic as possible, using the actual reference photos, drawings, models, props, lighting studies and motion-capture data. "We even hired the same stunt doubles from the movie to help us render the most realistic movements in the game," noted Schofield. Partner Relations Director Nina Dobner said that "we want the game to not just look like the films but to be exactly like the films." No details in the game are made up, she commented. "When we were reproducing Minas Tirith... we felt the team would benefit from being able to see and feel a piece of the actual movie set. Unfortunately, the set had already been dismantled. So, while in New Zealand, I searched the various warehouses to find remnants of the dismantled set. After much work, I returned to San Francisco proudly bearing four bricks from the Minas Tirith set."
The Return of the King went gold on all platforms on October 10, 2003. The game went on sale in North America on November 6, more than a month before the film was released in cinemas on December 16.
Read more about this topic: The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King (video Game)
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