"The Hobbit" is a video game released in 2003 for a number of platforms. The version I recently played was the GameCube version. It was the second time I bothered to finish it, having multiple rage quits between the first and second.
"The Hobbit" is an example of a game that has so much love in it, but it is left with so many frustrating problems, and not in a good way. The developers of this game went out of their way to capture the original story so well that it hurts to say anything bad about it, but there is a lot of good here too.
The game has you playing Bilbo Baggins, a hobbit on a quest almost too big for him. The game functions mainly as a combat platformer. It is hard, very hard. But the game throws so many chances to save at you that you never feel like you're getting knocked back too far from failure. Once the Ring is obtained, the game adds some stealth options. All this works well enough. Between using your walking stick, your sword Sting, and throwing rocks, combat is entirely serviceable, but still quite janky at the best of times.
"Janky" really is a good word to describe this game. Things seem like they work, but they don't always work the way you want them to. This leads to unintentional misses across the board. Misses in combat. Misses in platforming. Misses in stealth.
The game's major strengths is in the presentation. This really is the ultimate video game Hobbit experience. The character of Bilbo is well voiced, and his animations are extremely well done. However, everyone else's animations are crap. I'm sorry. Even Gandalf looks hideous. Nobody but Bilbo can move their eyes. And their mouths just sort of open and close. That said, their voice acting is excellent, so I'll give them that.
Likely the worst aspect of the game are 1. the spiders and 2. the treasure chests. The spiders are just terrible and glitchy. They can poison you even if you block, and if you don't have any antidote, you better just give up, because this game is over for you. I prepared for this happening from the beginning and you should too. Stock up!
The treasure chests have little puzzles that are just annoying. If you fail the puzzles, it either takes a lot of health away from you or poisons you. Really poison is the worse thing this game has to offer.
If you can get past those two things and the janky controls, then what's left is actually wonderful. There's a lot of content too. Tons of content. The game goes on for hours and hours. It never seems to end. I would say however to be warned that some iconic moments in the story were left to mere cutscenes, such as the encounter with Gollum. That's too bad. It was a really odd place to cut corners.
With all of its flaws, I still recommend "The Hobbit." It's an old game now, but the developers really seemed like they were trying to make the best game they could in the time they had. I applaud their effort, even if it does win the award for worst spiders in any game in history. It really does.
This blog was written on April 11, 2022.
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Video games are made by many people. When some of the people are very good, the results are very good. When some of the people are very bad, the results are very bad. It seems this game had some very capable people on the team but also so incompetent ones. There were incompetent people among the bosses, it seems, otherwise everything would have worked out perfectly. It was the boss's job to deal with the incompetence. He may have caused problems himself, such as rushing production or cutting the wrong corners.
ReplyDeleteKnowing you, I'd say stay the heck away from this. I think you'd quit long before the spiders, but if you did make it to them, it would be the beginning of the end. That said, there is still a lot here that should be commended. It's too bad it couldn't have just been polished a bit more.
DeleteThis is one I played through and I agree. The janky spiders were bad but the pain was well worth it in the end. The presentation overshadowed the flaws.
ReplyDeleteSo much love. I think maybe if they had more time, they could have achieved a less frustrating game. After the spiders got brushed up, I would totally redesign the treasure chest system from the ground up.
DeleteChallenges are one thing, but when a game gets frustrating it is time to stop. No matter how good the story, it becomes something to watch more than play. If you really like it, you can try again later.
ReplyDeleteI don't blame anyone for stopping this game. No joke.
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