The Hobbit
From Sierra
The Hobbit is an exciting 3rd-person action/adventure game that takes you into Middle Earth, for the great quest that predates the Lord Of The Rings trilogy!
Amazon Sales Rank: #5178 in Video Games Brand: Inevitable Entertainment Released on: 2003-09-23 ESRB Rating: Everyone Platform: GameCube Number of items: 1 Dimensions: .20 pounds
From Children's Software Review Set in the world of Middle Earth, this detailed, one player fighting/strategy game follows the story of the Tolkien's The Hobbit novel and is best suited for children ages 10 and up. Players steer Bilbo Baggins through places like Mirkwood Forest and Lonely Mountain, battling trolls and collecting gems for courage and health. The graphics are cartoony (like Zelda), but this doesn't take away from the game. We tested the Game Cube version, and found it to be very rich, with eleven different areas to explore. Strengths include a design that is really easy to either zoom through, or take more time and explore. For example, in the first level, all you need to do is fix a bridge and find a walking stick, and you're done. But you can take much more time and explore if you want to. The only thing we'd fix is to add a running mode -- Bilbo is a little slow at times, and our 16 year old seasoned tester found some of the puzzles really tough. One maze of islands, that requires specially timed jumps, stood out as being frustratingly hard. The bottom line? Buy it, if you're at all interested in The Hobbit book.Copyright © 2001 Children's Software Revue
Zelda, step aside... Bilbos Coming to Town This is by far the best game based on any of Tolkiens work I have ever played including The Fellowship of the Ring for PS2/Xbox and the two games based off the movies. This isn't much of a fighting game like the others although it does have its fair share of battles. If you like fights and battles get the movie based games, if you're a Tolkien fan (like me) and want a good game based off the books, this is it. It follows the book chapter by chapter and does a great job of it. Each chapter, for the most part, last about 2 hours each (11 Chapters) so it's a good size game unlike FOTR which was like 5 hours long. There are a number of quests throughout each chapter most of which are optional but if you do them you will be rewarded with lots of Courage Points which appear in the game as jewels. The more jewewls you collect, the higher your life meter goes giving you more of an edge for later levels. The fun stuff I think isn't really doing the quests cause there's not much to most of em, but trying to find ALL the Jewels and Silver Pennies (your currency) in the level. Most are hidden up high somewhere and require some thinking on how to get them. The farther you are in the game the more difficult and fun these puzzle become. Another cool thing in the game is the treasure chests. Instead of most games where you just walk up and open em, here you either need a skeleton key or you can just pick it by completeing a couple of small puzzles before the time runs out. Then at the end of each level you can buy supplies with the pennies you found.The graphics in the game are great. Everything is nicely animated and the voices are pretty good. Its cool cause sometimes you can climb up way up high and look back and see the whole valley down below where you just came from. No flat backdrobs or anything like that. The music is great and goes nicely with the game. Another great thing is that, again, it follows the book almost exact (adding on some to give you something to do, for example in Lake Town, you have to investigat some strange things going on and get back Barons (sp?) Black Arrow that was stolen). It is very detailed as well as to whats described in the book. For ex., on Flies and Spiders, you eventually climb to the tops of the trees and see thousands of butterflies before sliding down a hollow tree down into the spiders lair. If you're a Tolkien fan and like puzzle solving, then this is your game. Its awsome. For those who want a hack and slash game, go ahead and try it out but I warn you, many of the later levels have almost no fighting at all and require you to use your ring and stealth to sneak around and go and solve many puzzles.Tip: Save the game at the begining of every level in one file and then save throughout the level in another file. This is because near the end in Smaugs chambers, there is block that you can push off the edge that is NOT supposed to fall off. If you dont know what you're doing and save after doing this, you will have to start the game all over because you wont beable to complete the level. Just dont try pushing the blocks off and you'll be fine. (I learned from experience :( ) Great features and lots of hidden treasures. I played the GameCube version, but it is also available on PC, PS2, XBOX.The Hobbit is a pretty good action adventure with appealing graphics and a lot of nice features. The game progresses through Tolkien's story, with each level representing a location from the book. What to expect:* Although the gameplay consists mostly of combat, platform jumping, and rope climbing, there is a fair amount of stealth and even real puzzle solving as well.* While there's only one crucial timed sequence in the game, there are lots of little optional ones that can reap all sorts of goodies: Lockpicking is actually a minigame where you must trigger one or more moving mechanisms on a locked chest before the time runs out. While some chests won't fault you for failing, most chests will injure or poison you if you're too slow or make a wrong move.* Through the course of the game you will obtain different weapons, starting out with the relatively weak but far-reaching walking stick. Other weapons include the shorter, but more powerful sword Sting, and throwing rocks of various kinds.* You need every skill you acquire in the game. Different levels focus on different abilities (sneaking, jumping, fighting).* Enemies and quests become steadily more difficult throughout the game.* The game is just long enough to be satisfying and make you feel you've gotten your money's worth, but not so long that you get bored with it.* At the end of each level you're presented with a screen that shows how many gems, coins, and chests you discovered as well as the total number available in that level.What's good:* The graphics are colorful and intriguing. A decidedly different look from the live action LOTR films and the older animated ones.* Level design is generally good; each new location has a unique atmosphere and presents new challenges. * Purple "journey gems" that guide you to important locations. These gems often appear when you reach new phases in the main quest, and are indispensable at times- especially during the final sequence, which is timed.* There are goodies scattered all throughout the game, some out in the open, many hidden or locked in chests. What's great here is that you only have to walk in the general proximity of these items and they magically come to you. (Likewise when you dispatch enemies and they drop loot- even if they're across a chasm!) This is much nicer than games where you must make physical contact with all loot in order to retrieve it.* All dialog is spoken, and the voices are pretty good.* There's a very nice quest log that clearly identifies optional and required quests, and checks tasks off as you complete them.* After completing each level you get to visit a store where you can use coins you collected to buy potions, rocks and upgrades that allow you to carry more items.* Like most console games, you can't save wherever/whenever you want; you can only save at various "save pedestals" scattered around Middle Earth. What's nice is there are plenty of pedestals to be found, and they're almost always located right before particularly dangerous areas.* When Bilbo does something that affects another area (for example, flipping a switch that opens a door in another room), the game always quickly cuts to the other location to let you see what just happened. This feedback is helpful and important.* Some replay value, in that you may feel compelled to go through the game again just to find all the goodies you missed the first time.What's bad:* I encountered a clipping issue where Bilbo became permanently stuck on a mushroom. I loaded a saved game and avoided that mushroom after that.* While camera control is usually pretty good, there are numerous tight spots where you simply can't get the camera at a good angle, or worse- when the camera keeps moving when you're trying to do something.My rating (from Very Bad to Very Good): Very GoodYou will probably like this game if you liked these: American McGee's Alice, Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy, Prince of Persia: Sands of Time Great Game!! I bought this game last (11/12/03) night, and I have to say it's really good. I'm a huge fan of Tolkien's work, and this game is a tribute to his book. The cinematic sequences are fantastic, the in-game graphics are superb, and the game play is loads of fun. The music is great (it doesn't sound repetitive like other games), and the voice acting is spot on. I've been waiting for months for this title to be released and I wasn't disappointed. This game is a "must have" for any Tolkien fan.
