Did somebody say potatoes?
17.08.2023 - 09:47 / ign.com / Lars Wingefors
Embracer Group has said the Lord of the Rings intellectual property (IP) is performing “well ahead” of the business plan it set out when it bought the franchise in 2022.
Money generated by Middle-earth Enterprises grew significantly after “strong” licensing revenue for The Lord of the Rings, Embracer said in its financial report for the three months ending June 30.
In June, Embracer stressed the importance of "exploiting Lord of the Rings in a very significant fashion" by turning it into “one of the biggest gaming franchises in the world”.
The comments came amid a costly restructure of the gargantuan game business, which announced plans to cancel in-development projects, shut studios, and lay off an unspecified number of staff.
In an open letter to the company’s 17,000 staff, CEO Lars Wingefors said Embracer would decrease spending across the board, reduce third-party publishing, and “put greater focus on internal IP and increase external funding of large-budget games”.
Two months later, it seems Lord of the Rings is paying off for the company. “The performance of Middle-earth Enterprises is well ahead of the business plan developed at the time of acquisition a year ago,” Embracer boss Lars Wingefors said.
Wizards of the Coast recently released Magic the Gathering trading card game The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth (the one with the $2 million card). Free Range Games’ PC and console survival crafting game The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria is set for release later this year. Embracer said “many other exciting new products that will grow the IP further” are in the works.
However, all is not well in the world of Lord of the Rings-related video games. The Lord of the Rings: Gollum suffered a disastrous release in May, one that led to Daedelic shutting down its internal development arm and laying off 25 people.
Embracer bought the rights to The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit for nearly $400 million in August 2022 and announced plans to explore opportunities to create new games, movies, and more based on the famous intellectual property.
In May, Embracer announced it had signed a deal with Amazon Games for the developer of New World to create a new MMO based on The Lord of the Rings.
The massively multiplayer online game, which is completely separate from 2007's The Lord of the Rings Online and from Amazon's previously cancelled Lord of the Rings MMO, is currently in the early stages of development and as of yet has no official title.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at [email protected].
Did somebody say potatoes?
Magic: The Gathering just had one of its most popular crossover sets yet, as The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-Earth brought with it a whole bunch of new fans as the well as the game's most expensive card to date in The One Ring. Clearly expecting a success, Wizards of the Coast decided to double dip with Lord of the Rings by releasing the More Adventures in Middle Earth Secret Lair, a set of cards based on the 1978 animated film.
Gandalf may have feared to go into those mines, but we're chancing it with an exclusive first look at the upcoming Moria expansion for Lord of the Rings RPG The One Ring, along with its D&D equivalent (The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying).
The developers behind an upcoming Lord of the Rings survival-crafting game have teamed up with one of the linguists who worked on the movies to create the secret Dwarven language in its entirety.
One of the most memorable scenes from Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and Peter Jackson’s movie adaptation is the Fellowship’s brutal journey through the abandoned, once great Dwarven city of Moria.
New horror movie Starve Acre has a creepy first look, featuring Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power actor Morfydd Clark and former Doctor Who Matt Smith.
The developers of The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria took a frankly over-the-top approach with their Fourth Age-set Dwarven-focused survival-crafting game: they created the entire secret Dwarven language just so players can hear their characters use it in-game.
The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria, which was surprised revealed earlier this year, has a release date of October 24th. At least for PC and PS5, that is. This will be a digital release, with a physical PS5 release following in December. The Xbox Series X|S version of The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria, will not be available until early 2024. A reason for the Xbox delay has not been given.
The Best Pitch I’ve Ever Heard award has to go to The Lord Of The Rings: Return To Moria, which sounds like it’s taking Deep Rock Galactic’s procedurally generated cave looting and squashing it into Middle-Earth’s fantasy world. Chef’s kiss, no notes. The only downside is that the co-op craft-y-survive-a-thon is coming out on October 24th, the same week as - sweatily checks calendar - everything else. I’ll find the time to raid mines with big-bellied friends anyway, though.
Upcoming survival crafting game The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria has just announced a release date and it's breaking ground pretty soon, it turns out. We'll be delving down into the dwarven homelands starting on October 24.
Free Range Games has announced the official for the upcoming survival game.
Can you survive in the world of The Lord of the Rings? If you’ve been asking yourself that question your whole life, you’ll be able to find out soon enough. Publisher North Beach Games via IGN revealed plans to launch cooperative survival game Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria on October 24, 2023.