Variety reports that the gaming rights for both Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit are for sale.
According to the story, The Saul Zaentz Company, which owns the rights currently, has hired ACF Investment Bank to handle the sale process. Given Amazon’s upcoming live-action TV series, this seems like a good time for the Zaentz Co. to sell.
While a video game featuring Gollum is currently in the works, it’s been a long time since we’ve seen a proper Lord of the Rings video game. Lord of the Rings Online continues to release expansion packs, with the most recent (Fate of Gundabad) in 2021. Both Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor and Middle-earth: Shadow of War were released in 2014 and 2017, respectively, with more entries coming. However, it’s been a long time since we saw games based on events on the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit proper stories.
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment has published all recent Lord of the Rings games except for the MMO. It’ll be interesting to see if they look to purchase the rights to the proper stories or if someone wants to step in. Electric Arts has a history with these games; both The Two Towers and Return of the King were incredibly enjoyable.
It’s important to remember that Amazon was trying to make a Lord of the Rings MMORPG that was cancelled early last year. Maybe this is their chance to get back into the game?
