Not content with producing a hugely ambitious, billion dollar-budgeted TV series based upon The Lord of the Rings, Amazon has now announced that it is also developing a MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game) set in the world of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth.
The as-yet-untitled game will be free-to-play on PCs and consoles and promises to present players with “a new, immersive game experience for epic exploration of the vast world of Tolkien.”
“Tolkien’s Middle-earth is one of the richest fictional worlds in history and it gives our team of experienced MMO developers – from the same studio developing New World – tremendous opportunity to play and create,” said Christoph Hartmann, VP, Amazon Game Studios. ” We have a strong leadership team in place to helm this new project, and we’re actively growing our team to help build this incredible experience.”
The game will be set prior to the events of Tolkien’s trilogy, but will be completely unrelated to the TV series, which recently hired Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom helmer J.A. Bayona to direct its first two episodes.