It is often remarked that medieval fantasy settings in literature, tabletop gaming and other media would not have taken off as far as it has without the codification of the genre by author J.R.R. Tolkien and his many books on Middle-Earth, from “The Hobbit” to “The Lord of the Rings” and everything in between. Well after New Line Cinema and Peter Jackson brought the aforementioned books to the big screen in the first two decades since 2000, there have been several attempts to make more Middle-Earth media, from the pseudo-prequel series being developed by Amazon, to an action-adventure videogame featuring Gollum that apparently has been pushed back by a year.

According to IGN the multiplatform game “The Lord of the Rings: Gollum” from German developer Deadalic Entertainment and French publisher Nacon will now be releasing in 2022 instead. Nacon revealed the development in a post on their official Twitter page, dated January 27. This puts the kibosh on the original release window of this year, as initially announced back in August 2020. Initial information on the videogame would have it as a fusion of “Prince of Persia,” which featured massive environments traversed by vertical acrobatics, and “Metal Gear Solid” with portions of stealth around enemies.

“The Lord of the Rings: Gollum” is notable for putting players in control of the titular Gollum, a sometimes-antagonistic yet tragic character in both “The Hobbit” and “Lord of the Rings,” having once been a “Stoor” Hobbit named Smeagol who was corrupted by possession of the malevolent One Ring of Sauron. Teaser images from last year show that in addition to action adventure, players will see Gollum having internal dialogue and arguments between his current monstrous self and his gentle former persona as Smeagol. This translates into allowing players to make decisions regarding Gollum’s actions, something Daedalic says will affect the game storyline in passing.

Daedalic and Nacon are giving “Lord of the Rings: Gollum” a wide release on Nintendo Switch, Sony PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One and Series X/S, and finally on PC.Image courtesy of TechRaptor