Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3257 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: Electronic Arts
• Released on: 2006-03-03
• Platform: Windows XP

Manufacturer's Description
In The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-earth II, the sequel to the critically acclaimed RTS game The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-earth you now have the chance to experience all that Middle-earth was meant to be.

Given a new agreement with The Saul Zaentz Company d/b/a Tolkien Enterprises that grants EA the rights to develop games based on the books, in addition to a separate agreement that allows for games based on the New Line Cinema films The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-earth II will introduce players to depths of the fiction never before explored by EA.

With all new content from J.R.R. Tolkien's original fiction, delve deeper than ever before and engage in new battles that go beyond the award-winning movie trilogy. Wage war in the North and assume command of the most storied civilizations in all of Middle-earth history the Elven and Dwarven armies or fight on the side of Evil with heroes and creatures that have never been seen in The Lord of the Rings films. Defend or overtake never before seen lands such as Dol Guldur, The Misty Mountains, and Mirkwood as you unleash powerful new weapons and abilities - summon dragons, cause volcanoes to erupt, or bring down a cataclysmic lightning strike.

But beware, with greater power comes greater adversity. Your enemies, commanded by a powerful new AI system, possess a greater tactical edge and more powerful spells. Will your armies have the fortitude to persevere?

Customer Reviews

Great but not *quite* right
I'll give it 4 on the basis that the flaws will not stop me playing this again and again, it's well worth the money for pure entertainment. The Collector's DVD is ok yet it is all fairly obvious stuff, and from what I've seen the only 'whole new dragon that collector's only can get' is just a slightly different graphic of the normal dragon. For a headline that's not much. However, the music added to the game (which I was apprehensive about) is in a lot of places just as beautiful as Shore's original LotR score, which is fantastic.

However, despite some minor flaws with the collector's edition, it's worth the extra £2 on Amazon for some of the extra features you do get.

The game itself is lacking in a major area - the fact that against a competent player, rushing is order of the day and games are not likely to last long enough to put real strategy into play. When playing as Mordor you simply build 10 or so orc units for only 1,000 resources and mob your enemy, with resistance being fairly non-existent (unless, of course, you're playing against Goblins in which case troops only cost 75 resources per unit). There are no walls straight away which means that either of these two players can destroy the enemy fairly easily, and many subtleties that the Elves, Dwarves and Men get aren't put into practice. It's amazing if you can simply survive the first 15 minutes against a rushing player, let alone have enough time to buy an armoury and upgrade it to rank 3 so you can get worthwhile upgrades.

Walls can be taken down by anything - that sucks to be honest.
These are, however, my only gripes with what I think is a fantastic addition to the game's predecessor.

You can bet that owners of both games will find playing both exciting as the new one is radically different from BFME 1. Each will remain among the most popular online RTSs, and each will provide different challenges.

The War of the Ring feature is an amazing extra and I love it! It's like computerised risk, with some good challenges, and it is intertwined with the game. You can also auto-resolve which helps you tremendously in some respects leaving you to get on with the main strategy. Many players will spend more time on this than on the main game.

Create a Hero, despite what some people say, has got a lot going for it in that whatever hero you create it will be balanced (i.e. no word of power at Rank 1!). You can tailor a general, with plenty of summoning powers and train allies, or a battle wizened veteran with mount, Blade master, superior additions to stats and invulnerability for extended durations, depending on your strategy. The interface is easy to use and you can make a ton of interesting heroes.
The game itself is a lot more varied than BFME 1 and it's no longer the case that when you're on top, with all upgrades and Rank 10 troops, there's nothing to do. On the contrary, you can even set up a massive row of castle fortresses and take over the entire battlefield with walls if you have the resources! You can do a lot more in customising defences with rows of battle towers, a building available to all factions. All the factions have every unit type.

The balance with powers is superb despite my original doubts, as the game doesn't get to that stage until both players have been playing long enough to get some serious customisation anyway.
One thing I really like is that the unit cap is now Rank 5. It means that no player can truly be on top and just sit back with battlefield control, as their units are not all powerful - it forces players into pressing advantages and attacking when the opponent is on the back foot, leaving a more open game as battlefield control is difficult to maintain in this way.
Overall a brilliant game yet lacking in one or two respects - how long before a mod comes out to fix them though? Not long I'd suggest.

my thoughts
this game is in many ways a step forward from the original; the "build anywhere" idea, the new races, expanded campaigns...however, there are a few issues which NEED to be adressed, the most obvious of which is that ANY unit can take down a wall, given enough time....we're going back to the days of AoE here! Secondly, you cant put troops on the walls anymore....why, EA? however, despite some flaws, the game remains fun, and the full game should prove a great experience ( mind you, it is up against Star Wars: Empire at War, so it'll be pretty hard to decide which is better). I'd also like to reccommend the collector's edition over the regular edition, since theres only a £2 difference between them, and the Collector's Edition has loads of bonus material. So overall, the game is good, but EA should tweak it a bit....

Worth the Pennies...
If you were considering purchasing the game, why buy the original when the colectors edition is only a fraction higher in price. Providing the gamer with unique skins, exclusive DVD capturing the design of the game and soundtrack. Exclusive maps to purchasers of this edition and many other things.

Regarding the gameplay, this game is brilliant. I have only experineced two factions that were featured in the demo version of the game and i am already hooked. Whether you refer micromanaging game units (few units controlled well) or macromanaging (spam units, overwhelm the enemy) then this game is for you.

Featuring all new factions such as the Elves, Dwarves and goblins this game is liekly to provide a refreshing experinece from the first installment. And if all these new units were not enough to satisfy you, then the game gas been completely estructured. A fan of command and conquer, well this game is practically a LOTR version of the game. No more build plots to restrict strategy. Restructured power trees featuring some army destroying abilities and not to mention the intorduction of new ring heroes if you manage to find gollum and captue the one ring (finding the little b*****d is difficult), Sauron (yes controlling the biggest bad guy in middle earth...swats an enitre group of soldiers in one hit!!) and Galadriel (army destroying tornado ability).

New graphical enhancements that are pleasing to the eye and new water battles (nothing special compared with land conflicts). This game is sure to waste away those hours.

Anyway enough about gameplay, your probably wondering about the specs of the game, well here they are folks...

Microsoft® Windows® XP
PC with 1.6 Ghz equivalent or higher processor
256 MB of system RAM
512 MB of system RAM for online play with 3 or more players
5.5 GB available hard disk space
16x speed or faster CD-ROM drive
64 MB GeForce3-class video card.
--- only officially support cards with ATI and Nvidia chipsets, and the Intel GMA 900 and GMA 950 products. We are not officially supporting the GeForce 4 MX series.
EA is also supporting all other cards in the GeForce 4 series including GeForce 4 TI, GeForce 4 Go, and GeForce 4200.
Sound card with speakers or headphones.
Microsoft Mouse or compatible pointing device.
56.6 Kbps or better modem for 1v1 online play.
Broadband connection for online play with 3 or more players.
DirectX 9.0c or above.

Hope the review was helpful. (Review based on incomplete version of the game, however minimum specs are official)