Revisit, Retake, and Rebuild the Mysterious Mines of Moria

I recall hearing about The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria; it feels like ages ago. I had forgotten about it until yesterday, when I learned it had been released. The iconic fantasy world created by J.R.R. Tolkien now has its own survival crafting video game. Honestly, I can’t believe it took to nearly the end of 2023 for that last sentence to be true. Moria is a perfect setting for a crafting survival game, how has this not been done before now? In The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria you’ll, “answer the call of Lord Gimli Lockbearer, and lead your band of Dwarves on an all-new adventure to reclaim their forgotten kingdom in the darkest deeps of the fabled Mines of Moria.”

The Mines of Moria is a dangerous place, players must conserve resources, hunt and gather for food, and manage their sleep, temperature and noise levels. There also happens to be unspeakable evils and hordes of monstrous Orcs that you’ll have to combat in order to be successful. There is of course base building: “Reveal and clear new locations to create architecture on a grand scale. Get creative and construct bases from scratch or build upon the existing environment. Beware the evils which seek to destroy Dwarven progress.”

The two features I’m excited to experience include the co-op. Nothing like grabbing a couple of friends and trying to rebuild the greatness that was Moria. Was it ever great? I don’t recall, I read the books in Jr. High when the movies were coming out. You can play alone or together with friends in online cooperative multiplayer with up to eight players on PC and up to four players on Console. And the best part is John Rhys-Davies coming back to voice Gimli Lockbearer.

The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria is available now digitally for Windows PC via the Epic Games Store. The game will see both a digital and physical release for the PlayStation 5 on Dec. 5, and is scheduled to come to the Xbox Series X|S console systems in early 2024.