The Lord of the Rings trilogy may not be coming out on Blu-ray any time soon, but gamers will soon have the chance to re-live the adventures of Middle-earth, Pandemic Studios announced today. The Lord of the Rings: Conquest has just gotten an official release date for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3: Jan. 9, 2009 internationally and Jan. 13, 2009 in the United States.
The Lord of the Rings: Conquest is an action game created by the same Pandemic Studios team behind the Star Wars Battlefront titles. Set in “The Lord of the Rings” universe as depicted in the film trilogy from new Line Cinema, the game will let players fight the entirety of the epic battles in any way they wish. This means that, in addition to playing as the forces of good, players will be able to hack and slash their way through Middle-earth while playing as the legions of Sauron’s evil army, including Cave-trolls, Oliphaunts, the Balrog and Sauron himself.
Playing as the evil side was previously only an option in the RTS title Battle for Middle-earth. EA’s previous The Lord of the Rings action games have featured only the good guys.