A solid LOTR RPG with some great graphics, a strong battle system, and a number of holes.
The ablilty level up system is good, and fun. You get abilities in categories such as- sword craft, spirit powers, bow craft, ranger craft, axe craft, etc. (depending on each character) Every time you use one of these poweres you get +1 spirit point, that goes to the next power that you want to use. the powers are different, and often look different and quite cool. However this process is way too time consuming, and the limit of 1 spirit point per spell/ability is quite a set back, but its still a good system.
Dispite this buttery goodness, the game has a lot of holes. Dont get me wrong, i love this game (after playing it the first time, i would have given it a 9.4!) and it reallly is a good game, But its got some things missing.
Holes-
NO SHOPS!!! every RPG has shops. Shops are cool. There could be more weapons in the shops, you could have a money system, man it would be fun!
Lack of substantial side questions- Most of the side quests in this game are- find the little box with the cool 2nd age weapons kinda thing. I mean how boring is that!? We go downstairs, find a chest, and boom! we completed a side quest! wow. that was... not hard.... Final Fantasy has it down, you need quests where you talk to people, and have to bust your ass off finding it for them, and then they give you cool stuff in return, or it leads you to this or that. EA should have looked at some of the big rpgs like Final Fantasy and KOTOR, and they shouldve been able to figure out what a side quest is.
Lack of Interaction that means something- Sure you can talk to ppl, but nothing happens when you do! they never give you anything, lead you up a secret path, or give you some important piece of info.
Lack of story- Well the story is LOTR, but they never once mention the ring, and the cutscenes are few, and brief, and there just isnt enough interaction between the characters, and enough life. I just wanted to care about the charaters more. I also would have liked a little more story, with better twists that i could've seen coming if id looked really deep into the story. I love it when you find something out in a game, and then you look back and you go, no kidding! of course, why couldnt i figure that out? I just feel i needs a bit more story.
Lack of game changing material- There isn't much in this game that you can change. You cant change the storyline, you can't add to the story line, you just go along with it. This really brings down the value. It loses most of it replayablilty, because you can't do things diferently. You don't go- oooo i want to play the game again, so that i can make the story do this! You play it once and probably put it in the ' i already played that' box. (unless you're me, then you pop it back in ur PS2 every few days after you finish it.)
Things that could've made this an even better game-
Create a character- Since these are fake LOTR characters anyway, why couldnt they have a a create-a-character system, like in KOTOR? That would put some cool variaty into the game! Just that might have hitched the value up to 8.
More paths that lead you to something important- At the begining of a game, theres an elven sanctuary, thats basically a cool wall. in here there is a set of broken stair leading to the top of the wall. wouldnt it be cool to climb those stairs, and maybe find out somestuff about the elves, or maybe get some cool info on this or that, or hang out with your buddies there. that would make for more exploring, and more places for story/character building.
Choices- Like in KOTOR you have conversation choices, light or dark side choices, huge enviornments to explore, lots of people to talk to, and even choices with you weapons. in the third age, you basically no that if you get a new weapon it is probably better than the one you have equipped, so you better hurry up and get the new one on. In KOTOR, that's not guarented, and so it makes you dicide whcih one is better for your character at the moment. If there was more of this in TTA it would be a ridiculously fun game.
A BETTER TRAVEL SYSTEM!!!- I dont think you can even access the 'travel menu' button, and you can't travel from place to place. For instance, you are at Pelennor Fields, and you travel to Helm's Deep, you can only travel back to Pelennor Fields, not to other places. And if you walk out the gate of the hornburg, booom! your back in pelennor. It would be better if you could go about exploring a bit more. So if you go to helm's deep from pelennor, you should be able to walk out of the gate to ROHAN with helm's deep behind you. And so on and so forth. That way you could walk all around middle earth. How cool would that be?
All and all, Lord of the Rings: The Third Age is a solid, enjoyable game, that just has some room for improvement. I would say its a must get for any LOTR fans, but probably not what hardcore RPG fans are looking for.