Hey remember last September when Athlon Games – owned by Leyou Technologies, which also owns Warframe studio Digital Extremes – announced that it was working on a new “free-to-play massively multiplayer online video game” set in the Lord of the Rings universe? It kinda set the MMO world on fire for a few weeks there, given that we have a Lord of the Rings Online MMO already. But at the time, Standing Stone said the new game wouldn’t interfere with LOTRO as it’d be set in prequel times.
Of course, we’ve heard that before.
As of today, things just got a lot more interesting, as Amazon Game Studios popped out a press release saying it is now involved in a “special collaboration” with Leyou on a “PC and console game based on the beloved The Lord of the Rings literary universe,” which is the same game, only now confirmed for multiple platforms, though it doesn’t sound as if it’s tying in directly with Amazon’s upcoming TV show, the cross-promotion certainly isn’t going to hurt.
It gets better – or worse, depending on your view of Amazon’s other MMORPG, New World, which perturbed players by closing down its previously always-on alpha earlier this summer.
“Development is being led by the same Amazon Game Studios team behind New World, and a new team being assembled for this project will utilize resources from across AGS locations in Seattle, Irvine and San Diego. Amazon Game Studios recently wrapped a successful alpha test of New World, and looks forward to sharing updates on that game in the future. The Amazon Game Studios team working on the game includes veteran developers who have worked on Everquest, Destiny, Planetside, World of Warcraft, Defiance, Rift, and other popular MMOs.”
Huh. There’s no release date just yet.
Further reading:
