Amazon & Embracer Partnering Up For Lord of the Rings MMO

By Travis Pasch | May 15th, 2023 | Categories: Amazon, Asmodee, Lord of The Rings, Pop Gamer Culture, Tabletop Gaming News & Rumors, video game

Amazon and the Embracer Group (Asmodee’s parent company) are partnering up to make a new Lord of the Rings MMO.

Embracer recently acquired Asmodee Group and Dark Horse Comics, and after that, they partnered with New Line Cinema and Warner Bros Pictures to bring more LotR to the big screens. However, it doesn’t look like they are stopping there regarding LotR, as they have partnered with Amazon to make an MMO.

This is also the second attempt at this game, as Amazon tried to make an MMO about two years ago now, but that project was abandoned when Tencent bought out Leyou Technologies.

Amazon & Embracer Partnering Up For Lord of the Rings MMO

Amazon made the official announcement, and from the sounds of it, they seem very committed.

The upcoming game will be an open-world MMO adventure in a persistent world set in Middle-earth, featuring the beloved stories of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings literary trilogy. The game is in early stages of production, with the Amazon Games Orange County studio—makers of the popular open-world MMO game New World—leading development. Amazon Games will publish the game globally for PC and consoles. Additional details, including launch timing, will be shared at a later date.

Amazon isn’t completely new to the MMO game, as they produced New World, and it has done quite well. The new game doesn’t have an expected release date quite yet, which makes sense considering this is all so early in development. This sort of came about in an odd twist of fate, as Amazon tried to approach Middle-Earth Enterprises a while back about making the game again but was ultimately denied.

Then, after Embracer acquired Middle-Earth Enterprises, Amazon came back with the idea, and the two partnered up.

Amazon Games vice president Christoph Hartmann said the game would include characters from the LOTR trilogy and the Hobbit. The game is still in its early stages, but they have some grand ideas.

My ambition is to make it the largest MMO out there, and what I really want to achieve with it is to take MMOs beyond the traditional customer, and that’s why I really like that licence.

Being in the games industry, we all like Lord of the Rings in some form. I read the book when I was a kid, I watched the movies, and we have some people in the studio who even speak Elvish – I have no clue what they’re talking about. We need that for the game. They will make sure it’s really true to the IP.

We’ll have to see how the game goes, but this is very interesting, and Embracer seems to be taking things as far as possible with their new LotR licenses.

On the miniatures side of things, this also once again begs the question, will they make a game with Asmodee and cut out GW’s license when it comes up for renewal?

What do you think about Amazon & Embracer partnering up for a big Lord of the Rings MMO?

Let us know in the comments of our Facebook Hobby Group, and make sure you enter the latest monthly giveaway for FREE today!

Get ad-free access to our hobby videos, a monthly crate of miniatures, and support some of the best creators out there for as little as $6 a month on Patreon!