Ever since I was a wee lad I have been a big fan of Tolkien. From the first time I read 'The Hobbit' when I was about 7 right up till now the world of Middle Earth has enthralled me. It was this introduction to fantasy worlds above and beyond fairy tails that got me interested in other fantasy worlds and fantasy games.

A couple of years ago a Turbine, a well known games company, release the Lord of the Ring MMO game and more recently the first expansion for the game 'The Mines of Moria'. In this game you can create a character of one of the many races of the free people in Middle Earth (Elf, Dwarf, Human, & Hobbit) and go and explore Middle Earth during the timeline of the Lord of the Rings storyline. Rather than taking the role of one of the main characters from the storyline of the book you create a character who takes a supporting role in assisting the fellowship from behind the scenes and helping in side plots that are never fully explored in the book. Not taking the role of a main character gives the game designers a much greater level of creative freedom in creating stories and quests for the game without conflicting with the storyline itself.

In future posts I will include some screen shots of some of the more famous locations in the game as mentioned in the book such as Bag-End, Weathertop, Rivendell etc.