“Tales of the Shire: A Lord of the Rings Game” Review

All across the Shire hobbits and friends gather together for good company, good stories, and most importantly good food. Tales of the Shire: A Lord of the Rings™ Game immerses players in Bywater, a part of Hobbiton, during the years…

All across the Shire hobbits and friends gather together for good company, good stories, and most importantly good food. Tales of the Shire: A Lord of the Rings™ Game immerses players in Bywater, a part of Hobbiton, during the years between The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy. TotS begins in the way many farming/life-sim games do, but with the expected LOTR focus. Your character moves into a neglected home with land, fixes it up, grows things, cooks, learns to fish, meets the locals… standard fare. Your journey begins when a tall wizard bearing an uncanny resemblance to Gandalf finds you asleep beside the road from Bree. He offers you a ride and says cryptic Gandalf-isms on the way. When you arrive in Bywater, he bids you farewell for now, promising to show up again when you least expect him.

This nod to Frodo and Gandalf’s scene at the beginning of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings sets the mood for the whole game. So what makes it special? That’s easy: TotS‘s setting. And what a special setting this is! The writers didn’t skimp on the Tolkein lore; there are easily-recognizable references plus deeper ones that may send you to the bookshelf for a quick lookup of the history of King Argeleb II of Arthedain giving land rights to the hobbits for example, should you choose to dive that deep.

Many of Bywater’s townsfolk have connections to characters from the books. Nefi the dwarf is Ori of the House of Durin’s nibling. There are Tooks and Brandybucks. Your first friend, Orlo, is one of the Proudfoots (that’s Proudfeet!). Rosie Cotton regularly corresponds with Samwise Gamgee’s family and his Old Gaffer sends seeds to the young horticulturist. And well, there’s the wizard of course.

The entire map is deliciously LOTR! Roaming around visiting everyone’s home and exploring biomes and landmarks is a little breath of fresh air, a little high fantasy for the soul. Delphinium’s Tree is magical at night. The artists do the Shire much justice here and in a myriad of other locations. I will think back wistfully to taking the long route to Sandyman’s mill or looking up at a full moon over my hobbit-hole years from now. It’s a testament to the artistry at work when games make permanent location-based memories–Bywater, Jeuno in Final Fantasy XI, Zora’s Domain in Ocarina of Time, my island from Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

Once your character is resettled from The Prancing Pony in Bree to Old Ruby’s place in your new village, Bywater’s colorful cast of characters help you get started on your journey. The townfolk range from thoughtful, helpful friends to cantankerous old goats of hobbits constantly poking at each other and low-key feuding. Some characters are finding their place in life, some aren’t even hobbits, but almost all of them are hungry (Nefi the dwarf’s little buddy Ladle being one exception).

The townsfolk love being invited to meals, and planning then hosting shared meals is a central element of the game. Your cute little hobbit-hole has a writing desk from which you can pen invitations and read replies/messages. Keeping all of your new neighbors content is a delicate juggling act early on in the game before you unlock new, larger venues for hosting shared meals. Ignore one person too long and they will become upset and refuse to accept meal invitations. When the townfolk are receptive, they RSVP with a craving in the letter so you can try to cook a meal tailored for them. A trifecta of satisfied cravings plus serving a favorite dish plus cooking a higher rated dish grants maximum relationship points. The townsfolk reward you with gifts like furniture, decorations, and garden items.

The only arc of the main storyline unfolds while you are getting to know everyone. You cooperate with them to convince an assessor that Bywater qualifies as a village rather than a part of Hobbiton. This took me four seasons (one year) to complete, taking my time. The pace was spot on for me and, until I completed it, I thought it suggested plentiful content to keep me engaged further. The story was surprisingly humorous in a very hobbit-ish way. I was laughing at some of the antics and quips from the townsfolk. Apart from the main storyline there are tales (quests) to level up your character’s skills. You eventually found and participate in clubs–Cooking Club, Fishing Club, Foraging Club, and Gardening Clubs–with missions available on the boards at the Ivy Bush Inn.

Working on all these tales, keeping up with your friendships, collecting recipes and gifts from townsfolk, discovering every food ingredient throughout the seasons, and unlocking new locations and hobbit-hole rooms and shop items sounds like a lot to keep track of, but the creators give players a hand with much of that through refreshingly accessible and feature-rich menus. Want to know what recipe each of your guests want? It’s right there when you start cooking. Need to know where and when to find a fish? Easy, check the tab. Recipe ingredients? Season for planting garlic? Nora Burrows’ favorite foods? Which spices sweeten a dish? Check the tab. With the work put into a functional catalog, it’s a shame it won’t be used more… like for maybe a second arc to the main storyline.

Cooking strikes a satisfying balance between not-too-easy so as to become boring or a chore and not-too-hard to the point of irritation. Leveling unlocks new accessories like the mixing bowl, stew pot, and frying pan. These let you season some ingredients to skew the outcome between sweet, sour, bitter, and spicy. Even though you can skip the cutscene that shows the townsfolk’s reaction to your cooking, I rarely do. It’s nice to see when they really like a meal, especially when you are experimenting with new potential favorite dishes for each person.

Fishing doesn’t quite hit the easy/hard balance for me. Reeling in fish sometimes takes me entirely too much time to the point of frustration, even with the level 3 fishing rod from Mister Noakes. I still primarily make money off fishing (usually to buy new clothes from the shop). Ladle’s Jetty is conveniently located near the shops for quick sales, but long fish fights make me clear off before catching every fish that spawned for that part of the day. Sometimes a new shirt isn’t worth it. I also wish it didn’t take so long to walk to each fishing location. Maybe an enchanted ring that can warp the character to fishing holes will be an option later in the game? That’s a long shot of a wish.

Gardening is pretty straightforward. A little into the game you’ll learn about companion plants to boost the quality of the produce and flowers. Decorating the garden area and laying out the planting beds is fun, though I think I’d like it a little if the townsfolk commented on my yard (though maybe I will get to that eventually?). Home decorating is a little less fun, but I haven’t unlocked enough choices. At the time of review I’m 40 hours into gameplay on my second character and I would like more placemats, maybe a table runner if it exists, I’m woefully understocked on rugs, and I wish I could put flowers I grow in vases. I’m aware of the existence (but not the story) of internet rumblings surrounding production that suggest DLC could be a problem. Without DLC, I’ve pretty much finished the game. Apart from Steam achievements, there’s nothing else to do.

Now that we’ve covered gameplay, let’s talk technical aspects. I began playing TotS on my OG Switch which lags a good bit, so I moved over to the Switch 2. That transition was problematic for me. The Switch to Switch 2 issue may have already been remedied with a pre-release update. Additionally, the “large text” option from Steam isn’t yet available for Switch. The Switch text was too small for me when undocked, so after playing a few seasons on the Switches I moved to Steam and started anew. The game performs okay on my aging covid-era gaming rig. There are some slowdowns and every now and again during interactions like turning in quests or ending a shared meal. Sometimes it looks like the game froze but if I give it 10 seconds, it resolves. This was happening pre-release on both my main rig and the Steam Deck OLED. Again, this may have been remedied by launch. I’ll come back and update this a few days after launch, just in case another game update is pushed.

Honestly, I was surprised by the recommended system requirements. The spacious map of Bywater appears fully loaded without zone changes (and of course that map expands as you unlock areas) so this is probably why TotS needs more resources than other full 3D cozy games like Fae Farm or Wylde Flowers. Gameplay is better on the Steam Deck where everything feels smoother, and that’s why it’s my preferred way to play. Second is on the Switch 2, docked. The text size is not an issue on a TV. Should you need an expensive Steam Deck to experience less jagged gameplay… seems like a hard sell.

Now for the graphics. This is divisive online. Some people wouldn’t even entertain the thought of trying TotS based on art style. I admit, at first the very stomach-forward walking style of my character was off-putting. But I quickly got over that and mostly got over the look of the character models. Gameplay usually transcends graphics. The scenery is adorably Middle Earth in my eyes. I have no complaints at all with the art of Bywater’s village areas, the water, trees, hobbit homes, gardens, and cut scenes. The clipping and forced camera angles could be improved though.

The soundtrack didn’t grab me, I’m sad to say. It isn’t bad, it just is… there. I listened to Howard Shore’s soundtrack during some of my Steam sessions instead.

Do I recommendTotS? Yes. Does it nail the goal-oriented but still casual vibe I fall into when playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons or Stardew Valley? It’s not too dissimilar, so mostly, yes; but TotS‘s vibe is unique. It feels unfair throwing it up against those two powerhouses. Is this game “play-it then leave-it” like Fae Farm was for me? No. Will I be coming back to it as much as ACNH? Maybe not, but I don’t see me putting it down anytime soon. The game’s vibes are exactly what I want right now. It’s happy, it’s cozy, it lets me be a hobbit for a while.