Games

With the decision taken to split the two Hobbit movies into three, a question mark was raised about how the films would be titled and when they would be released. Warner Brothers have now answered those questions. The three movies will be called: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - 14 December 2012 The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - 13 December 2013 The Hobbit: There and Back Again - 18 July 2014 Interesting news, though to be honest I don't think the second title works that well. Even assuming the film's title comes from its conclusion (basically the end to the book, The Hobbit ), that still doesn't seem to leave a lot of material for the third movie. Whilst Jackson has repeatedly defended the decision to split the slim novel (less than one-third length the size of The Lord of the Rings ) in three on the basis that there is material in the appendices of The Lord of the Rings to mine, this claim has not withstood close scrutiny. The overwhelming majority of the appe...

The long-awaited third version of Third Age: Total War has been released. This fan-made (but professional-quality) mod allows owners of Medieval II: Total War and its Kingdoms expansion to conquer Middle-earth with one of several factions. The new third version of the game features a host of changes, most notably the long-awaited introduction of custom battle maps and settlements, putting iconic locations such as Minas Tirith and Edoras on the battlefield to be fought over. These replace the generic Medieval II towns that had stood in for the settlements in previous versions of the game. More information on the game, including download links and installation information can be found on TWCenter .

Upon his death in 1973, J.R.R. Tolkien left behind a vast collection of writings about Middle-earth. His third son and literary executor, Christopher, assembled some of these into The Silmarillion , published in 1977, but the question about what to do with the other reams of material was unclear. Aware that fans of Middle-earth would be eager for more material, even unfinished or existing only in rough drafts, he assembled Unfinished Tales and published it in 1980. Its success inspired him to proceed with the far more ambitious, twelve-volume History of Middle-earth project. Unfinished Tales occupies an awkward place in the Tolkien canon. Unlike the History series, which consists of almost exclusively non-canon material (early drafts and rough notes of material that was eventually finalised and published), the material in Unfinished Tales was specifically written by Tolkien to flesh out other parts of his mythos that were not explored in the books themselves. In particular, the wr...