Tales of the Shire: Everything we know about the upcoming Lord of the Rings game

Jun. 3, 2024

Tales of the Shire finally has a release date, so here’s everything you need to know ahead of the new Hobbit game!

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Tales of the Shire is the coziest take on the Lord of the Rings universe yet, putting players in the shoes of a Hobbit in the midst of Hobbiton and tasking them with uniting the community surrounding Bywater. You’ll be able to fish in ponds, produce food and crops, forage for fruit, and trade with townsfolk to better your comfy life.

Revealed earlier this year from developer Weta Workshop Game Studio - a subsidiary of Weta Workshop best known for working on the Lord of the Rings movies - the storybook life sim set in Middle-earth gives off someStardew Valleyvibes and promises to be a great entry point for newcomers alongside longtime fans of Tolkien’s universe.

Read on below for a full recap of everything we know so far about Tales of the Shire.

Tales of the Shire release date

So you’ll be able to play the cozy Lord of the Rings game on PC, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch.

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Right now, we only have three Tales of the Shire trailers to go off, and you can see two of them in full for yourself here. The first trailer above is the one used to announce the game, and so it’s more conceptual in general - you don’t get a look at gameplay, for example.

However, down below, you’ll get to see a more in-depth teaser that shows several mechanics like fishing, cooking, and more. We even get a look at some iconic Lord of the Rings characters like Gandalf!

A better look at Tales of the Shire’s gameplay comes in the more recent trailer above, released by Nintendo just earlier this year. This time, we’re getting a good look at Hobbits roaming around Hobbiton, hanging out together near the edge of lush lakes, foraging for food, and baking goods.

The above trailer is a really good look at how Tales of the Shire is going to play, and the general speed and rhythm of the game. In short, as you might not be surprised to hear, it’s likely going to be a slow-moving adventure, just like we’ve come to expect from farming sims like Stardew Valley and such.

As we mentioned in ourTales of the Shire preview, the upcoming game stands out thanks to its cooking mechanics. Instead of just making sure you have all the needed ingredients in your inventory when it comes to crafting a dish, you can chop, fry, and season your food - which will result in different textures. Getting the right combinations and serving the best plates at your Hobbit dinner parties is the main focus of the game, currently.

While our first taste of Tales of the Shire wasn’t perfect (with its heavy focus on fetch-quests and sometimes non-cozy weather animations), it is still promising. Honestly, with a little more fine-tuning, we may just have a new entry to thebest Lord of the Rings gameson our hands here.

Unfortunately, if you were hoping to roam around Hobbiton with your friends, it looks like you’re firmly out of luck.Steam’s store page for Tales of the Shire has a ‘Singleplayer' tag listed by publisher Private Division, so put those multiplayer dreams to bed.

It’s also worth pointing out that we probably shouldn’t hold out hope for a multiplayer mode further down the line. Adding a multiplayer mode for any game isn’t as simple as flicking a switch - there’s servers to purchase and maintain and features to adjust and fine tune, for example. Let’s not get our hopes up for now.

For recommendations, you can play right now; here’s our pick of thebest simulator games.Or, if you want more Middle-earth fun, check out our in-depth guide onThe Rings of Power season 2.

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