Warhorse Studios has revealed what’s in the works at the studio: a new open-world Lord of the Rings RPG and a new Kingdom Come game.
Warhorse Studios let the cat out of the bag with a single post on their official X (formerly Twitter) account, announcing both projects. In one post, the developer confirmed the over half-year-long rumours that it was making a Lord of the Rings RPG and another Kingdom Come game. What’s intriguing is that the post described the game as an “open world Middle-earth RPG,” rather than Lord of the Rings, which means that while the title is set in Middle-earth, it could be during a different era than the Third Age (where The Lord of the Rings trilogy takes place).
It’s also very possible that instead of playing a seriously powerful character (like the wraith Talion in Shadow of Mordor, or Legolas in any other game), Warhorse Studios could embrace their Kingdom Come: Deliverance ethos, and have players embody a relative nobody in the grand scheme of things.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance has players claw through the narrative as Henry, the son of a blacksmith, and at the game’s beginning, he can’t read and has no combat ability. Warhorse’s claim to fame with Deliverance is its focus on the period the game is set in, and the scenarios it creates while interacting with townfolk and discovery.
A Middle-earth title focused on the period could work with the staggering amount of lore Middle-earth has; it could even take place during the rise of Sauron (like Prime Video’s Rings of Power) during the Second Age. There is a lot of space in Middle-earth’s history that Warhorse Studios can explore, and fans are excited.
Warhorse Studios also announced a new title in the Kingdom Come series, but stopped short of calling it Kingdom Come: Deliverance 3. While it’s fun to speculate, Warhorse Studios explicitly said in the announcement, “We’re excited to tell you more when the time is right,” so fans are still left with no details aside from the fact that new games are coming. It has been nearly a decade since Middle-earth: Shadow of War was released, and fans can finally rest knowing another open-world Middle-earth game is coming.
