I work at a video game store and the more I heard about this game the more empathy i felt for the 4 people that preordered it at full price at our store
I work at this Walmart like place and we have this ugly hideous game! Someone with a functioning brain has bought this game! (Whoever bought it I feel so sorry!)
@@philiproler5572 Only game I ever pre-ordered was Red Dead Redemption 2 since I played Red Dead 1 for hundreds of hours with friends as a kid and it was therefore such an integral part of my childhood. Luckily I don't even regret it because that game was great.
27:48 I can't stop holding in laughter at the mental image of this lady and her orc procession walking along this wooden walkway when Crazy Frog Gollum launches himself down from above, slips on dry wood and falls, screaming, into the lava pits below, as everyone just watches on with looks of "What just happened?" on their faces...
At this point, Tolkien is probably rolling so fast in his grave he's basically become a self-sustaining, infinite generator producing enough energy to single-handedly end any form of energy crisis and totally cancel the need for oil to power our technology.
It is now 2053 and all is well. All of humanity's energy issues have been resolved and with them, the issues of pollution and global warming have been severely reduced and everyone can enjoy clean, plentiful energy. We call this time the Golden Renaissance and we have the video game "Gollum" to thank for this, as researchers have finally found the reason why the fountain of neverending energy took shape. It has been 10 years now since the night sky of Oxford was pierced by a beam of pure white light emanating from what seemed to be the district of Cutteslowe. Panic quickly set in for the residents of the Empire since this was thought to be another strike from the Grand Canadian Royal army, as the Pan-Global Kerfuffle of 2030 was still ongoing at the time and the armies of the broken continent of Canada, formerly known as North America, were still launching operations to disrupt the forces of then newly resurrected third Empire of Albion. It would be several hours, on the morning of November 13th, Charlesday (Friday in the old world calendar system) that it was found that the light was emanating from a small parcel in the Catholic section of Wolvercote Cemetery. It would be another week while containment and investigation took place to determine the origin point to be the plot of land dedicated to the burial place of one John Ronald Reuel Tolkien and Edith Mary Tolkien. What is now referred to as the Tolkien Spin Turbine phenomenon was found to be triggered several decades in the past but the effects could only be felt in 2043 on that scorching November night. Scientists found that the frequent abuse of the late Tolkien's works in pop culture were the starting point that triggered the physical revolution of Tolkien's remains which, in turn, would lead to the cultural and technological revolution we are living through today. As more research is done on the matter, some point toward the Lord of the Rings made by Ralph Bakshi as being the original spark whereas others point toward Peter David and his Hobbit "trilogy" of movies when discussing when the rotational movements began. Whatever started the Tolkien Rotation and gave birth to the pillar of light that would emerge and, quite fittingly encircle the planet in a ring of light that could be harnessed by humanity, it is now beyond a shadow of a doubt that the movement reached irreversible charge levels with the release of the "Gollum" video game in 2023, once touted as a repulsive waste of money, time and a beloved IP, now revealed to be the quite literal savior of mankind. As we move forward into the new decade with the "Planet Earth Spaceship" program powered by the Tolkien Turbine and construction on the pseudo Dyson sphere that has Earth at its center is reaching its halfway point, we give thanks to the creators of "Gollum" and the frankly courageous yet rather daft early adopters that actually played the game and allowed its existence to be more than just a theory, and instead made it a game theory. May Gollum be with you and bless you all.
I like his videos even when the game is bad but this was a bridge to far for me. I had to tap out for the first time. Kevin did his best but not even he could make watching this game entertaining.
When the game used the color blue at one point, I knew this game was a masterpiece. Using two colors in a game is something I thought I would never see.
The fact that the reward for beating the final chapter was only achieved by 0.75% of players tells you everything you need to know about the games quality players tells you everything you need to know
Nah. It’s just a perfect shit storm of a small indie team that’s mostly just worked on low end indie point and click games, who had no clue how to make a game of this scale and just bafflingly threw themselves into the fire trying to create and publish a “AAA” game all by themselves. I don’t know how the hell they even got the license for this.
There's one more terrible aspect to this game nobody talks about due to all other terrible things: it's premise doesn't make sense. I always thought Gollum is some tiny, funny little man dwelling in caves, eating raw fish and mumbling to himself, but no, apparently he's some orc murdering machine, epic assassin-level parkourer and political player of the Middle Earth. Makes sense
In the story he’s kinda there to show what the ring can do to people, and he does have a body count of at least one from what I remember. When Sméagol first got the ring he killed his brother. The writers of this gave just kinda gave up I think
@@moosenman This. There's a distinction that the developers and director of Gollum missed completely, and it's that Smeagol is a well-meaning, almost innocent Hobbit who has been tortured and broke down, essentially having his mind transformed into a prison by this all powerful artifact of a nearly forgotten age that belongs to the disembodied force of a dark lord who could easily shroud the entire world in malice and manifested hatred if the fellowship didn't continuously and miraculously luck out. Gollum, however, is an extremely violent and volatile conniver who is both equally disturbing and unsettling to deal with~ be it face to face or through a TV screen. For all of the things that The Hobbit got wrong, it got the dread of knowing that Gollum knows you're trying to trick him right on the fucking money.
Hes none of what you stated. He lives in mountains so yeah, he should climb. He's used as cannon fodder to cover their tracks not a politician. You're exaggerating basic skills. Thats like saying a monkey is a parkour expert
Year is still young. Do remember we thought that about Forspoken and then came Redfall and now Gollum. I know 2023 won't disappoint and at least 2 more games will join the list. Yatzhee will have such an easy year with his bottom 5 games of the year.
It really sucks how cool the idea is that you have to convince one of two sides of yourself to make an immoral/moral choice, and it's completely squandered on this....
While you don't really fight yourself (sort of), Dark Earth from 1997 did something similar to this where the main character can switch from a light to a dark attitude and, in turn, have different conversations depending on which mode you picked.
I can say without a doubt that this is the most suspenseful action game every, with every jump, every swingy bar i held my breath and my heart skipped a beat. Because this game has actual real world consequences, unlike other games where all you lose is a couple seconds or minutes this game can fully block you from even completing it. Absolutely amazing work and i love the colour red, an easy 10/10 for Gollum 2023
Hold on? That memed to hell picture of Gollum looking like a wet, beaten dog was from an ACTUAL game?! If the developers actually thought any of this was a good idea, then l pity them.
Imagine being a teenager in high school, and your parents decided to get you one game as a gift for passing your classes. This is the game they get you. You can't afford anything else. You have a whole summer to enjoy this 70$ game.
My parents NEVER would get me a game unless I specifically ask for one on a wish list as a present. Because of crap like this. They been burned by bad movies, so they know games can be the same way.
ahh that happened to me already. My godfather (i think thats the english term) bought me Transformers for PS3. i wasnt even a big transformers fan, nor was the game any good. But still, i appreciated his intentions though and was thankful.
As a German, I feel a strong need to apologize to the world for Germany's actions (the developer of Gollum is a German game company) for the first time since World War II.
@@veszekium5693 Someone has to take care of him after making this video !! This game could have lost him so many braincells now due to the sheer lack of the publisher doing their job, That Kev is now endangered to be forced into a Sanatorium. 🧐🧐
I was kind of half expecting the fanbase to do a thing where they all kind of just pretend it's this utterly goaded game like with people continuing the joke that John Cena is invincible even though it's been like a decade.
This looks like one of those one-man Unity horror games that Markiplier plays, except those are usually made by one person with no budget in the span of a few weeks and are kind of charming as a result
There's a key difference there. I'm so bad at Callisto Protocol that I consistently die and get to see the animations. I'm so good at Gollum that I consistently die and get to see my home screen.
A game of a* time you mean? Other than that, perfect review of a game. It's a game, it has textures, code is there, bugs are too, voice actors voiced and Gollum does Gollum all over a game
I love the Gollum impression the most at 14:40. This whole video made my side hurt, I love your sense of humour (and watching you suffer playing a video game is great too)
This is the kind of game you'd get for your 12th birthday in 2007 and then become obsessed with even though you can never get past the starting area because its poor design makes it way too challenging for you. Your parents paid 30 bucks for it.
Oh man, that reminds me of a ps2 game that was unbelievably dark with odd forced camera angles, to the point where you basically coulddnt see most of the game
I kept replaying max payne 2 for a year when I was 11-12 because I couldn't figure out how to enter the elevator. All I had to do was press e on the panel💀
I just remembered something..... Zelda Tears of the Kingdom was 70 dollars. A game running at 30 fps on Nintendo Switch hardware with a file size of about 16 GB......and yet was able to achieve wonders beyond compare, having such freedom of choice in its game world, such flexibility in its custom vehicle system that it just downright terrifying, even letting you have an active party of about five AI partners without missing a beat. Truly a technical achievement n game design that will be talked about for decades to come..... And then you got.........this game........this.....45 GB.........thing........meant to be played on PS5 and Series X/S hardware.......and it's just......this.......I have no words.....oh God and they want to inflict this horror on Switch owners! God no!
Kev slowly losing his mind and raging is by far the funniest i have ever gotten to enjoy. It is slow methodical and downright as we all do. Much love Kev
@@ReigoVassal I mean, yes, that is true. AAA games certainly have been slipping of late. I just simply expect if you are going to use to LotR brand, one of the most beloved fantasy epics of all time that only rarely gets games made of it, you'd invest *something* into it to make sure it lives up to its legacy. I'm more disappointed in that then the raw quality of the game in isolation.
An hour long video and it really didn't come close to the pain that stream was. Watching chapter 4 over and over again, the puzzles, trying to kill the blind girl and her acting like it never happened for the rest of the game. It was wild
If I were a Dev of this game and was asked how my work on this project was, I would say I was being lazy and gave no fuck. Imagine saying you gave your best in making this.
@@creppersaurusrex2300 meh at least Dark Souls 2 is playable compared to this almagamation of terror. honestly why did this company make it and not like oh idk Monolith? Monolith already proved they can make great games based on the story and history of Middle Earth. just look at the glorious Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War games. Story was not very focused but everything else was freaking great anyways and Story was not their main focus on it ever anyways.
I am genuinely horrified with your end choice, I actually gasped lol. You already had the "all gollum choices" achievement, the poor bird could have at least lived lol
@PhoenixLord777 exactly, and that's why they deserve radioactive spills snd not firing squad, make them suffer as much as the players who "played" this """"game""""
@@Massakre8492nd I mean this is gollum we're talking about. He absolutely would do that lmao. It's even kind of hinted that he's eating human babies in the books. That being said. This is an awful rendition of gollum lol and that bird should have lived :( my poor heart.
Some quotes I found developers and a hype team article: “As we reported in November 2020, Jonas Husges of Daedalic Entertainment told Official PlayStation Magazine that Gollum will make use of the next-gen PS5 tech. Gollum’s actions become more tangible and his physical struggle when he runs out of stamina translates directly to the way the game is played," said Husges. This points to The Lord of the Rings: Gollum using the PS5 DualSense's haptic feedback ability, which will likely apply more resistance to the triggers when Gollum is tired or otherwise strained.” “In the same interview mentioned above, Husges praised the PS5's SSD component, and said it will help the Lord of the Rings: Gollum vastly decrease loading times and create a large explorable world. It also means Gollum's world will be incredibly well-lit. "Clean, ray-traced shadows allow for maximum effect in player guidance in building stealth passages while dynamic and moving light sources bring in the extra challenge when Gollum is roaming through the darkness," said Daedalic art director Mathias Fischer. "All these things, of course, have the nice side-effect of making the game feel vast, and such free roaming environments we are creating look as spectacular as Middle-earth deserves." But I digress.
I refuse to believe that this game was made recently and wasn't just found on some forgotten hard drive from the early 2000s. Its the only way I can justify the graphics in my head.
@@SuperVincent0000but they actually exist in canon lore? Not by whatever name Galadriel calls him, but the orcs canonically exist, in Tolkien’s writings, because Melkor/Morgoth tortured and twisted elves into dark creatures and then selectively bred them into what are now orcs
The developers of this game should be very proud of themselves for managing to make something that looks worse than a Mount and Blade mod while actually having a budget.
I saw the system requirements and was like "wow this must be the most realistic game to date with those numbers" and then I watched gameplay vids and was like "dude why does this look like goat simulator"
The fact that 6% completed the 5th chapter is a testament to how much the designers turned players off. Truly astounding, as if the team didn't do any focus testing at all - one walk through the QA room would have given devs enough understanding to push this back for another 2 years on top of their previous delays. I've worked on some turds (Where the Wild Things Are is the worst I can think of, but even Brash didn't have the nerve to charge AAA prices for it), but at least I can be proud that companies I worked for wouldn't release a game with any of the numerous glaring issues experienced in Gollum, especially the horrid number of crashes on display here. I feel like the testers' impressions reaching the right people might've prevented such mediocrity from reaching market in its released state... But sometimes deadlines matter to shareholders more than quality, integrity and reputation, and those same decision-makers also have the mindset that kids will consume (watch, listen to , play) any old slop that's served out to them with a shiny marketing campaign.
There was a game I loved called "Styx: Shards of Darkness" that had similar dark, stealthy gameplay to Gollum. I was beyond excited when this was announced. The gameplay of Styx in the LOTR universe? I was *hyped* but...then I saw this monstrosity. Thank God we have the internet to see how games look before buying them or I would have made a huge mistake.
I want you to think of every character in the wide world of The Lord of The Rings, one of the most beloved fantasy settings ever conceived, a place that continues to inspire to this very day. I want you to think of all the possibilities for a captivating game that exist within that cast. You could have a Legend of Zelda-style adventure with Legolas, a Mines of Moria resource management/survival game, you could even delve into the untapped potential of the Blue Wizards. Fuck, I'd even take a Tom Bombadil Farmville Rip Off But no, apparently someone on the development team decided to ignore all of that and make a game focused around the slimy, leech-infested, generally unpleasant cave mutant. And even with that horrible idea to start with, they somehow managed to make it even worse by making it the most mediocre, boring, by the numbers, mid-2000s movie tie-in ass stealth platformer you've ever seen in your life. What in the fuck are we doing here?
That was an amazing adventure, we all could feel and hear you losing your mind. In the chapter 10 you sounded like defeated crazy man. We appreciate your journey with Gollum, you proven it to be very immersive game, that will probably leave scars for years
by watching this gameplay i had, before my eyes PS2 LoTR game, I don't remember title but it was turn based game with Aragorn as MC, and guess what, gollum looks like it was developed in same studio at the same time
I seriously didn't even realize this game was released recently when I first heard of it, because it looks like an early PS2 game at most. I was like "why is everyone complaining about such an old game all of a sudden" then it hit me that it came out in 2023. The mechanic of having to "convince" one side of Gollum's personality to go with the other was cool though. I'd love to see it on a better game.
Yea I think a gollum game could actually be a really interesting game but they executed it so poorly and didn't include any things that could actually make the gollum and smeagol fighting actually decent
When people say this game looks like a ps2 game, it makes me wonder if they've never seen an actual ps2 game in their life. Very likely, with all the zoomers around now.
@@PKFireFawx I'm a "zoomer" and I grew up with a ps2 lmfao. It's not some ancient boomer console that the young folks have never heard of. Most zoomers are adults by now, stop confusing us with gen alpha. I actually thought PS3 at first, but then I remembered the Harvest Moon game my sister played on the PS2 and that game was far prettier than this one. Heck, as the guy above you put it, Uncharted came out 16 years ago on the PS3 and looks better than this.
this is like an ARG where the entire gaming community is trying to figure out the intended solutions to this game because the game is so broken and terribly designed at the same time that its really hard to tell what is and isnt intended
@@nullprop if renting or demos or trials were more common i'd agree with ya but game journalists have proven they arent worth anything when it comes to games since they are bought off since the gamespot kane and lynch debacle(dude got fired for being honest that the game is terrible since EA bought so much ad space on the website this happened yrs before gamergate was even a thing) so buying is literally the only way to know a game is well this terrible. also physical copies are becoming less common and alot of stores like ps store and gog dont do refunds even if ya only played for less than an hr like steam does. gog only let me refund one game after i gave evidence i could not phyiscal play it on my pc by sending them my pc specs and a video of me trying to run it and a list of all the things i tried to fix it and then it wasnt even an actual refund but store credit.
When I found out the game was going to be made I told a friend about it and he told me: “Why would I even buy a game to go through something I already experience daily in my own home?”
Tbf this game is exactly what I was thinking withdrawing from magical hard drugs would be like. Nothing makes sense, everything looks wrong, and people hate you for (seemingly) no reason.
I've played so many games myself and I watched other people play even more... but this... Yes, you are indeed correct. I can't describe my feelings neither with English nor my native language. Part of me want to believe this is not real
Thinking back to the countless hours of fun I had playing Shadow of Mordor while watching this video, and the fact that I was still finishing middle school at the time, is just mind-blowing
Haha yeah its funny you mention shadow of mordor. This game is like shadow of mordor if you removed all the fun combat and orc domination and replaced it with all the annoying bad stealth missions from those games.
I'm glad you started off by sharing the fact *an emote pack* was what qualified as "DLC" according to the developers. That sets the expectations exactly where they need to be. I'll give them credit for one thing: Usually when there's an interesting skeleton for a game but it's just released in a woefully unfinished state, there's a Christmas deadline to blame because they wanted to ship the game out so it'd be a Christmas present for instant sales. So at least they're innovating by releasing a woefully unfinished game OUT of Christmas season. Also, when you said you'd only cried twice, was it from game frustration or retina poisoning? ........The answer is "yes", isn't it?
The fact that you beat this...wow. I've seen posts from streamers and youtubers saying they gave up due to the amount of bugs causing progress locks making them restart missions. I can't imagine putting myself through this hell.
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if you listen really closely, between all of Gollum's screams of death, you can hear Kev's friends sigh in relief that this is single-player only.
they are lucky
Lol
@@Kevduit the Emotes say otherwise
It was likely PLANNED to have multiplayer but was scrapped during development for later DLC
@@AmaryInkawultI mean...with how jank it is...
The game actually did a great job to make you feel as pitiful and miserable as Gollum
Ironic ain’t it
@@AleXavieR-l2t I would say its kinda poetic imo.
@@douppi2877ironic poetry in this case, if you will.
that's the opposite of ironic since there's no reversal here
Immersive/10
I work at a video game store and the more I heard about this game the more empathy i felt for the 4 people that preordered it at full price at our store
They deserved it. Never preorder
Can confirm. Preordered fallout 76. Thanks, Todd
@@johnme16IT JUST WORKS
I work at this Walmart like place and we have this ugly hideous game!
Someone with a functioning brain has bought this game!
(Whoever bought it I feel so sorry!)
@@philiproler5572 Only game I ever pre-ordered was Red Dead Redemption 2 since I played Red Dead 1 for hundreds of hours with friends as a kid and it was therefore such an integral part of my childhood. Luckily I don't even regret it because that game was great.
The best part was seeing how the basic achievements got more rare the more he played through it showing how almost nobody finished this shit.
And this is release week!!!! 💀😂 So it should be higher percentages due to less players.
I finished the game. But I do not recommend it. At least not until it will cost 2.99$
Most games are never finished
@Lewis Pooper That’s not true. People just tend to focus more on the negative than the positive.
@@digitalplayland It isn't even worth free
The worst part about this game is that they found the one guy that can't do a gollum voice and decided he was the one.
Nope it's the fact it EVEN HAVE price tag
Wdym I love how they got Murdock Nickels from gorilaz to voice gollum 😂
I dunno if it's the worst part, but it sure adds to the pile...
It's like finding a guy who doesn't have a Borat or a Bane impression. Near impossible.
Are your expectations subverted yet?
27:48 I can't stop holding in laughter at the mental image of this lady and her orc procession walking along this wooden walkway when Crazy Frog Gollum launches himself down from above, slips on dry wood and falls, screaming, into the lava pits below, as everyone just watches on with looks of "What just happened?" on their faces...
When you realise the devs had the audacity to put a "deathless run" achievement...
Frodo: Hold my ring.
Literally no one will ever get that achievement.
@@Shaun_Jonesapparently people have
@@Pugkin5405 Yea modders or hackers lol
@@Berserk_96 So people have
At this point, Tolkien is probably rolling so fast in his grave he's basically become a self-sustaining, infinite generator producing enough energy to single-handedly end any form of energy crisis and totally cancel the need for oil to power our technology.
Both JRR and Christopher
It is now 2053 and all is well. All of humanity's energy issues have been resolved and with them, the issues of pollution and global warming have been severely reduced and everyone can enjoy clean, plentiful energy. We call this time the Golden Renaissance and we have the video game "Gollum" to thank for this, as researchers have finally found the reason why the fountain of neverending energy took shape.
It has been 10 years now since the night sky of Oxford was pierced by a beam of pure white light emanating from what seemed to be the district of Cutteslowe. Panic quickly set in for the residents of the Empire since this was thought to be another strike from the Grand Canadian Royal army, as the Pan-Global Kerfuffle of 2030 was still ongoing at the time and the armies of the broken continent of Canada, formerly known as North America, were still launching operations to disrupt the forces of then newly resurrected third Empire of Albion.
It would be several hours, on the morning of November 13th, Charlesday (Friday in the old world calendar system) that it was found that the light was emanating from a small parcel in the Catholic section of Wolvercote Cemetery. It would be another week while containment and investigation took place to determine the origin point to be the plot of land dedicated to the burial place of one John Ronald Reuel Tolkien and Edith Mary Tolkien.
What is now referred to as the Tolkien Spin Turbine phenomenon was found to be triggered several decades in the past but the effects could only be felt in 2043 on that scorching November night. Scientists found that the frequent abuse of the late Tolkien's works in pop culture were the starting point that triggered the physical revolution of Tolkien's remains which, in turn, would lead to the cultural and technological revolution we are living through today.
As more research is done on the matter, some point toward the Lord of the Rings made by Ralph Bakshi as being the original spark whereas others point toward Peter David and his Hobbit "trilogy" of movies when discussing when the rotational movements began. Whatever started the Tolkien Rotation and gave birth to the pillar of light that would emerge and, quite fittingly encircle the planet in a ring of light that could be harnessed by humanity, it is now beyond a shadow of a doubt that the movement reached irreversible charge levels with the release of the "Gollum" video game in 2023, once touted as a repulsive waste of money, time and a beloved IP, now revealed to be the quite literal savior of mankind.
As we move forward into the new decade with the "Planet Earth Spaceship" program powered by the Tolkien Turbine and construction on the pseudo Dyson sphere that has Earth at its center is reaching its halfway point, we give thanks to the creators of "Gollum" and the frankly courageous yet rather daft early adopters that actually played the game and allowed its existence to be more than just a theory, and instead made it a game theory. May Gollum be with you and bless you all.
@@vetreas366 This comment is better than the entire game
DO A BARREL ROLL
@@vetreas366 I'm crying at this short story it's just too good
Wow they really went all out making the scene of you breaking the birds neck look and sound better then everything else in the game!
99% of the budget into the bird neck snap scene
Not so fast.
@@KevduitI'm not sure how this game isn't Game of the year. It should've been in the Goty list
@@beastmotoz I think it's definitely broken records
@@graceholbert2126 it should've been 😂
A true psychopath seeks out pain and dispair...and then forces them on others. Well done sir
Kevin's friends are probably very thankful the devs didn't implement co-op.
I like his videos even when the game is bad but this was a bridge to far for me. I had to tap out for the first time. Kevin did his best but not even he could make watching this game entertaining.
@@terry2295 when I first saw gameplay of this game I instantly thought about a comment like this and I’m so happy someone actually said it 😂
@@tellyg47 It would've made for a fun video though.
If this is how the world looks through the eyes of Gollum I can see why his mind is so fucked up
*red.*
When the game used the color blue at one point, I knew this game was a masterpiece. Using two colors in a game is something I thought I would never see.
The fact that the reward for beating the final chapter was only achieved by 0.75% of players tells you everything you need to know about the games quality players tells you everything you need to know
I paid Full Price for this and by god, i will squeeze every Cent out of this. Those 0,75% or something.
A larger percentage of people believe in Bigfoot…
@@ShinForgotPassxXx you paid full price for this shit?Holy shit,i feel bad for you
Or perhaps the people that bought it don’t do RUclips as a job and have time to beat the game right away
I’ve seen soulsbourn optional bosses with more players achieving it
I have the feeling that game was finished for years and was just forgotten on a random computer and then they found it and thought „It will be fine“
it has the vibes of a game that kept changing genres like 10 times throughout development but they had to eventually release it
thats probably what happened with redfall and gollum
It has that 2008 Licensed Game smell to it.
@@xord6286 ;ike cyberpunk
Nah. It’s just a perfect shit storm of a small indie team that’s mostly just worked on low end indie point and click games, who had no clue how to make a game of this scale and just bafflingly threw themselves into the fire trying to create and publish a “AAA” game all by themselves. I don’t know how the hell they even got the license for this.
There's one more terrible aspect to this game nobody talks about due to all other terrible things: it's premise doesn't make sense. I always thought Gollum is some tiny, funny little man dwelling in caves, eating raw fish and mumbling to himself, but no, apparently he's some orc murdering machine, epic assassin-level parkourer and political player of the Middle Earth. Makes sense
In the story he’s kinda there to show what the ring can do to people, and he does have a body count of at least one from what I remember. When Sméagol first got the ring he killed his brother. The writers of this gave just kinda gave up I think
That and he wasn’t really afraid to hop on a bitch and choke them, though it was less stealth and more anger.
@@moosenman This. There's a distinction that the developers and director of Gollum missed completely, and it's that Smeagol is a well-meaning, almost innocent Hobbit who has been tortured and broke down, essentially having his mind transformed into a prison by this all powerful artifact of a nearly forgotten age that belongs to the disembodied force of a dark lord who could easily shroud the entire world in malice and manifested hatred if the fellowship didn't continuously and miraculously luck out.
Gollum, however, is an extremely violent and volatile conniver who is both equally disturbing and unsettling to deal with~ be it face to face or through a TV screen. For all of the things that The Hobbit got wrong, it got the dread of knowing that Gollum knows you're trying to trick him right on the fucking money.
Hes none of what you stated. He lives in mountains so yeah, he should climb. He's used as cannon fodder to cover their tracks not a politician. You're exaggerating basic skills. Thats like saying a monkey is a parkour expert
@@moxiemaxie3543 monkeys can’t stealth kill
"Animations straight out of the 1700s."
Kev has such a way with words.
More like youtube story animation.
@@bryanpineda2096 … ah yes.. the uh.. joke. Nothing gets past you
IDK, I think they could draw up something better in the 1700's 🤔
"Emotes...? In a single player game...?"
That really set the tone for the whole experience, huh.
at that moment I buckled up
This game makes you really FEEL like a broken shell of your former self.
This is certainly one of the games ever! It has graphics! The characters move! Certainly a game.
That exists. Today. For money. 😂
Now with dialogue!
I will debate it has graphics
@@DubberRucks Way too much money.
😂
You should play through the game a second time with the emotes. Really enhances the experience
I know right? Him default dancing while hiding from the elves really makes it better!
The fucking fact they made the "apology" with chat gpt is insane
The devs were really ambitious and worked hard to make the worst game of 2023.
Worked hard?
Year is still young. Do remember we thought that about Forspoken and then came Redfall and now Gollum. I know 2023 won't disappoint and at least 2 more games will join the list.
Yatzhee will have such an easy year with his bottom 5 games of the year.
It sucks that Nacon did it because they're doing Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown. Seeing how bad this looks scares me a ton
@@bryanpineda2096 You have to work hard to make something this shit. You can't do this on accident, I just can't believe it any other way.
@@matosz23 we also have Starfield and S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2
It really sucks how cool the idea is that you have to convince one of two sides of yourself to make an immoral/moral choice, and it's completely squandered on this....
While you don't really fight yourself (sort of), Dark Earth from 1997 did something similar to this where the main character can switch from a light to a dark attitude and, in turn, have different conversations depending on which mode you picked.
Disco Elysium has similar mechanics but it's rare nonetheless
romance club biatch
@odilemwaro833 Yeah, not to mention that the game basically lets you pick neither option.
Fable III
I can say without a doubt that this is the most suspenseful action game every, with every jump, every swingy bar i held my breath and my heart skipped a beat. Because this game has actual real world consequences, unlike other games where all you lose is a couple seconds or minutes this game can fully block you from even completing it. Absolutely amazing work and i love the colour red, an easy 10/10 for Gollum 2023
Hold on? That memed to hell picture of Gollum looking like a wet, beaten dog was from an ACTUAL game?! If the developers actually thought any of this was a good idea, then l pity them.
I don’t
It looks like fking dream
Imagine being a teenager in high school, and your parents decided to get you one game as a gift for passing your classes. This is the game they get you. You can't afford anything else. You have a whole summer to enjoy this 70$ game.
Ufff that hurts
My parents NEVER would get me a game unless I specifically ask for one on a wish list as a present. Because of crap like this. They been burned by bad movies, so they know games can be the same way.
ahh that happened to me already. My godfather (i think thats the english term) bought me Transformers for PS3. i wasnt even a big transformers fan, nor was the game any good. But still, i appreciated his intentions though and was thankful.
Well time to start mowing lawns.
That's an 80's experience.
'smeagol does not know what to do' 'breeding' has to be the best and most terrifying line of this entire video
Never actually seen Kev literally angry in any of his plays and not just playful frustration. This game is truly the pit of despair.
No no, the pit of despair is Princess Bride!
Well, he makes these reviews for money and entertainment. Why would he be angry?
@@ctdaniels7049HAHA I GET THAT REFERENCE I LOVE IT
As a German, I feel a strong need to apologize to the world for Germany's actions (the developer of Gollum is a German game company) for the first time since World War II.
I love your culture and almost everything about your country, I currently study Deutsch and soon to work as a Deutsch teacher in schools
@@aeoncalcos7830 was für ne Kultur lmao
And some of their games are so good.... im so sad
Likewise. I promise we can also make good games 😭
WW2 was the last time Germany didn't need to apologize, actually.
At least it is immersive.
After finishing it, you'll know EXACTLY how Gollum felt, being tortured by the orcs....
thats the only decent part everything else is trash
The review on Steam that says "We threw ourselves into the fiery pits. Gollum is free!" always cracks me up. 🤣
Kevduit once again putting his sanity on the line for us
And making us watch it… again
@@veszekium5693 Someone has to take care of him after making this video !!
This game could have lost him so many braincells now due to the sheer lack of the publisher doing their job,
That Kev is now endangered to be forced into a Sanatorium. 🧐🧐
Our lord and savior, kevduit. He sacrifices so much for us.
I was kind of half expecting the fanbase to do a thing where they all kind of just pretend it's this utterly goaded game like with people continuing the joke that John Cena is invincible even though it's been like a decade.
RIP Keduit's sanity
This looks like one of those one-man Unity horror games that Markiplier plays, except those are usually made by one person with no budget in the span of a few weeks and are kind of charming as a result
This looks like something you'd play at the dentists office
I played better games. There was a AWSOME megaman arcade and Simpsons one too
*Perfect* description; truly an aesthetic mode
I’m gonna stick to pac man 😂
Please don't disrespect Pac-Man World like that 🙏
Man at least my orthodontist had an n64 with mario kart, better than this shit
Getting people to pay for emotes in a single player game is as shady as Callisto protocol making people pay for more death animations.
callisto protocol does WHAT
Wait... you serious? Callisto does that? 💀
There's a key difference there. I'm so bad at Callisto Protocol that I consistently die and get to see the animations. I'm so good at Gollum that I consistently die and get to see my home screen.
"They say textures are so pure there you can almost see them." That made me lol 😆
A game of our time
Textured were textured, code was coded, bugs were bugsed, voices were voiced and gollum was gollumed
Mordor mordor'd
I loved the part where Gollum says "It's Gollumin' time" and then he died mid air
A game of a* time you mean?
Other than that, perfect review of a game.
It's a game, it has textures, code is there, bugs are too, voice actors voiced and Gollum does Gollum all over a game
This truly was our GOLLUM
I can’t believe they made a game based off of anti-depressants, so cool
I mean this is a pretty good anti-depressant: ”could be worse, could be playing Gollum right now”.
I love the Gollum impression the most at 14:40. This whole video made my side hurt, I love your sense of humour (and watching you suffer playing a video game is great too)
I like the dynamic difficulty system where every time you die it flips a coin and corrupts all the scripting on tails
This is the kind of game you'd get for your 12th birthday in 2007 and then become obsessed with even though you can never get past the starting area because its poor design makes it way too challenging for you. Your parents paid 30 bucks for it.
Oh man, that reminds me of a ps2 game that was unbelievably dark with odd forced camera angles, to the point where you basically coulddnt see most of the game
@@eliaspanayi3465it could be anyone
@@eliaspanayi3465 "Do you have an idea of how little that narrows it down?"
I kept replaying max payne 2 for a year when I was 11-12 because I couldn't figure out how to enter the elevator. All I had to do was press e on the panel💀
that was Sonic 06' for me...we returned that game within 3 days
14:38 this all reminds me of 90's games.
No instructions, sometimes jumps too far and sometimes not far enough.
Oh god that entire experience must have been agonizing.
I don't know what was worse; watching this atrocity get played, or knowing that he had to pay for the experience. 😂
Honestly pretty decent early Xbox 360 game. I love watching Kevduit play weird old games. Wait it’s next gen exclusive?
I just remembered something.....
Zelda Tears of the Kingdom was 70 dollars. A game running at 30 fps on Nintendo Switch hardware with a file size of about 16 GB......and yet was able to achieve wonders beyond compare, having such freedom of choice in its game world, such flexibility in its custom vehicle system that it just downright terrifying, even letting you have an active party of about five AI partners without missing a beat. Truly a technical achievement n game design that will be talked about for decades to come.....
And then you got.........this game........this.....45 GB.........thing........meant to be played on PS5 and Series X/S hardware.......and it's just......this.......I have no words.....oh God and they want to inflict this horror on Switch owners! God no!
My favorite part of the story was when Gollum said, "it's GoLlUm time" and he Gollumed himself into an invisible wall and Middle-Earth crashed.
🤣😂🤣🙄
@@19thunderchild It was a reference to that elf cape thing frodo used on the gates of mordor
I'm crying lmao
😂
Gollum’d all over those
This feels like the entire development team just embezzled the budget and told the intern to make the game
Coming back to this comment to say you were kind of right.
Kev slowly losing his mind and raging is by far the funniest i have ever gotten to enjoy. It is slow methodical and downright as we all do. Much love Kev
He is becoming gollum minute by minute the devs master plan is working perfect
There is combat in this game, it's fighting the controls. Charlie ran into a broken cutscene in his playthrough too.
Kev's friends are grinning from ear to ear that this isn't a multiplayer game
Can't believe they got Gollum himself to code and develop this game
The fact that a game like this exists in the current year is astounding.
Just think of the memories we'll have of 2023... Redfall, Gollum, there's some stinkers memorable for all the wrong reasons 😂
it looks like it was made 20 years ago, and still runs worse than those games
Umm...did you live in a cave for the last 5-8 years.
This abomination have become a norm for "AAA" game
@@ReigoVassal stop the cap
@@ReigoVassal I mean, yes, that is true. AAA games certainly have been slipping of late. I just simply expect if you are going to use to LotR brand, one of the most beloved fantasy epics of all time that only rarely gets games made of it, you'd invest *something* into it to make sure it lives up to its legacy. I'm more disappointed in that then the raw quality of the game in isolation.
The lack of stylized text for the choice bits has me dying. They literally left the default font and said: "Looks good to me"
PS1 graphics, PS2 controls, PS5 price, Rings of Power writing.
An hour long video and it really didn't come close to the pain that stream was. Watching chapter 4 over and over again, the puzzles, trying to kill the blind girl and her acting like it never happened for the rest of the game. It was wild
"Gollum, Breeding halls, now!"
So nice that they managed to squeeze in a Gollum sex fanfic
Lmao
20:46
With this and Kaifs playthrough it's pretty safe to say that the bugs in each copy of Gollum are personalised.
If I were a Dev of this game and was asked how my work on this project was, I would say I was being lazy and gave no fuck. Imagine saying you gave your best in making this.
I tried saying I was being lazy and gave no fuck during sex
She was not amused by it and she was already mad cause I forgot her name
The people who made the art for the non-GGI cutscenes.
@@BetaJackMaxis only good part of the game. They're quite pretty
The "Welcome to Mordor!" achievement for dying is Dark Souls II's level of edginess
So *THAT* is why i didn't like DS2 when i played it after 1
Except DS2 is 100 times better then this shit
@@creppersaurusrex2300 meh at least Dark Souls 2 is playable compared to this almagamation of terror. honestly why did this company make it and not like oh idk Monolith? Monolith already proved they can make great games based on the story and history of Middle Earth. just look at the glorious Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War games. Story was not very focused but everything else was freaking great anyways and Story was not their main focus on it ever anyways.
@@creppersaurusrex2300 there's a lot of things DS2 did to fix most problems in Souls, you just need to open your eyes
But in Dark Souls 2 it made sense
The worst part about a bad game is that you want it to finish and it just keeps dragging on and on
I am genuinely horrified with your end choice, I actually gasped lol. You already had the "all gollum choices" achievement, the poor bird could have at least lived lol
The shock at the crunch killed me 😢
that "choice" in itself cemented my opinion that devs should be sent to clean up radioactive spills
@@Massakre8492ndDon't Forget to Send The Halo Infinite Developers as Well.
@PhoenixLord777 exactly, and that's why they deserve radioactive spills snd not firing squad, make them suffer as much as the players who "played" this """"game""""
@@Massakre8492nd I mean this is gollum we're talking about. He absolutely would do that lmao. It's even kind of hinted that he's eating human babies in the books. That being said. This is an awful rendition of gollum lol and that bird should have lived :( my poor heart.
Even as a bargain bin find in 2009, this game would disappoint
We NEED a full version of:
🎵"I love it, I love it, I love a broken game,
70 dollars down the drain."🎶💃🕺
found it to be very immersive, when I stopped playing and requested the refund I felt like gollum when he gets the one ring from frodo
Some quotes I found developers and a hype team article:
“As we reported in November 2020, Jonas Husges of Daedalic Entertainment told Official PlayStation Magazine that Gollum will make use of the next-gen PS5 tech. Gollum’s actions become more tangible and his physical struggle when he runs out of stamina translates directly to the way the game is played," said Husges. This points to The Lord of the Rings: Gollum using the PS5 DualSense's haptic feedback ability, which will likely apply more resistance to the triggers when Gollum is tired or otherwise strained.”
“In the same interview mentioned above, Husges praised the PS5's SSD component, and said it will help the Lord of the Rings: Gollum vastly decrease loading times and create a large explorable world. It also means Gollum's world will be incredibly well-lit.
"Clean, ray-traced shadows allow for maximum effect in player guidance in building stealth passages while dynamic and moving light sources bring in the extra challenge when Gollum is roaming through the darkness," said Daedalic art director Mathias Fischer. "All these things, of course, have the nice side-effect of making the game feel vast, and such free roaming environments we are creating look as spectacular as Middle-earth deserves."
But I digress.
😂 I'm shaken by their confidence in Gollum.
"A masterwork of pain and suffering"
"Sauron has nothing on the creators of this game"
"It just works"
One does not simply play Gollum without losing the will to live
you cant lose something you dont have in the first place ;)
I'm just impressed that they managed to make such a great game with 5 dollars and a sandwich as funding
I refuse to believe that this game was made recently and wasn't just found on some forgotten hard drive from the early 2000s. Its the only way I can justify the graphics in my head.
what's most baffling is how Mordor somehow looks cleaner than the Elve's home
Gollumn terrified me as a kid so this game is the embodiment of all my night terrors. Thank you Kev for being the holy Messiah
Its shame the game didn't end on Mount Doom
Dude is gross af, not sure what moron thought controlling him for hours was a good idea
This game is the embodiment of all my night terrors too......for different reasons
7:23 Sméagol says: Sméagol doesn’t know what to do
Orc captain says: breeding
Rings of power: "I am the worst thing that ever happened to LotR"
Gollum: "Observe"
@lucgermain9310 me when black people in my LotR 🤬
Oh yeah... The """"dark elf"""" 😂😂😂
😂
@@SuperVincent0000but they actually exist in canon lore? Not by whatever name Galadriel calls him, but the orcs canonically exist, in Tolkien’s writings, because Melkor/Morgoth tortured and twisted elves into dark creatures and then selectively bred them into what are now orcs
*sigh* is it because of the black elf?
The developers of this game should be very proud of themselves for managing to make something that looks worse than a Mount and Blade mod while actually having a budget.
at least last day of middle earth is fun to play
I dunno; Prophecy of Pendor actually looks decent for the games age...
i love the moment when you finish "gollum" and become gollum, because you no longer have any living brain cells
Kev you are genuinely a hero to all of us, you have my respect.
"I hope they remember you" - Thanos
This game resembles the feeling you would have after being told to do the dishes
In salt water. With razor blades hidden in random plates and cups.
@@DubberRucks yeah the average dishwashing experience
@@DubberRucks Don't forget the portal to Hell bubbling up outta the drain.
This proves that you're a child. lmao.
Having to reach down into the disposal because you dropped a small object into it
I saw the system requirements and was like "wow this must be the most realistic game to date with those numbers" and then I watched gameplay vids and was like "dude why does this look like goat simulator"
The fact that 6% completed the 5th chapter is a testament to how much the designers turned players off. Truly astounding, as if the team didn't do any focus testing at all - one walk through the QA room would have given devs enough understanding to push this back for another 2 years on top of their previous delays.
I've worked on some turds (Where the Wild Things Are is the worst I can think of, but even Brash didn't have the nerve to charge AAA prices for it), but at least I can be proud that companies I worked for wouldn't release a game with any of the numerous glaring issues experienced in Gollum, especially the horrid number of crashes on display here. I feel like the testers' impressions reaching the right people might've prevented such mediocrity from reaching market in its released state... But sometimes deadlines matter to shareholders more than quality, integrity and reputation, and those same decision-makers also have the mindset that kids will consume (watch, listen to , play) any old slop that's served out to them with a shiny marketing campaign.
Forget tears of tha kingdom, THIS is game if the year. Hands down. The game plays, the graphics graphic and the animators animated. Incredible work
Don't forget, the textures are also visible, and the sounds are audible in a variety of ways.
Oh, absolutely. And the voice acting is a chefs kiss on this wonderful experience of pain and suffering that we call Gollum!
@@voxvolhynia5400 mmm, sometimes.
There was a game I loved called "Styx: Shards of Darkness" that had similar dark, stealthy gameplay to Gollum. I was beyond excited when this was announced. The gameplay of Styx in the LOTR universe? I was *hyped* but...then I saw this monstrosity. Thank God we have the internet to see how games look before buying them or I would have made a huge mistake.
It amazes me that a GROUP of people looked at this game and said "this is good to ship!"
More likely a publisher gave a deadline and this is what was ready by then.
@@gaeulsbnidk, the core gameplay in Cyberpunk actually looked fun, this game feels like it would have been a disappointment even if it ran well
I want you to think of every character in the wide world of The Lord of The Rings, one of the most beloved fantasy settings ever conceived, a place that continues to inspire to this very day.
I want you to think of all the possibilities for a captivating game that exist within that cast. You could have a Legend of Zelda-style adventure with Legolas, a Mines of Moria resource management/survival game, you could even delve into the untapped potential of the Blue Wizards.
Fuck, I'd even take a Tom Bombadil Farmville Rip Off
But no, apparently someone on the development team decided to ignore all of that and make a game focused around the slimy, leech-infested, generally unpleasant cave mutant.
And even with that horrible idea to start with, they somehow managed to make it even worse by making it the most mediocre, boring, by the numbers, mid-2000s movie tie-in ass stealth platformer you've ever seen in your life.
What in the fuck are we doing here?
You are right. But hey, at least they didn't include any of the modern gaming crap u see nowadays
The thing is- Gollum is actually a really interesting character. Except the book has already pretty much delved into all of his character.
Touch Grass
The elves in this game honestly seemed like more interesting characters than their gremlin pet
Theres an eight player survival game were the dwarves retake the mines of moria . Release tbc
That was an amazing adventure, we all could feel and hear you losing your mind. In the chapter 10 you sounded like defeated crazy man. We appreciate your journey with Gollum, you proven it to be very immersive game, that will probably leave scars for years
Truly one of the ps2 games of all time
by watching this gameplay i had, before my eyes PS2 LoTR game, I don't remember title but it was turn based game with Aragorn as MC, and guess what, gollum looks like it was developed in same studio at the same time
Don’t diss the PS2 like that… PS2 had Shadow Hearts, Persona 4, Sons of Liberty, Snake Eater and Zone of Enders.
*atari 2600
@@OfficialSatelliteMan he just means graphics wise, not saying it's better or can compete with the best og games of ps2
@@alexsookhoo9919 but those games look amazing graphic-wise
I seriously didn't even realize this game was released recently when I first heard of it, because it looks like an early PS2 game at most.
I was like "why is everyone complaining about such an old game all of a sudden" then it hit me that it came out in 2023.
The mechanic of having to "convince" one side of Gollum's personality to go with the other was cool though. I'd love to see it on a better game.
Yea I think a gollum game could actually be a really interesting game but they executed it so poorly and didn't include any things that could actually make the gollum and smeagol fighting actually decent
Nah... Be honest thus game looks like ps3. But still bad
@SuperVincent0000 Uncharted came out in 2007, 16 years ago and it's still holding up better than this dumpster 🔥
When people say this game looks like a ps2 game, it makes me wonder if they've never seen an actual ps2 game in their life. Very likely, with all the zoomers around now.
@@PKFireFawx I'm a "zoomer" and I grew up with a ps2 lmfao. It's not some ancient boomer console that the young folks have never heard of. Most zoomers are adults by now, stop confusing us with gen alpha.
I actually thought PS3 at first, but then I remembered the Harvest Moon game my sister played on the PS2 and that game was far prettier than this one.
Heck, as the guy above you put it, Uncharted came out 16 years ago on the PS3 and looks better than this.
this is like an ARG where the entire gaming community is trying to figure out the intended solutions to this game
because the game is so broken and terribly designed at the same time that its really hard to tell what is and isnt intended
i think game companies should be able to be held legally accountable for charging $70 for a game that would still be bad if it was a ps1 game
Just...Don't buy it, lol.
@@nullprop No no he’s right, a precedent must be set
Bad in general since its been a very common tread with greedy rats
@@nullprop if renting or demos or trials were more common i'd agree with ya but game journalists have proven they arent worth anything when it comes to games since they are bought off since the gamespot kane and lynch debacle(dude got fired for being honest that the game is terrible since EA bought so much ad space on the website this happened yrs before gamergate was even a thing) so buying is literally the only way to know a game is well this terrible. also physical copies are becoming less common and alot of stores like ps store and gog dont do refunds even if ya only played for less than an hr like steam does. gog only let me refund one game after i gave evidence i could not phyiscal play it on my pc by sending them my pc specs and a video of me trying to run it and a list of all the things i tried to fix it and then it wasnt even an actual refund but store credit.
@@Kris-wo4pj ps store has added demos iirc
When I found out the game was going to be made I told a friend about it and he told me: “Why would I even buy a game to go through something I already experience daily in my own home?”
so true
Tbf this game is exactly what I was thinking withdrawing from magical hard drugs would be like. Nothing makes sense, everything looks wrong, and people hate you for (seemingly) no reason.
If this was a fan project, it would be incredible... but the sad thing is... its not a fangame, but an official one...
Why don’t they just make Total War LOTR already, who’s the nerd handing out the licenses
@@coachacola3755 Oh that'd be so much fun.
@@coachacola3755Battle for Middle Earth 2, check it out
Fangame are better
I've played so many games myself and I watched other people play even more... but this... Yes, you are indeed correct. I can't describe my feelings neither with English nor my native language. Part of me want to believe this is not real
Cyberpunk 2077: Wake the F*ck up samurai we have a city to burn
Gollum : Go back to sleep samurai the textures haven’t loaded yet
Thinking back to the countless hours of fun I had playing Shadow of Mordor while watching this video, and the fact that I was still finishing middle school at the time, is just mind-blowing
Haha yeah its funny you mention shadow of mordor. This game is like shadow of mordor if you removed all the fun combat and orc domination and replaced it with all the annoying bad stealth missions from those games.
Objective:
●Restrict the bloodflow to Gollum's™ throat.
Objective: Uninstall this game. Are you sure? Y/N
The amount of money I’d pay to be at the company meeting where they discuss how the game was received by players
The amount of fear in the wall climbing segment with all the Spiders makes this video God-Tier
My eyes are watering from the beauty and depth of this game's story. Definitely not the red.
Red? What red? I saw no red. 🤔 😂
I'm glad you started off by sharing the fact *an emote pack* was what qualified as "DLC" according to the developers. That sets the expectations exactly where they need to be.
I'll give them credit for one thing: Usually when there's an interesting skeleton for a game but it's just released in a woefully unfinished state, there's a Christmas deadline to blame because they wanted to ship the game out so it'd be a Christmas present for instant sales. So at least they're innovating by releasing a woefully unfinished game OUT of Christmas season.
Also, when you said you'd only cried twice, was it from game frustration or retina poisoning?
........The answer is "yes", isn't it?
The fact that you beat this...wow. I've seen posts from streamers and youtubers saying they gave up due to the amount of bugs causing progress locks making them restart missions. I can't imagine putting myself through this hell.