14 DAY TRIAL // 
The first Battle for Middle-Earth game attempted something a little different in the crowded world of RTS games, and its accessibility combined with the fantastic setting of Tolkien's universe proved to be a very successful pair. The Battle for Middle-Earth 2 improves on its predecessor in virtually every way while retaining most of what made the original successful, which is a textbook example of how a sequel should be made.
Gameplay It may seem strange that a sequel should follow when the first game pretty much covered all the ground from Peter Jackson's trilogy. It turns out EA Games have decided to expand outside the realm of the movies by unifying them with the general Tolkien license, thus allowing for a much grander view of the War of the Ring. The Battle for Middle-Earth 2 shifts focus to the war in the north where the elves and the dwarves also struggled against the forces of Sauron, and which, according to the histories, held some of the biggest battles of the entire war.
The main single-player offer is divided into two campaigns, allowing you to once again play as the forces of good or those of evil, but unlike the original game, the campaigns unfold in a completely linear fashion. It works much better this way in theory, as it allows for a stronger narrative to link up each mission; however, I found the game's story much less compelling than the original's. At least it's a good excuse to visit some beautiful locations from Middle-Earth, like Rivendell, Celduin or Erebor, and for all those who wondered how setting the Shire aflame would feel like, now they have a chance to find out.
There is also a Risk-like campaign called "war of the ring", that allows you to blend turn-based strategy with real-time battles, like in Shogun and Medieval Total War, and is played on a map similar to that from the first game, but spanning the whole Middle-Earth this time. The territories have two building nodes each, and since there are four building choices and each territory confers a certain bonus to the owner, you have some basic decisions to make about their role in the grand scheme. You can move armies around the map, and when opposing armies meet you engage in your regular build-your-base-and-flood-out-the-enemy skirmish game (or you can let the computer automatically generate the results), with that territory as the prize. Nothing that you build outside the world map stays around, so if an opponent tries to invade the same territory again, you have to rebuild your base and army practically from scratch. It's not terribly complex and the interface is awful, but it does provide additional options after you've completed the main campaigns.
As far as the actual gameplay is concerned, there are three new factions: the dwarves, the elves and the goblins, bringing the faction count to a whopping six, all with their own special abilities and heroes. The dwarves are expert builders, slow moving but stone-tough, the elves are expert archers, graceful, swift and stealthy, and the goblins use sheer numbers to overwhelm the enemy, bringing new play styles and adding a rich variety to the game. Isengard and Mordor are pretty much the same as in the previous game, but Gondor and Rohan have been combined to create a more rounded out faction called The Men of the West. Most of the classic characters from both the books and the movies appear in the game and have been spread between the factions, including Glorifindel, Haldir, Arwen, Elrond, Gloin, King Dain, Grima Wormtongue, the Mouth of Sauron and Shelob next to the ones from the original.
The factions are balanced quite well, as even though there are certain units that can be upgraded to the point where they become virtually unstoppable in large numbers against all other units, all factions have access to formidable powers that can tip the scales in their favor in a flash. One such power is the evil side's Watcher in the Water, which bursts through the ground at a chosen location and kills everything on a large area, or the good side's ability to summon Tom Bombadil, who appears on the battlefield and... dances enemies to death.
The largest departure from its predecessor is BFME 2's allowing you to place buildings anywhere on the map, instead of being limited to very specific locations. It's back to the basics, with a more traditional free-form base building system that requires faction specific farm-like structures to produce the game's single resource called simply "resources", and complete with an elaborate system of walls and defensive structure upgrades. Farms automatically generate resources, but they can't be amassed in one place because they lose effectiveness, forcing players to spread them out and actively expand into new territory, and making defense a lot trickier. It's an interesting idea in that it tries to balance defense and territorial control, but it's dragged down due to poor execution, as the ease with which all your defensive structures are destroyed hardly justifies the costly investment and makes building fancy defendable bases pointless. You're much better off investing your resources into your army.
Despite numerous changes, the core game has remained unchanged. Once again you command companies of soldiers (that are a bit larger this time around) rather than individual units, with the exception of heroes and large beasts, and the various types of units are balanced with a basic rock-paper-scissors system, such that every type of unit is effective against some but vulnerable to others. Both heroes and units gain experience from battles, thus becoming more powerful, and most units have special abilities they can bring into play, like the Mountain Giants that can either toss boulders at considerable distances or send little soldiers flying at close range, or Goblins that can scale walls. The abilities of hero units are especially powerful, and some can also mount or dismount on command, adapting to face different enemies.
The AI is as incompetent as ever, its strategy being limited to constantly sending the same units along the same path towards your base, one at a time of course, and increasing the difficulty level doesn't make it any brighter, only allows it to cheat. The pathfinding is still a major source of annoyance, often causing your units to stop in their tracks when ordered to move across the map, but not more annoying than your units' not reacting in any way when being peppered with missiles from afar. A few behavioral settings wouldn't have hurt.
Naval combat has also made its appearance for some reason, but the ships feel overly big and move too fast, while the pathfinding is as big a mess as on land, and I wouldn't have missed it one bit had it been left out entirely to be honest, especially since it appears in such a tiny fraction of the game.
Another new feature is the ability to create your own custom hero that can be used in multiplayer, skirmish and war of the ring modes. The customization is rather thin, especially considering how prevalent this aspect is in other EA games, giving you only a few costumes, color options and a limited skill specialization, but in case you want to see a virtual you represented in the game, it's there.
Video and audio Overall, Battle for Middle-Earth 2 is a visually impressive experience. The graphical engine has been significantly improved, and it's easily noticeable in the particle effects, reflections and all the fancy stuff that have become a standard these days. The environments look wonderful, and so do the units when viewed from afar, but when you zoom in, all the flaws become apparent, which would not be such a big deal were it not for the fact that most of the cinematic sequences use in-game graphics, highlighting the game's imperfections.
The interface is not only visually pleasing, but occupies very little of the screen and can be completely hidden with the press of a key, which is how all interfaces should be like.
Most of the animations are superb. I couldn't have enough of watching the Witch King's Fellbeast plummet from the sky, smashing into a formation of terrified soldiers, scattering them like leaves in a gale, then grabbing one in its claws, taking back to the skies and dropping him to his death. Strangely enough however, some animations are downright ugly, and those of the naval units are the biggest culprits. Luckily you don't get to see them so often.
The sound effects are excellent, be it the roar of beasts, the clashing of steel, or the cry of triumph of victorious troops, and Howard Shore's beautiful music contributes to the atmosphere like nothing else. Voice acting is of excellent quality as well. Many actors from the movies have reprised their roles, and Hugo Weaving (Elrond from the movie) provides the narration.
Multiplayer There's a unique twist to the standard multiplayer game. On every map Gollum runs around with the Ring as a stealth unit, and the side that manages to kill him first is allowed to build immensely powerful (and expensive) "Ring heroes". The good side gets access to the Elf Queen Galadriel, while the bad side can enlist the aid of Sauron himself, and seeing the dark lord sweep whole battalions skyward is a sight to behold. The war of the ring campaign can also be played in multiplayer which is really nice.
Conclusion The Battle for Middle-Earth 2 is a great-looking lightweight strategy game with emphasis on action, lots of action, significantly improved over its predecessor, and the best use of the Lord of the Rings license of any game to date. If you like RTS games, this is one worth having.
