Lord of the Rings: Gollum dev to shut down following bungled launch By Heidi Nicholas, 03 Jul 2023 FollowtopicsThe Lord of the Rings: GollumMiddle-earthNaconAction-AdventureHeidi Nicholas The Lord of the Rings: Gollum dev Daedalic Entertainment is closing its development department and canceling a follow-up LOTR game.The Lord of the Rings: Gollum definitely wasn't the one game to rule them all — it met with poor reviews all-round and was followed up by an apology from developer Daedalic Entertainment. While Embracer wants to exploit Lord of the Rings to turn it into a huge gaming franchise, Daedalic Entertainment is going the other way, and has announced it will close its development department and discontinue its follow-up Lord of the Rings game, which had already started development. Daedalic Entertainment is canceling its other in-development LOTR game"Daedalic Entertainment has made the decision to close its development department, with full focus now on our publishing business. Eight promising releases will be launching in this financial year alone," Daedalic Entertainment said in a statement to Polygon, after GamesWirtschaft first reported on the news."Even though The Lord of the Rings: Gollum did not live up to the expectations we had for the game, we are very grateful for the opportunity and the learning experience it brought us. Currently, we are working on another patch for The Lord of the Rings: Gollum. A follow-up project in The Lord of the Rings universe that has already been started will be discontinued. The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection, as the body responsible for the federal funding, was informed of this some time ago."Daedalic emphasizes that it does "value each and every member of our team very much and it is important to us that the transition goes as well as possible. We will therefore support our former employees in finding new opportunities within our network," calling the announcement "a difficult break, but also a new beginning in the already long history of Daedalic Entertainment."More The Lord of the Rings: Gollum stories: Embracer to exploit Lord of the Rings to turn it into huge gaming franchise Daedalic "deeply apologizes" for The Lord of the Rings: Gollum The Lord of the Rings: Gollum reviews prove it's not so juicy sweet New Xbox games — May 22 to 28 The Lord of the Rings: Gollum Xbox achievement list steps out of the shadows Industry News Written by Heidi NicholasHeidi tends to lean towards indie games, RPGs, and open-world games on Xbox, and when not playing Disney Dreamlight Valley, happily installs every new wholesome game that appears on Xbox Game Pass, before diving back into favorites like The Witcher 3. She's looking forward to Age of Mythology Retold, Everwild, Fable, and Avowed on the Xbox horizon. Heidi graduated with an MA in English Literature before joining the TrueAchievements team.