Wolves of Mordor: Lord of the Rings online puts Sauron centre stage

Mordor is calling

The expansion is built around the region where Sauron made his home, adding three new areas: Heledhris, Parth Rhavas and Nan Ogol.

Fittingly, it leans into Sauron’s First Age role as the Lord of Werewolves, the creator of Tolkien’s wolves who was even known to fight in wolf form. On the gameplay side, a new account-wide “Survival Instinct” system tracks a player’s progress through the new regions.

It is a notable shift for the long-running MMO, one of the most enduring online games around, which has usually kept the Dark Lord as a distant, background threat spoken about only in hushed whispers rather than a playable focus at the heart of the story.

No release date has been confirmed yet, but with a steady stream of Middle-earth projects in the pipeline, there is plenty more to come for fans keeping an eye on the latest film and TV news.