Pippin: But what about MMORPGs?
Aragorn: You've already had it.
Pippin: We've had one, yes. But what about second MMORPGs?
Merry: Don't think he knows about second MMORPGs, Pip.
New World team pretty much guarantees it's fucked.
It'll sell well at launch at least, if New World was any indicator. Fans don't learn from past mistakes, so the same crowd that dove into New World will dive into this; thrice-fold since it has the LotR branding slapped onto it.
Unless it actually does something decent then I will just stick to lotro. It has it's up and downs, the lag is so fucking horrible, but it's alright I suppose for an old mmo.
I'm getting HASBRO/WOTC vibes from LotR: it doesn't matter how bad a product is; fans will buy it anyway because the books and the movie trilogy were just that damned good. That's not to say the original MMO is terrible: its got one of the best representations of a Bard class in the MMO-sphere (alongside Rift), but man, looking at some of the LotR console games that have come out over the last few years... yeesh.