Amazon’s Lord Of The Rings MMO, previously thought dead amid mass layoffs, is now very much conclusively deceased. Though, the coporation say they’re still exploring “a compelling new game experience that does justice to Tolkien’s world”.
“Our creative team continues to explore a compelling new game experience that does justice to Tolkien’s world; we are working closely with Middle-earth and remain excited about the IP,” Amazon’s head of games Jeff Grattis told Eurogamer, who’ve conducted a wider investigation into the company’s push towards using generative AI in development prior to last year’s layoffs.
As has consistently been the case over the years as Amazon have said two Lord of the Rings MMOs were in the works as part of partnerships only to subsequently scrap them, concrete details about what this latest one would’ve entailed are scarce. It’d more than likely have contained some hobbits.
Moving away from small fantasy blokes, Eurogamer’s wider report focuses on a game codenamed Project Trident, which reportedly started out as Shadow of the Colossus-style co-op action game about battling towering nordic jotuns. Then, in mid-2024 and prior to that iteration of Project Trident being formally pitched, Amazon reportedly brought in an “AI mandate” decreeing a push must be made to “innovate with LLM tech in all divisions”.
Seeing this as something to abide by if they wanted to avoid potentially being shut down, the report claims the team were given just 18 months to get their game out of the door, leading them to pivot to a Helldivers-inspired third-person action game set in a similar nordic world, but with missions you’d drop into and interact with LLM-powered NPCs. Having adopted that mould because they thought it’d be more achievable to get up and running quickly, the team reportedly pivoted again to a linear single player story after their deadline was extended indefinitely.
Then, just as they were working on an “E3-style” demo, the devs were let go as part of Amazon’s mass layoffs late last year, in which around 14,000 staff are believed to have lost their livelihoods. “I think we did discover the best ways and the worst ways that [generative AI implementation] can happen,” one source told Eurogamer, adding that it means nothing as Amazon “laid off everyone that was an expert in the best and worst ways to implement AI in regards to game development.”
Asked for comment on the report, Amazon’s Grattis said the following:
AI was not the reason behind role reductions in Games. Those changes were the result of a strategic shift in our business and a refocus on the areas where Amazon can deliver the most value to players. Great games are made by talented people and we think AI should expand what’s possible. We remain focused on using these technologies thoughtfully and responsibly, always guided by the creativity and judgment of our teams. We’re proud of what our teams are creating, and we look forward to sharing more of what they’ve been building soon.
The tale told by the report isn’t exactly one which paints Amazon as being “guided by the creativity and judgment” when it comes to AI use. Well, here’s hoping whatever they’ve currently got going on doesn’t involve lots of weird chats with SamwAIse and BagginsGPT.
