Strategy Informer  

The Hobbit film in the works will naturally need a tie-in video game for it to feel legitimate in today's transmedia world, and it looks like F.E.A.R.'s Monolith Productions will take on the shire.

Their latest release was this year's Gotham City Impostors for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC. It seems the second part to The Hobbit will be a WB Seattle affair. Snowblind 'virtually gone'.

Super sleuth Superannuation is making the connection between more Tolkien fantasy and Warner Brothers' Seattle-based talent. It won't be Snowblind though after War in the North flopped.

"As to what Monolith/Warner Bros. Games Seattle is up to now - pretty sure it is a little fantasy action RPG-lite called The Hobbit: Part One," twittered Superannuation. Warner Bros. has let 60 members of staff go across their Seattle-based operations which include Snowblind, Monolith and Surreal Software.

"Snowblind basically no longer exists, so WB Games Seattle is more or less Monolith and some other dev support/publishing staff and whatnot. It also sounds like WB Seattle will be handling the tie-in for the second Hobbit film."

The Lord of the Rings: War in the North released from Snowblind but panned critically for its generally poor gameplay mechanics. It was thought Snowblind's time on Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance could help revive the Lord of the Rings video game franchise but it wasn't meant to be. Gotham City Impostors is in the mid 60s or low 70s.

Source: Eurogamer

Related games: Gotham City Impostors (PC), Gotham City Impostors (Xbox360), Gotham City Impostors (PS3), The Lord of the Rings: War in the North (PC), The Lord of the Rings: War in the North (Xbox360), The Lord of the Rings: War in the North (PS3)