It's Official, The Lord Of The Rings Returns This Month
Published Jul 10, 2026, 1:30 AM EDT
Tom Wilson is a Gaming Features Writer at Screen Rant. Over the past five years, Tom has worked as the Editor-in-Chief at The Game Crater, as a Staff Writer for GamingIntel, a List Writer at TheGamer, and, of course, as a Senior Writer at ScreenRant. Tom has experience writing reviews, guides, news, and features, and has been responsible for teams of writers, training them and editing their work.
Tom graduated with a Masters in Multimedia Journalism, and has since gone on to build up his portfolio of games journalism work.
Sign in to your ScreenRant account
Despite the original books establishing genre-defining trends, and the films becoming one of the most critically acclaimed and beloved trilogies of all time, The Lord of the Rings continues to feel like an oddly untapped IP that is teeming with potential. The lack of video games, new films, and TV shows, or at least well-received ones, is astounding for a world and cast of characters so beloved by fans worldwide. Fortunately, that appears to be changing, at least somewhat, in the near future.
Of course, there are the upcoming new LOTR movies that are in active production and have fans eager with anticipation. These will likely prove to be an enjoyable way to re-immerse oneself into the world of Middle-earth, but with little word around their release dates, there's not much to latch onto in the interim period. That is where a new slate of Lord of the Rings games comes into play, especially one that completely revisits the original stories and offers a fresh new perspective and way of interacting with beloved characters and fearsome foes.
Lord of the Rings has always had fairly good luck when it comes to board games, and the upcoming The Lord of the Rings: Ascension appears to continue that trend. Developed by Stone Blade Entertainment, The Lord of the Rings: Ascension is yet another entry into the legendary Ascension series, adopting its very best mechanics and ideas that have been refined since the series originally launched back in 2010, with a few novel twists that are designed to give it a unique LOTR flavor.
Joining the likes of numerous upcoming LOTR TTRPGs and video game projects, The Lord of the Rings: Ascension is set to dominate yet another sector of the gaming world: deckbuilding titles. Ascension is a critically acclaimed deckbuilding game that has had several beloved expansions release over the years, and its Lord of the Rings variant seeks to expand upon its offerings with familiar faces, a unique corruption mechanic, and so much more.
The Lord of the Rings: Ascension is designed for 1 - 4 players, and will feature three different sets, one for each of the books. Each set adds new mechanics, cards, and ideas to help both better represent the stories they are adapting and further flesh out the ideas from game to game. The Lord of the Rings: Ascension has the opportunity to be the very best LOTR game if Stone Blade Entertainment plays its cards right, and it can manage to drum up enough interest to hit its funding goals.
The crowdfunding campaign to get The Lord of the Rings: Ascension into production is set to start on July 14, 2026 via Gamefound. Currently, the available tiers and pricing aren't available, but fans won't have long to wait before they're officially announced. Those interested in the project can follow it to be notified of when it goes live and people can begin backing it.
Of course, those who don't want to back it early will still be able to pick up a copy when it is released to the public. Regardless, it is great to be getting a full-blown Lord of the Rings deckbuilding game, especially one that's being developed by the creators of one of the most acclaimed deckbuilders of all time.
Created by J.R.R. Tolkien
First Film The Lord of the Rings (1978)
Cast Norman Bird, Anthony Daniels, Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Liv Tyler, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, Cate Blanchett, John Rhys-Davies, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Christopher Lee, Hugo Weaving, Sean Bean, Ian Holm, Andy Serkis, Brad Dourif, Karl Urban, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, James Nesbitt, Ken Stott, Benedict Cumberbatch, Evangeline Lilly, Lee Pace, Luke Evans, Morfydd Clark, Mike Wood, Ismael Cruz Cordova, Charlie Vickers, Markella Kavenagh, Megan Richards, Sara Zwangobani, Daniel Weyman, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Lenny Henry, Brian Cox, Shaun Dooley, Miranda Otto, Bilal Hasna, Benjamin Wainwright, Luke Pasqualino, Christopher Guard, William Squire, Michael Scholes, John Hurt
What's Your Reaction?
Like
0
Dislike
0
Love
0
Funny
0
Wow
0
Sad
0
Angry
0
Comments (0)