Tales of the Shire, a cozy life sim set in the Lord of the Rings universe, wears its Tolkien bona fides on its sleeves. The Hobbits are obsessed with food. Life is simple and peaceful. But the game makes one crucial mistake: way too much name-dropping.
Like any rational Hobbit, I didn’t expect Bilbo to knock on my door and take me on an adventure when I first booted up Tales of the Shire. It felt safer to curb my expectations concerning famous Hobbits; if I don’t expect to meet Bilbo and Frodo, I can’t be disappointed about not meeting Bilbo and Frodo, right?
At the start of the game, Gandalf rides in with his creaky cart and his smoky pipe, uttering words of wisdom and stirring up hopes of meeting other The Lord of the Rings characters. Although I loved to see the old disturber of the peace, it had the unfortunate side effect of severely damaging my resolve to not expect a meeting with Bilbo, Frodo, Sam, Merry, Pippin, and — who knows — maybe even The Gaffer or Farmer Maggot.
So, when Gandalf dropped me at my front door along with a map of The Shire, the first thing I did was look for the shortest route to Bag End. Alas, Tales of the Shire’s border runs just northwest of The Green Dragon and Bywater Pool, which means that Hobbiton and Bag End are close, but forever out of reach.
Undeterred, I reminded myself that Bilbo and Frodo aren’t confined to their cozy Hobbit-hole, and may frequent the local inns or the Bywater town center from time to time. After all, the four fellowship Hobbits are known to love The Green Dragon, whereas The Gaffer, Sam’s dad, favors The Ivy Bush Inn, both of which are on the Tales of the Shire map.
And so I started to observe the clientele. Every group of youngsters and every older gentleman was a suspect. But as I couldn’t find evidence of a cameo (despite spotting plenty of waist-coated elders), and this habit was getting in the way of my fishing and gardening, I once again decided to stop hoping for a run-in with Bilbo and start living my Hobbit life.
This went well for a while, until I started overhearing the name Bilbo whenever I entered the Bywater town center. To make matters worse, my new Hobbit friends, too, began name-dropping their famous peers. Rosie Cotton caught me quite off guard when she suddenly mentioned not only The Gaffer, but her future husband Samwise Gamgee – and she was blushing, too.
Yes, some characters from The Lord of the Rings made it into Tales of the Shire — such as Farmer Cotton, Young Tom, and Sandyman — and it’s lovely to meet them. But even the recognizable names play a minor role compared to “The Big Five” (the fellowship Hobbits + Bilbo), so seeing them doesn’t mean I suddenly don’t want to encounter my favorite characters anymore.
Of course, incorporating major characters into a new adaptation is a risky business, but in my opinion, it wouldn’t be too complex to do so in Tales of the Shire. After all, Bilbo, Frodo, and Sam live a stone’s throw away from Bywater, and at this point in time (being blissfully unaware of Rings of Power and Dark Lords), it’s not as if they’re too busy to stop by the local drinking holes and have a chat with yours truly.
More than the name-dropping itself, however, it was the not-knowing that drove me to madness. As a new Tales of the Shire player, I just wasn’t sure whether I would get to meet the Big Five or not. Hearing their names and meeting Gandalf pushed me away from “nah, they won’t” and ever closer to “maybe they will.” When I finally met the 15th member of the Townsfolk, I couldn’t help but feel a tinge of sadness at the final line-up – none of the major characters had taken up a spot.
As if that isn’t agony enough, due to an elderly Hobbit losing his trousers while defiling my fishing pond (long story), and said trousers having disappeared from the face of Middle-earth due to a bug, I haven’t seen the ending to Tales of the Shire’s story yet. For now, I’ll hold on to a fleeting hope for a cameo as I wistfully stare in the direction of Bag End – and I’ll tell Fosco to stop talking about Bilbo’s excellent taste in waistcoats.