No Lord of the Rings detail was too small for Weta Workshop in making Tales of the Shire

Dexerto sat down with Tales of the Shire developers at Wētā Workshop, wherein the dev team revealed just how much attention to detail has gone into realizing this cozy version of the Shire.

Tales of the Shire is an upcoming Lord of the Rings game set to release on March 25, 2025. Unlike the more realistic Lord of the Rings games that came before it, Tales of the Shire allows fans to immerse themselves fully in the Hobbit lifestyle.

Wētā Workshop, the developers behind Tales of the Shire, have gone to extensive lengths to ensure the game’s fabric honors the legacy of The Lord of the Rings and the passionate fans who, in some cases, know everything there is to know about the lore.

As such, it’s no surprise to hear the New Zealand-based dev team put in some intense research to ensure Tales of the Shire was as lore-accurate as possible. 

Tales of the Shire is faithful to canon

For Art Director Stephen Lambert and the rest of the team, it was pivotal that Tales of the Shire didn’t just feel like a “veneer of Middle Earth.”

“Research was pretty exhaustive on everything. Lord of the Rings is often presented as a world where it’s about fighting and monsters and these large-scale things, but the core theme, the heart it comes back to, is places like the Shire, these worlds within Middle Earth you want to be part of, you want to protect.”

Despite spending very little time in the Shire throughout the books, Lambert further noted that “the core theme is about bringing protection and peace” from the uncertainty of the rest of Middle Earth and so from the get-go, “that was always going to be the main focus” of the game.

Even the smallest details matter

It’s not just about capturing the essence of the Shire, though. Even the smallest details that casual fans wouldn’t notice have been given extensive thought, resulting in lengthy discussions throughout the dev team.

“Just to give you the level of how much we really thought about every decision, we had back-and-forth arguments about whether lemons should be in the shire for months. Just purely from lore and looking at areas of the world the Shire represents. Lots and lots of research,” revealed Calliope Ryder, Lead Producer for the project.

Lambert then added, “Even down to how we structured bile water, we look at how the history of the landform would have been developed before the hobbits even arrived.

“So there are certain plants that might have been planted by the people before. Trying to pull out every piece of lore.”

Clearly, no stone has been left unturned in bringing Tales to life and no doubt fans will be sinking dozens of hours in to unravel every little secret once it rolls out on March 25, 2025.