Why is LEGO The Hobbit Incomplete?

Описание: If you’ve ever played LEGO The Hobbit, then you may have once completed the final level for The Desolation of Smaug and been excited to defend Lake-Town from the Chiefest and Greatest of Calamities himself only to realize... that the game was over. The Battle of the Five Armies was not included in the game. But that wasn’t always the plan.

0:00 Intro
0:14 DLC Leaked & Announced
0:34 DLC Cancelled
0:45 Explanation: Underperformance at the Box Office
1:01 Explanation: TT Games was Busy

LEGO The Hobbit was originally announced in November of 2013 as an adaptation of only the first two Hobbit films, but, just a few months later, it was reported that a DLC covering the third movie, at the time titled “There & Back Again”, had been revealed at the London Toy Fair and would be launching in December of 2014 alongside the film.

Its existence was later confirmed by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, although without a concrete release date. And then, nothing. It would take until March of 2015, almost a year later, to get any sort of news and, unfortunately, it wasn’t good. In a statement, WB confirmed that there were no plans to develop an expansion based on the Battle of the Five Armies. So what happened?

Well, according to TT Games co-founder Jon Burton, several factors are likely to blame. The first one is that The Battle of the Five Armies hadn’t performed as well as expected. While all films in The Hobbit trilogy had been profitable, each sequel had made less money than its predecessor, a complete reversal of The Lord of the Rings’ box office success.

At the same time, TT Games had several upcoming titles in the works and decided with Warner Bros. that it was simply a better business decision to move on to the next game rather than committing developers to work on a DLC for around six months.

And although Burton himself would have preferred they create at least a single level covering the film’s final battle, it never came to be.


Sources:
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, TT Games and The LEGO Group Set Off on a New Journey to Create “LEGO The Hobbit” - Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, TT Games, LEGO Group, Nov. 25, 2013.
https://web.archive.org/web/202008040...
LEGO Hobbit Videogame to get There & Back Again DLC - Adam (Brick Fanatics), Jan. 1, 2014.
https://web.archive.org/web/201404072...
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, TT Games and The LEGO Group Buddy-up to Launch “LEGO The Hobbit” Videogame - Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment (Warner Bros.), April 8, 2014.
https://web.archive.org/web/202008080...
Warner Bros. Cancels Lego: The Hobbit's Five Armies DLC - Jenna Pitcher (IGN), Mar. 16, 2015.
https://www.ign.com/articles/2015/03/...
GameHut "Extra Life" Stream - Sonic, LEGO Star Wars & Crash Twinsanity! - Jon Burton (GameHut), Nov. 3, 2018.
   • GameHut "Extra Life" Stream - Sonic, LEGO ...  
Box Office History for Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings Movies - The Numbers, n.d.
https://www.the-numbers.com/movies/fr...

Games Featured:
LEGO The Hobbit (2014)

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