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The Lord of the Rings: The White Council is a role-playing video game currently under development at Electronic Arts Los Angeles. It is based on the Lord of the Rings novels of J.R.R. Tolkien.
Project Gray Company was the game's working title as well as a hint to its nature: "The Grey Company" was a group of Rangers of the North that accompanied Aragorn along the Paths of the Dead in Tolkien's The Return of the King -- and they lend their name to the title of a chapter in Book Five of that work. They are omitted in Peter Jackson’s film version. On July 13, 2006, EA revealed that Project Gray Company was to be in fact a new chapter in EA’s series of videogames inspired by Tolkien’s books and Jackson’s film adaptations.
Initial details were limited about the game, but the official site contained art, pictures of the team working on this game, forums, a wallpaper, and a designer's diary feature (which included, at first, only humorous “behind-the-scenes” videos which purported to share design details but which were “accidentally” out-of-focus or otherwise unintelligible, thereby offering only a tease designed to stoke early fan interest). The website also contained a letter from the game's executive producer Steve Gray:
The action takes place in a massive open world where you can go anywhere you want, and the characters in this world are powered by an incredible simulation AI based on the same technology used by the makers of The Sims 2. The story of the game is built around a series of Story Quests. You can choose to follow specific Story Quests, embark on a range of other types of quests, or set off on your own adventures in the massive open world environment.
Included with the July 13, 2006 announcement was the information that since EA continues to hold the game development license to both Tolkien’s books and the New Line film trilogy, the game will be based on both, like The Battle for Middle-earth II. Players can choose to play as either a Man, a Dwarf, an Elf or a Hobbit. The ultimate aim of the game is to become an hero allied with the influential group in the game's title, the White Council. The game is expected to be released in Q2 2007 and will be available for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC.
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