Gollum isn’t an obvious choice for a videogame lead character. Partly this is because he doesn’t feature in Tolkien’s books as heavily as several other characters, and partly because, well, he looks like a cross between Elon Musk and a haddock. Yet here we are and, much like the twisted creature himself, the game is unpleasant and constantly fighting with itself.
This is not, as we shall soon explain, a good game. The tragedy of this truth is that Gollum himself is, in fact, wonderful. Everything about him here – the design, the animation, the writing, the acting –
