“We’re concentrating on the character of Gollum, and we’re telling his story before we learn about what happens to him in the books,” Daedalic CEO Carsten Fichtelmann told PC Gamer in 2019. “We’re looking for ways to tell stories that haven’t been shown in the movies. We’ll tell the story of a character we’re familiar with, but not repeating what you already know.”

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The Lord of the Rings: Gollum joins a growing number of high-profile games that have had their 2021 release dates extended. Kerbal Space Program 2 was pushed back to 2022 last November after missing its original fall 2020 release window. More recently, Hogwarts Legacy and Riders Republic also received substantial delays.

No specific reasons were provided for any of these setbacks, but after the hell year that was 2020, it’s understandable that game development might be in a precarious position industry-wide.