Amazon Canceled Lord of the Rings MMO, Plans New Middle-earth Game

Amazon has reportedly canceled its highly anticipated Lord of the Rings MMORPG, according to multiple industry sources. The decision follows significant layoffs within Amazon Games last October, which impacted development teams across the Irvine and San Diego offices.

While Jeff Gattis, Amazon's head of games, did not explicitly confirm the MMO's cancellation, his statement to IGN suggests a pivot in direction. "Our creative team continues to explore a compelling new game experience that does justice to Tolkien's world; we are working closely with Middle-earth Enterprises and remain excited about the IP," Gattis said.

This marks the second major setback for Amazon's Middle-earth gaming ambitions. The original MMO was announced in 2019 in partnership with Leyou Technologies, only to be terminated after Tencent acquired Leyou in 2020. In 2023, Amazon formed a new partnership with Embracer Group, which owns Middle-earth Enterprises, to revisit the project.

Development was spearheaded by Amazon Games Orange County, the studio behind New World. According to GamesIndustry.biz, approximately 1,000 developers had transitioned from New World to the Lord of the Rings venture before the layoffs hit. The project was reportedly in pre-production when the cuts occurred.

An internal memorandum from Steve Boom, Amazon's vice president of audio and games, indicated the layoffs were tied to halting a substantial volume of first-party MMO projects. Sources cited a preemptive AI initiative named Project Trident as a factor in the staffing reductions, though Gattis refuted claims that artificial intelligence drove the cuts.

"Great games are made by talented people and we think AI should expand what's possible," Gattis stated. "We remain focused on using these technologies thoughtfully and responsibly, always guided by the creativity and judgment of our teams." (The disconnect between internal AI mandates and public messaging is a familiar dance in tech, frankly.)

The physical reality of this cancellation is stark for developers. Imagine spending months transitioning from one project to another, only to find your new assignment terminated before you've even touched the code. The friction of that experience—empty desks, deleted Slack channels, the quiet hum of servers powering down—speaks volumes about the volatility of live-service development.

Embracer Group's acquisition of the Lord of the Rings rights in August 2022 came with ambitious plans to turn the franchise into "one of the biggest gaming franchises in the world." The company has since released Moria and a Hobbit Shire game, but the MMO cancellation represents a significant blow to those expansion goals.

What remains unclear is what "new game experience" Amazon is developing. Speculation points to a rumored single-player RPG from Warhorse Studios, the developer behind Kingdom Come: Deliverance, which is owned by Embracer. This would represent a strategic shift from the endless grind of MMOs to a more contained, narrative-driven experience.

Whether Amazon can deliver a Middle-earth game that satisfies both Tolkien purists and mainstream gamers remains the real question. The franchise has a checkered history in gaming, with Shadow of Mordor standing as one of the few unanimous hits in two decades.

Time will tell if this pivot saves the IP or if it's just another coat of paint on a rusted gate.

Artūras Malašauskas is an AI Systems Integrator with 20+ years of production-grade web engineering experience. He has designed, shipped, and scaled enterprise Python/PHP systems for logistics, SaaS, and public-sector clients. For the past year, he has focused exclusively on AI integrations: deploying open-source LLMs, building generative media pipelines (image, audio, video), and engineering multi-agent workflows for real production environments. His standard: reproducibility, security, cost-efficient inference—no vaporware. He documents and evaluates emerging AI tooling, separating verified capabilities from marketing noise. Technical editor at: muza-ai.eu, ai-verslas.lt, ai-naujinos.lt Connect on LinkedIn