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We recently got our hands on the new story-driven Lord of the Rings card game and visited its creators, Fantasy Flight Interactive, at their Paris-based studio. After playing a few hands we were able to sit down with Tim Gerritsen, who explained to us how they've looked to make the game accessible for people who might not be familiar with the tabletop game upon which their title is based.

"We tried to make it much more accessible, so if you have never played the tabletop game, you'll be able to dive into this pretty quickly," the studio director explained to us. "The strategies are very unique, very different from the tabletop game. But if you've played other card games, I think that you'll easily understand how it works if you've played Gwent or Elder Scrolls [Legends] or Hearthstone or Magic: The Gathering. A lot of the concepts are similar."

"I think that we've focused on a different tactical depth within both the deck building and the play than in those games," Gerritsen went on. "But I think if you're a fan of card games in general and you've never even seen the tabletop game, you'll still be able to dive into this pretty quickly. It's one of the big changes from the tabletop card game; I think that the tabletop game is harder to start, it's hard to dive into. Once you get into it and understand it there is a lot of depth there and the community who plays this game is really strong and really love the game and has been part of its longevity, but we want casual players who are playing online to basically be able to get into the game and understand it right after that."

The Lords of the Rings: Living Card Game is heading to Steam Early Access in Q1, 2018.