This was a competition entry in the Swedish Adventure Game Championship, held by a gaming magazine. Completely finished and coming third place, the game was never actually released anywhere it seems, as apparently it was written just for the competition and never intended for release.
Still – seems like a complete waste of a game not to be enjoyed by many? Hopefully we can find out a bit more about this title soon and see something of it digitally preserved. Maybe the author themselves would be keen to play it again after all these years?
Thanks to Anonymous Contributor, it seems there might be a mix up and this looks to have been a ZX Spectrum game only, which also won first place and not third. See more details at https://www.lysator.liu.se/tolkien-games/entry/sagan-sv.html
The creator therefore would be Peter Tjernström and the game remains unreleased. The article with the winners can be found in the scans section, and was in Swedish magazine Allt om hemdatorer (All about home computers) issue 2/3 1985, page 35.
According to the article, the contest was announced in late 1984 with the following details:
The results of our Swedish Adventure Game Championships contest
First prize
Peter Tjernström in Boden [a city in the north of Sweden] has, on his Spectrum, created an amazing text adventure based on Tolkien’s ”Lord of the rings”. There is a lot to recognize from the book, among other things he has really managed to capture some of the atmosphere, e.g. at the start you see a rider approaching from the distance. If you’ve hidden he’ll ride past you, if not it’s over.The game is the winner due to being exciting as well as entertaining. Another advantage is that the programmer has really succeeded with the feat of getting all the major events of the book in there.
Looks like this a case closed, and you can now find a separate ZX Spectrum entry now here.
Contributions: Fabrizio Bartoloni, Anonymous Contributor
Supporting content
Gallery
