Amazon’s Lord of the Rings MMO On the Brink as Ex-Dev Says You Would Have Loved It Amid Thousands of Layoffs

Amazon just gave New World a sunset date, and now the company may have quietly iced its other big fantasy swing too: that Lord of the Rings MMO it had been building. None of this is official-official yet, but the smoke signals are hard to miss.

The situation at a glance

• Yesterday, Amazon said its four-year-old fantasy MMO New World is winding down, with no future DLC or updates planned.
• Shortly after, layoffs hit Amazon Games. Among those let go was senior gameplay engineer Ashleigh Amrine, who said they were on New World and the in-development Lord of the Rings project.
• Amrine called the LOTR game a fledgling project and added: y'all would have loved it.
• Amazon had previously kept the LOTR MMO close to the vest, only saying last year that it was early and the team was still trying to find the hook.
• Amazon Games boss Christoph Hartmann in 2024: It is still early. It is a big IP, it is a big game.

The LinkedIn post that set off alarms

Amrine did not come out and declare the LOTR MMO dead, but their note reads like a farewell to a project that will not see daylight. The most telling lines:

This morning I was part of the layoffs at Amazon Games, alongside my incredibly talented peers on New World and our fledgling Lord of the Rings game.

Y'all would have loved it.

They also praised the team, calling the group one of the most skilled, creative, and kind they have worked with, and signed off with a simple: it has been an honor to build alongside you. If there is a future for this MMO, it sounds dim.

Where the LOTR MMO actually was

This one was always a bit of a black box. Even last year, Amazon was describing it as early days and, to use their words, still trying to find the hook. Translation: big license, big ambition, but the creative core was not locked yet. Hartmann summed it up in 2024 with two tidy lines:

It is still early. It is a big IP, it is a big game.

We still do not know how far along it got, how playable it was, or whether any of that work will continue anywhere inside Amazon.

Meanwhile, New World is bowing out

New World is entering its endgame with no further updates coming. The team even left a parting note to players, the kind that stings if you sunk hundreds of hours in: 'Thank you for so many stories.' Not subtle, and not easy.

So is the LOTR MMO actually canceled?

There is no formal cancellation announcement. But when a developer on the project says the team was caught up in layoffs and talks about the game in the past tense, that is not exactly a confidence builder. The reality right now: the status is unknown, and optimism would be brave.

GamesRadar+ said it asked Amazon Games for comment. If anything concrete changes, we will all hear about it fast. Until then, consider expectations managed. And if you are still roaming Middle-earth in The Lord of the Rings Online as it enters year 18, you already know: there is only so much to do in one world, even a very good one.