Private Division announces Tales of the Shire for later this year

Private Division today dropped a trailer for an upcoming cozy game: Tales of the Shire: A Lord of the Rings Game. Weta Workshop Game Studio, the game-focused branch of the company that worked on the previous Lord of the Rings film trilogy, developed the title. Private Division, the publisher, announced plans to launch the new game in the second half of the year on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch and Steam.

The game takes place, as the name suggests, in the Shire, the home of the Hobbits in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth. Players create a Hobbit who lives in the village of Bywater, and whom they can customize as they please. They can then live out the idyllic life of a Hobbit — decorating their subterranean Hobbit homes, cooking up a plenitude of meals, gardening, farming and fishing. They’ll also be able to make friends with fellow Bywater residents, explore the rest of the Shire and help throw the Bywater Festival.